Three Essays on the Italian Labour Market: The Measurement of Unemployment, The Determinants of Registration at the Public Employment Agencies, and The Gap between Subjective and Objective Position of Immigrants

The first chapter of this dissertation addresses the measurement of unemployment in the Italian regional context. Specifically, retrieving data from Tuscany, we compare the picture of unemployment that emerges by exploring official data and administrative records over the period after the burst of the Great Recession. Consistently with previous findings, we find that registered unemployment is higher, more persistent and more concentrated on women than its official measure. Nevertheless, we show that the cyclical behaviour of registered job seekers is similar to the one of official job seekers. Moreover, we provide a way to reconcile the two measures of unemployment. Thereafter, we develop a model that provides a rationale for the coexistence of official and registered job seekers and we explore how it reacts to productivity shocks and its policy implications. Finally, we offer some insights about the desirability of an integrated use of these data. The second chapter investigates some issues related to the measure of unemployment by using microdata from the Italian labour force survey. First, by cross-checking registered individuals in public employment agencies and official unemployment, I show that only 50% of the formers are unemployed according to official criteria. Moreover, I analyse some of the reasons that lie behind the heterogeneity between official and registered unemployment with a special focus on the determinants of the decision to register in public employment agency to search for work. By using a probability model, I show that the eligibility for unemployment benefits and the participation to vocational training programs substantially affect the decision to register. Finally, the third chapter investigates the matter of that immigrant population report relatively higher levels of perceived income and job satisfaction even though their situation in the labour market tends to be worse than that of natives. The investigation is in two steps using a large sample of workers from the Italian Labour Force Survey. First, the determinants of objective labour market position and subjective work perceptions are assessed separately, particularly from the perspective of gender and migration status but also taking into account other personal characteristics of workers and labour market variables. Second, this paper estimates the gap between subjective work perceptions and objective work status, breaking it down by various dimensions. Results indicate that female immigrants and immigrants from developing countries report higher income and job satisfaction than natives when considering the actual job position.