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Abstract. This paper studies the role of the expansion of higher education (HE) in increasing the equality of tertiary education opportunities. We examine Italy's experience during the 1990s, when policy changes prompted HE institutions to offer a wider range of degrees and to open new sites in neighbouring provinces. Our analysis focuses on non-mature full-time students and suggests that HE expansion might have had only limited effects in terms of reducing existing individual . He wishes to thank both institutions for providing him with excellent research facilities. The visit to ECASS was financially supported by the Access to Research Infrastructure action under the European Community's 'Improving Human Potential Programme', which is gratefully acknowledged. We thank Giuliana Matteocci and Alessio Ancaiani from the Ministry for Education for providing us with data on the evolution of the Italian university system and for valuable assistance with its use. We are also grateful to an anonymous referee and to Luigi Cannari, Piero Casadio, Massimo Omiccioli, Carmine Porello, Andrea Presbitero, Alfonso Rosolia, Paolo Sestito, and conference and seminar participants at the Institute for Social and Economic Research (University of Essex, Colchester), the European University Institute (Florence), the University of Milan (Milan), the Marche Polytechnic University (Ancona), the Bank of Italy (Rome), the joint seminar ISFOL-University 'La Sapienza' (Rome), IZA (Bonn), the inequality in HE achievement as it had a significantly positive impact only on the probability of university enrolment but not on that of obtaining a university degree.

The paper examines micro data on Italian manufacturing firms' inventory behaviour to test the Meltzer (1960) hypothesis according to which firms substitute bank credit with trade credit (TC) during money tightening. We find that inventory investment of Italian manufacturing firms is constrained by their availability of TC and that this effect more than doubles during monetary restrictions. As for the magnitude of the substitution effect, however, we find that it is not sizeable. This is in line with the micro theories of TC and the evidence on actual firm practices, according to which credit terms display modest variations over time.

The paper investigates the importance of history for local economic performance in Italy by studying the role of social capital, which refers to trust, reciprocity and habits of co-operation that are shared among members of a local community. The paper presents a test based on worker productivity, entrepreneurship, and female labor market participation. Using as instruments regional differences in civic involvement in the late 19th century and local systems of government in the middle ages, it shows that social capital does have economic effects.

This paper provides an empirical investigation of the advantages accruing to workers in industrial clusters. Using a unique data set based on the Cluster Mapping Project of the Italian National Statistical Institute, we examine whether industry agglomeration leads to wage and labor mobility differentials. We estimate complete Mincerian wage equations, investigating whether returns to seniority and education are a possible source of differentiation. We find that working in an industrial cluster reduces the returns to education, does not affect the returns to seniority, and does not provide average wage premia. On the other hand, industrial agglomeration positively affects the likelihood of being employed, of starting a business, and of making a transition from payroll employment to entrepreneurship; it also increases blue-collar worker mobility across jobs.

The paper uses questions included in the 2010 wave of the Bank of Italy's Survey on Household Income and Wealth to investigate the role of family transmission of values. It presents three main empirical findings. First, the paper shows that a number of attitudes (generalized and personalized trusting behaviour, risk and time preferences) and outcomes (female labour force participation, fertility, entrepreneurship, productivity) are associated with the values received. Second, it documents that values received from parents are correlated with the values transmitted to descendants. Third, by using respondent moving patterns, the paper highlights that values received are slowly changing even after a discontinuity in the reference environment. Comparisons between first-and second-generation movers suggest that what matters for breaking the family chains are the formative years, when young people somehow strike a balance between the values transmitted by their parents and what they experience in the (possibly different) environment where they grow up.

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