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Papers by Giuseppe Travaglini

Research paper thumbnail of Energy efficiency: measurement and impacts

Research paper thumbnail of Irreversibility and Interest Rates

The literature on irreversible investment fails to explore the relationship between the present v... more The literature on irreversible investment fails to explore the relationship between the present value of alternative strategies and appropriate risk-adjusted interest rates. We attempt to fill this gap by showing that, to avoid arbitrage opportunities, the real option's rate must be higher than the rate of the immediate strategy. Further, we explain how irreversibility influences the risk-return combination of competing strategies acting as a pure risk factor.

Research paper thumbnail of The productivity slowdown puzzle of European countries: a focus on Italy

With the end of the Twentieth century and the beginning of the new millennium many European count... more With the end of the Twentieth century and the beginning of the new millennium many European countries, especially those of the Southern Europe, experienced a structural economic change. The slowdown of the GDP growth rate, the deterioration of labor productivity, total factor productivity and investments are all common facts. In this paper we use the growth accounting to measure the contribution of different sources to economic growth in some European countries and in U.S.. We attempt to disentangle the determinants of the European slowdown during the Great Recession, with a special focus on Italy. The analysis suggests that the productivity.

Research paper thumbnail of La regolamentazione del sistema bancario dopo la crisi

Il presente articolo mira a descrivere le principali novita intercorse negli anni recenti nella r... more Il presente articolo mira a descrivere le principali novita intercorse negli anni recenti nella regolamentazione del sistema bancario internazionale, ripercorrendo le fasi principali della crisi finanziaria del 2007-2008 e della crisi dei debiti sovrani del 2010-2011, il loro impatto sulla tenuta del sistema bancario internazionale e le principali proposte di riforma del sistema bancario che si sono originate in risposta alle crisi: (i) le riforme strutturali e il dibattito su tra banca universale e banca ristretta, (ii) i nuovi vincoli patrimoniali delle banche introdotti dalla agenda di Pittsburgh, (iii) la normativa in materia di resolution . Infine, si discutono le principali riforme in termini di vigilanza bancaria.

Research paper thumbnail of The construction industry in Italy: crisis and opportunities over the last decade

This paper presents a map of the great transformations of the Italian construction sector that to... more This paper presents a map of the great transformations of the Italian construction sector that took place in the last decade. The paper is divided into two parts. The first one reconstructs the macroeconomic transformations of this sector by means of data provided by Istat. The second one has a microeconomic content and analyzes the AIDA balance sheet data of companies acting in the construction sector. Data shows an overall recessional dynamics up to 2013, with some recent signs of rebound but still to consolidate. Active policies in the labor market and subsidies for investments in environmental sustainable construction, and building improvement schemes seem to be the most desirable measures to relaunch the sector.

Research paper thumbnail of Notes on consumption theory

Research paper thumbnail of The Mezzogiorno in the Italian economy over the last twenty years: productivity, accumulation and divergence

In this paper we shed lights on the economic growth of Mezzogiorno of Italy during the last twent... more In this paper we shed lights on the economic growth of Mezzogiorno of Italy during the last twenty years. The empirical analyses refer to various aspects of the Mezzogiorno economy: income per capita, labor productivity, public and private accumulation and competitiveness. The main contribution of this paper is to provide a key to explain the actual weackness of Mezzogiorno. More precisely, we argue that the effectiveness of regional policies has been affected by national legal rules that have had different effects across regions. In addition, the effectiveness of regional policies has been diminished by attributing importance to regional governments as control centres of public intervention.

Research paper thumbnail of Il concetto di mercato efficiente nella teoria economica

Research paper thumbnail of Note sulla teoria del consumo

This is a short survey on consumption theory. Consumption is important to both fluctuation and gr... more This is a short survey on consumption theory. Consumption is important to both fluctuation and growth. In addition, consumption introduces some important issues involving financial markets and portfolio decisions. We will describe consumption decisions in a dynamic context. Uncertainty about income and interest rates are introduce in the second part of the paper. The interaction between consumption decisions and portfolio choice is investigated in the third part of the paper.

Research paper thumbnail of Investment, Financing Constraints and the Euler Equation

In what follows, we show that financing constraints affects firm's investment decisions befor... more In what follows, we show that financing constraints affects firm's investment decisions before the constraints is binding. This occurs because the firm anticipates at the current time the future bound. We argue that, even with imperfect capital markets, investment policy must be such that there are no arbitrage opportunities at any time. Contrary to the usual "expectations view", this forward looking behavior guarantees the respect of the Euler quation even when the restriction is binding, that is the optimality of the constrained investment decisions.

