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ABSTRACT This research note presents and compares some first findings obtained by the project EINITE-Economic Inequality across Italy and Europe, 1300-1800. The main aim of the project is to investigate long-term trends in economic inequality in Italy and in Europe. Here we compare previously published data for Piedmont with some early findings for Lombardy and Veneto, in order to provide a broad picture of northern Italian inequality. The period we cover is particularly long (13th–early 19th centuries) for Piedmont, while for Lombardy and Veneto a somewhat shorter period is considered (15th–18th centuries). We provide an in-depth analysis of the archival sources usable to study long-term changes in economic inequality in northern Italy, and we provide some key measures of inequality over time (Gini indexes, top percentiles). We find evidence of a tendency for Italian inequality to increase almost everywhere and almost continuously over time, since about 1400 or 1450, confirming what has been suggested by previous studies that focused on Piedmont and Tuscany.

Public procurement outcomes depend on the ability of the procuring agency to select well-performing suppliers. Should public administrations be granted more or less discretion in their decision making? Using Italian data on municipal public works tendered in the period 2009-2013, we study how a reform extending the scope of bureaucrat discretion affects supplier selection. We find that the share of contracts awarded to politically connected firms increases while the (ex-ante) labor productivity of the winning firm decreases, thus suggesting a potential misallocation of the public funds. These effects are concentrated among lower quality procuring agencies.

This paper presents measures of differential mortality in Italy by educational level. The results refer to the year 2001 because the census is the only source providing data about population by level of education; as to deaths the data are provided by death certificates. As often happens, in order to compute differential mortality using these period frequencies it was necessary to confront problems both in the use of unlinked records and in relation to limitations in statistical documents; that is why we classified the population in only two groups: one with a low level of education and the other with a high level. We used a logit relational method to build life tables according to the levels of education. Particular attention was given to expectation of life at the ages from 35 to 65. At 35 years of age the expectation of life for a person with a low level of education is about 7.5 years less than for a person of a higher level in case of a male, and 6.5 years less in case of a female. The tendency continues, and at the age of 65 the expectation for those with a lower level is one quarter less in case of males and one fifth less in case of females. We found that a linear relationship exists between life expectancy and standardized rates among the Italian provinces; the same relation is also true for the analogous indicators of differential mortality by educational level.