Research and policy
Research and policy
Publications and Working papers
The Inverted U-Shaped Relationship between Female Entrepreneurship and Economic Development
with Nava Ashraf (LSE), Alexia Delfino (Bocconi University) and Edward Glaeser (Harvard University). 2025. AEA Papers & Proceedings. NBER Working Paper.
In the World Bank Enterprise Survey, the share of entrepreneurs who are women first rises and then falls with national income, which reverses the well-known U-shaped relationship between female labor force participation and economic development. This paper presents a model of entrepreneurship in which women face disadvantages, including discrimination from workers and household demands on their time, that deter firm formation in the poorest countries. In richer countries, these forces mean that women are less likely to start more complex organizations. In the model, women face the most level playing field in middle-income countries, where the returns to entrepreneurship are high enough to offset gender-based costs and both sexes typically form simple forms. We document three facts that are compatible with the model: male-owned firms are typically much larger than female-owned firms, large firms yield far higher revenues per employee and female-owned firms are more usually in industries with low levels of skilled workers. Despite the entrepreneurship rate’s reversal of the U-shaped link between female labor-force-participation and economic development, female labor-force-participation and the entrepreneurship rate are highly correlated across countries. The female entrepreneurship rate is also strongly associated with female education, weak kinship ties and Buddhism.
with Sara Giunti (University of Milan), Andrea Guariso (Bicocca University) and Mariapia Mendola (Bicocca University). 2024. IZA Discussion Paper. Submitted.
In this paper, we study a short educational program for high-school students aimed at promoting cultural diversity and improving attitudes toward immigration through active learning. To identify the impact of the program, we designed a randomized controlled trial involving 4,500 students from 252 classes across 40 schools in northern Italy. The program led to more positive attitudes and behaviors toward immigrants, especially in more mixed classes. In terms of mechanisms, the intervention reduced students' misperception and changed their perceived norms toward immigration, while it had no impact on implicit bias, empathy, or social contacts. Our findings suggest that anti-immigrant attitudes are primarily driven by sociotropic concerns rather than individual inter-group experience, and that educational programs fostering critical thinking and group discussion in an issue-salient context can correct them.
Trial registration: AEARCTR-0010674
Work in progress
Navigating Informality: Bargaining Practices and Preferences for Domestic Workers in Milan
with Belén Hípola (Bocconi University). Trial registration: AEARCTR-0015856
Bargaining Power in Informal Markets
with Tommaso Crosta (Bocconi University)
Policy reports and publications
6th Migration Observatory Report "Immigrant Integration in Europe"
with Tommaso Frattini (University of Milan). 2022.
We show that women face considerable disadvantages in the labour market. They have a lower employment probability, are employed in less economically rewarding occupations, and earn lower wages than men even when they perform comparable jobs. Such gender inequality is exacerbated for immigrant women, who face labour market penalties over and above those faced by immigrant men.
Research note on the impact of unit non-response rate in the 2020 EU LFS
with Tommaso Frattini (University of Milan). 2022.
According to the European Labour Force Survey (EU LFS), the number of immigrants between 2019 and 2020 has decreased by about 4 million individuals in Europe and by about 3 million in EU14 countries. There are at least two reasons why estimates of the size of the immigrant population obtained from Labour Force Surveys in 2022 may not be correct, which we investigate in this research note: 1) weights may be incorrectly estimated; 2) non-response may have differentially increased among natives than among immigrants.
with Tommaso Frattini (University of Milan), in collaboration with Ferruccio Pastore (Collegio Carlo Alberto), 2022.
In this report we provide an in-depth analysis of part of the interviews conducted with 600 migrants in “situation of protracted displacement” in Greece and Italy within the framework of the TRAFIG (Transnational Figurations of Displacement) research project funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 programme under grant No. 822453 (https://trafig.eu/).
Book chapters