Research paper thumbnail of Riforme senza politica industriale: l'Italia negli ultimi venti anni

Research paper thumbnail of Impact and nature of irreversibility and uncertainty on firms' investment decisions: a survey in italian manufacturing industry

Research paper thumbnail of Sources of productivity growth in Italian energy sector: A structural vector autoregressive approch

By using a vector autoregressive model, this paper decomposes labor productivity of the Italian e... more By using a vector autoregressive model, this paper decomposes labor productivity of the Italian energy sector, into technological and non technological shocks. We take the innovative approach to use economic theory, about long-run impacts of di¤erent shocks, to identify the empirical model, and to measure the labor productivity response to each shock, separately. The key identifying restriction is that the level of productivity is determined in the long-run by shocks to technology. We …nd that: (1) productivity responds positively to technological shocks, leading to a transition from one equilibrium to another; (2) capital accumulation shows a persistent decline in response to a positive technological shock, revealing that, in energy sector, technology and capital stock are substitutes. Yet, non technological shocks play a minor and transitory role in explaining productivity change. Results show that shocks that move the productivity at business cycle frequencies may also a¤ect the ...

Research paper thumbnail of Optimal capital stock and financing constraints

In this paper we show that financing constraints affect the optimal level of capital stock even w... more In this paper we show that financing constraints affect the optimal level of capital stock even when the financing constraint is ineffective. This happens when the firm rationally anticipates that access to external financing resources may be rationed in the future. We will show that with these expectations, the optimal investment policy is to invest less in any given period, thereby lowering the desired optimal capital stock in the long run.

Research paper thumbnail of Technology transfer with search intensity and project advertising

The Journal of Technology Transfer

In this paper we present a model where technology transfer is embedded into a competitive model o... more In this paper we present a model where technology transfer is embedded into a competitive model of utility and profit maximization and is the result of a matching process between heterogeneous Knowledge Transfer Offices (KTOs) and innovative firms. Our model improves on previous literature by endogenizing the process that drives the dynamics of university researchers in search and firm vacant projects. We are able to show that the KTOs' reservation fee rate must be greater than the ratio between the marginal researcher cost and the marginal utility of matched projects, and that technology transfer strictly depends on the efficiency units of searching researchers and vacant projects. Further, we show that firm technological progress might be too low when KTOs too much intensively search for project matches. This occurs because both sides of the market ignore the externalities of their decisions. Finally, behavioral complementarity, substitutability, and free riding are all potential equilibrium outcomes.

Research paper thumbnail of Enter titleIndagine sul reddito delle famiglie italiane vulnerabili in relazione al fenomeno della fuel poverty e agli strumenti di efficienza energetica

Research paper thumbnail of The productivity slowdown puzzle of European countries: a focus on Italy

With the end of the twentieth century and the beginning of the new millennium in many European co... more With the end of the twentieth century and the beginning of the new millennium in many European countries, and especially those of the Southern Europe, a structural change in the way the economy grows took place. In this essay we use the growth accounting methodology to measure the contribution of different factors to economic growth in some European countries and in the U.S. and to isolate the determinants of the European slowdown during the Great Recession. The focus on Italy suggests that the slowdown of the Italian economy is structural and affects both the non-ICT and ICT sectors.

Research paper thumbnail of Macrodynamic Modeling of Innovation Equilibria and Traps

The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics

We study the interplay between the decision of firms to innovate and human capital. Based on a dy... more We study the interplay between the decision of firms to innovate and human capital. Based on a dynamic evolutionary model, we show that in the presence of a high stock of human capital, an advanced economy can remain caught in an “innovation trap”. Following the literature on endogenous growth, R&D investments and human capital are modeled as strategic complements. Skilled workers increase productivity and enjoy a wage premium if they are employed in the R&D sector, while they receive the same wage as unskilled workers if they are employed in the production sector. We model the evolutionary dynamics of the share of innovative firms and human capital to determine the conditions under which an economy converges to a high, low or mixed state of innovation.

Research paper thumbnail of A Schumpeterian model of investment and innovation with labor market regulation

Economics of Innovation and New Technology

Research paper thumbnail of The Productivity Gap Among Major European Countries, USA and Japan

Italian Economic Journal

This paper analyzes Total Factor Productivity (TFP) in five European countries (France, Germany, ... more This paper analyzes Total Factor Productivity (TFP) in five European countries (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and UK), the USA and Japan between 1954 and 2017. It uses the common trend– common cycle (CTCC) approach to decompose series in trends and cycles. We find that the seven economies are structurally different and differently affected by similar shocks. We show that trend and cycle innovations are, in most of the cases, negatively correlated as predicted by the ‘opportunity cost’ approach to productivity growth, and that trend innovations are larger than cycle innovations. We provide an interpretation for countries’ differences in TFP performance in recent years that is related to the so-called ‘deep’ determinants in growth literature, such as the presence of efficient markets and institutions. Finally, we present a comparison with the traditional Hodrick and Prescott deterministic filter to highlight the advantages of CTCC methodology that does not require a priori on the nat...

