The last decade has seen significant increases in consumer indebtedness in western countries, causing concern about its economic and social impact. In particular, over-indebtedness is attracting attention from national and international authorities because of its potential effect on both the...

This paper deals with optimal international portfolio choice by developing a latent class approach based on the distinction between international and non-international investors. On the basis of micro data, we analyze the effects of many social, demographic, economic and financial...

In a choice model of risky assets the role of risk aversion is analyzed. The measure of risk preference comes from a direct subjective survey question and it is considered as an imperfect information about the true risk attitude of investors. Misclassification between the true and the observed...

The sample estimates are uniformly below those of the Financial Accounts, even after harmonising all the definitions and the evaluation criteria. Such a problem can stem from the interviewee's unwillingness to disclose the actual value of the asset (under-reporting). The paper presents a method...

This paper investigates the underlying sources of the Italian industrial sector fluctuations. It concentrates in particular on the role of different shocks on the manufacturing business cycle. To this end, it considers both domestic shocks (to hours worked and to technology) and external shocks...

Current account (CA) dispersion within European Union (EU) member states has been increasing progressively since the 1990s. Interestingly, the persistent deficits in many peripheral countries have not been accompanied by a significant growth process able to stimulate a log run rebalancing as...

The paper presents an estimate of the expenditure requirements to be used as a benchmark in the identification of best practices in the spending behavior of the municipalities. In order to distinguish the determinants of theoretical expenditure requirements with respect to those relating to...

This paper examines structural changes in the Italian manufacturing sector, focusing on labour productivity in recent decades. To this end it distinguishes between trend and cyclical movements in the data using a multivariate unobserved components model. Changes in the relative importance of...