Research paper thumbnail of Energy efficiency: measurement and impacts

Research paper thumbnail of Irreversibility and Interest Rates

The literature on irreversible investment fails to explore the relationship between the present v... more The literature on irreversible investment fails to explore the relationship between the present value of alternative strategies and appropriate risk-adjusted interest rates. We attempt to fill this gap by showing that, to avoid arbitrage opportunities, the real option's rate must be higher than the rate of the immediate strategy. Further, we explain how irreversibility influences the risk-return combination of competing strategies acting as a pure risk factor.

Research paper thumbnail of The productivity slowdown puzzle of European countries: a focus on Italy

With the end of the Twentieth century and the beginning of the new millennium many European count... more With the end of the Twentieth century and the beginning of the new millennium many European countries, especially those of the Southern Europe, experienced a structural economic change. The slowdown of the GDP growth rate, the deterioration of labor productivity, total factor productivity and investments are all common facts. In this paper we use the growth accounting to measure the contribution of different sources to economic growth in some European countries and in U.S.. We attempt to disentangle the determinants of the European slowdown during the Great Recession, with a special focus on Italy. The analysis suggests that the productivity.

Research paper thumbnail of La regolamentazione del sistema bancario dopo la crisi

Il presente articolo mira a descrivere le principali novita intercorse negli anni recenti nella r... more Il presente articolo mira a descrivere le principali novita intercorse negli anni recenti nella regolamentazione del sistema bancario internazionale, ripercorrendo le fasi principali della crisi finanziaria del 2007-2008 e della crisi dei debiti sovrani del 2010-2011, il loro impatto sulla tenuta del sistema bancario internazionale e le principali proposte di riforma del sistema bancario che si sono originate in risposta alle crisi: (i) le riforme strutturali e il dibattito su tra banca universale e banca ristretta, (ii) i nuovi vincoli patrimoniali delle banche introdotti dalla agenda di Pittsburgh, (iii) la normativa in materia di resolution . Infine, si discutono le principali riforme in termini di vigilanza bancaria.

Research paper thumbnail of The construction industry in Italy: crisis and opportunities over the last decade

This paper presents a map of the great transformations of the Italian construction sector that to... more This paper presents a map of the great transformations of the Italian construction sector that took place in the last decade. The paper is divided into two parts. The first one reconstructs the macroeconomic transformations of this sector by means of data provided by Istat. The second one has a microeconomic content and analyzes the AIDA balance sheet data of companies acting in the construction sector. Data shows an overall recessional dynamics up to 2013, with some recent signs of rebound but still to consolidate. Active policies in the labor market and subsidies for investments in environmental sustainable construction, and building improvement schemes seem to be the most desirable measures to relaunch the sector.

Research paper thumbnail of Notes on consumption theory

Research paper thumbnail of The Mezzogiorno in the Italian economy over the last twenty years: productivity, accumulation and divergence

In this paper we shed lights on the economic growth of Mezzogiorno of Italy during the last twent... more In this paper we shed lights on the economic growth of Mezzogiorno of Italy during the last twenty years. The empirical analyses refer to various aspects of the Mezzogiorno economy: income per capita, labor productivity, public and private accumulation and competitiveness. The main contribution of this paper is to provide a key to explain the actual weackness of Mezzogiorno. More precisely, we argue that the effectiveness of regional policies has been affected by national legal rules that have had different effects across regions. In addition, the effectiveness of regional policies has been diminished by attributing importance to regional governments as control centres of public intervention.

Research paper thumbnail of Il concetto di mercato efficiente nella teoria economica

Research paper thumbnail of Note sulla teoria del consumo

This is a short survey on consumption theory. Consumption is important to both fluctuation and gr... more This is a short survey on consumption theory. Consumption is important to both fluctuation and growth. In addition, consumption introduces some important issues involving financial markets and portfolio decisions. We will describe consumption decisions in a dynamic context. Uncertainty about income and interest rates are introduce in the second part of the paper. The interaction between consumption decisions and portfolio choice is investigated in the third part of the paper.

Research paper thumbnail of Investment, Financing Constraints and the Euler Equation

In what follows, we show that financing constraints affects firm's investment decisions befor... more In what follows, we show that financing constraints affects firm's investment decisions before the constraints is binding. This occurs because the firm anticipates at the current time the future bound. We argue that, even with imperfect capital markets, investment policy must be such that there are no arbitrage opportunities at any time. Contrary to the usual "expectations view", this forward looking behavior guarantees the respect of the Euler quation even when the restriction is binding, that is the optimality of the constrained investment decisions.

Research paper thumbnail of Riforme senza politica industriale: l'Italia negli ultimi venti anni

Research paper thumbnail of Impact and nature of irreversibility and uncertainty on firms' investment decisions: a survey in italian manufacturing industry

Research paper thumbnail of Sources of productivity growth in Italian energy sector: A structural vector autoregressive approch

By using a vector autoregressive model, this paper decomposes labor productivity of the Italian e... more By using a vector autoregressive model, this paper decomposes labor productivity of the Italian energy sector, into technological and non technological shocks. We take the innovative approach to use economic theory, about long-run impacts of di¤erent shocks, to identify the empirical model, and to measure the labor productivity response to each shock, separately. The key identifying restriction is that the level of productivity is determined in the long-run by shocks to technology. We …nd that: (1) productivity responds positively to technological shocks, leading to a transition from one equilibrium to another; (2) capital accumulation shows a persistent decline in response to a positive technological shock, revealing that, in energy sector, technology and capital stock are substitutes. Yet, non technological shocks play a minor and transitory role in explaining productivity change. Results show that shocks that move the productivity at business cycle frequencies may also a¤ect the ...

Research paper thumbnail of Optimal capital stock and financing constraints

In this paper we show that financing constraints affect the optimal level of capital stock even w... more In this paper we show that financing constraints affect the optimal level of capital stock even when the financing constraint is ineffective. This happens when the firm rationally anticipates that access to external financing resources may be rationed in the future. We will show that with these expectations, the optimal investment policy is to invest less in any given period, thereby lowering the desired optimal capital stock in the long run.

Research paper thumbnail of Technology transfer with search intensity and project advertising

The Journal of Technology Transfer

In this paper we present a model where technology transfer is embedded into a competitive model o... more In this paper we present a model where technology transfer is embedded into a competitive model of utility and profit maximization and is the result of a matching process between heterogeneous Knowledge Transfer Offices (KTOs) and innovative firms. Our model improves on previous literature by endogenizing the process that drives the dynamics of university researchers in search and firm vacant projects. We are able to show that the KTOs' reservation fee rate must be greater than the ratio between the marginal researcher cost and the marginal utility of matched projects, and that technology transfer strictly depends on the efficiency units of searching researchers and vacant projects. Further, we show that firm technological progress might be too low when KTOs too much intensively search for project matches. This occurs because both sides of the market ignore the externalities of their decisions. Finally, behavioral complementarity, substitutability, and free riding are all potential equilibrium outcomes.

Research paper thumbnail of Enter titleIndagine sul reddito delle famiglie italiane vulnerabili in relazione al fenomeno della fuel poverty e agli strumenti di efficienza energetica

Research paper thumbnail of The productivity slowdown puzzle of European countries: a focus on Italy

With the end of the twentieth century and the beginning of the new millennium in many European co... more With the end of the twentieth century and the beginning of the new millennium in many European countries, and especially those of the Southern Europe, a structural change in the way the economy grows took place. In this essay we use the growth accounting methodology to measure the contribution of different factors to economic growth in some European countries and in the U.S. and to isolate the determinants of the European slowdown during the Great Recession. The focus on Italy suggests that the slowdown of the Italian economy is structural and affects both the non-ICT and ICT sectors.

Research paper thumbnail of Macrodynamic Modeling of Innovation Equilibria and Traps

The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics

We study the interplay between the decision of firms to innovate and human capital. Based on a dy... more We study the interplay between the decision of firms to innovate and human capital. Based on a dynamic evolutionary model, we show that in the presence of a high stock of human capital, an advanced economy can remain caught in an “innovation trap”. Following the literature on endogenous growth, R&D investments and human capital are modeled as strategic complements. Skilled workers increase productivity and enjoy a wage premium if they are employed in the R&D sector, while they receive the same wage as unskilled workers if they are employed in the production sector. We model the evolutionary dynamics of the share of innovative firms and human capital to determine the conditions under which an economy converges to a high, low or mixed state of innovation.

Research paper thumbnail of A Schumpeterian model of investment and innovation with labor market regulation

Economics of Innovation and New Technology

Research paper thumbnail of The Productivity Gap Among Major European Countries, USA and Japan

Italian Economic Journal

This paper analyzes Total Factor Productivity (TFP) in five European countries (France, Germany, ... more This paper analyzes Total Factor Productivity (TFP) in five European countries (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and UK), the USA and Japan between 1954 and 2017. It uses the common trend– common cycle (CTCC) approach to decompose series in trends and cycles. We find that the seven economies are structurally different and differently affected by similar shocks. We show that trend and cycle innovations are, in most of the cases, negatively correlated as predicted by the ‘opportunity cost’ approach to productivity growth, and that trend innovations are larger than cycle innovations. We provide an interpretation for countries’ differences in TFP performance in recent years that is related to the so-called ‘deep’ determinants in growth literature, such as the presence of efficient markets and institutions. Finally, we present a comparison with the traditional Hodrick and Prescott deterministic filter to highlight the advantages of CTCC methodology that does not require a priori on the nat...