Report

2021-05-03 Cecilia Attanasio Ghezzi

Rural China and the Return to Youth

When Xi Jinping officially declared the defeat of poverty last February, the officials assigned to the project were transferred to “rural revitalization,” with the task of dealing with even more complex problems such as depopulation, the ageing of the population, and the chronic lack of work in the internal areas. “China is still the largest developing country in the world,” the deputy propaganda minister Xu Lin stated at the time. And he added: “To face inequality, the inadequate development of the internal areas of the country, and to reduce the imbalance between urban and rural territories, ...

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2021-04-14 Gianmarco Ottaviano

Brexit, Northern Ireland, and the Risks for Trade between the United Kingdom and the EU

What is the price of Brexit, and what has the United Kingdom gained from it? The violence seen in Northern Ireland starting last Good Friday is there to remind us that calculating the costs and benefits of a decision made on the tenuous boundary that separates economics and politics is not only premature, but also very complicated. The reason is that the context is unsettled, and while we begin to take stock of the first months since Brexit, unexpected clouds are forming on the horizon. We will start with what has happened so far to trade between the United Kingdom and the European Union. In January ...

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2021-04-07 Fabrizio Perretti

2021: An Artificial Intelligence Odyssey

When we reflect on artificial intelligence – as we are doing in the Dossier of this issue – it is useful to recall one of the most famous figures in the history of film: HAL in 2001: A Space Odyssey, Stanley Kubrick's masterpiece and cult film. More than an odyssey in space, though, the film tells of a voyage in time – from primitive man to the man of the future – in which intelligence is the true protagonist, and in which HAL (an abbreviation whose letters precede the well-known brand IBM) is more than a computer in a traditional sense, but is the subject that actually controls the spaceship, ...

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2021-03-29 Cecilia Attanasio Ghezzi

The China of the Future

All spiffed up and vaccinated for the most important political event of the year. At the beginning of March, in Beijing, in the Great Hall of the People in Tiananmen Square, approximately three thousand members of the National People's Congress met, the closest thing China has to our parliament. For one week each year, delegates from every part of the country meet in the capital for discussion and closed-door votes, or better, considering the current political system, to learn about and ratify the national legislative measures. This year they had to approve the 14th Five-Year Plan, the direction ...

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2021-03-23 Andrea Beltratti, Alessia Bezzecchi

Seeking Well-being by Measuring Sustainability

Microeconomy teaches us that the theoretical foundations of national accounting, i.e. the known relationship between supply and demand at the aggregate level, are linked to choices made by society aimed at the best management of capital stock and the maximization of long-term well-being. In a functioning economy the use of each resource must be balanced and aimed at the creation of prosperity. Thus, the relevant capital stock must include everything that is useful and necessary for social well-being, meaning human, physical, social, and environmental capital. Without a specific method of measurement, ...

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2021-03-08 Donato Masciandaro

Biden and the Fed: a Bubbly New Deal?

Since January, the Fed has entered a new economic phase: it will have deal with the economic policy actions of Joe Biden, assisted by Janet Yellen. Many expect a "New Deal"; perhaps it is no coincidence that a portrait of Franklin Delano Roosevelt now hangs in the Oval Office, behind the new president. But what are the implications for fiscal and monetary policy? Let us start with the similarities and differences between the situation that the Biden-Powell duo must address and the situation Roosevelt faced ninety years ago. The common element could be the considerable economic recession. In truth, ...

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2021-02-25 Cecilia Attanasio Ghezzi

Chinese Soccer Falls Flat

It seems that Suning intends to sell Jiangsu, the team that won the Chinese soccer championship last season. And it is certainly seeking funding to deal with the liquidity problems of Inter, it's European crown jewel. The move appears to be part of a plan to divest from "non-relevant" activities implemented by the Nanjing giant Suning.com after the financial problems linked to the pandemic and the invitation from the central government to block investments abroad by Chinese companies. In 2017, there were 20 European clubs in the hands of Chinese investors; today, that number is less than 10, and ...

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2021-02-23 Veronica Vecchi, Manuela Brusoni

Public Procurement as a Driver of Economic Growth

In the coming months, Italy will begin to benefit from a considerable volume of resources, in the context of both the Next Generation EU and the new cohesion policy pushed by Prime Minister Mario Draghi. This is an opportunity that the country and its public administration have the duty to exploit productively, to sustain the society and the economy. Using these resources well implies not only selecting priorities and making plans, but also using purchasing tools and logics differently, an area that has always been considered a "minefield" by most of the personnel in the PA. In recent years, purchases ...

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2021-02-22 Paola Dubini

An Industrial Plan for Culture?

With the inauguration of the new government led by Mario Draghi, attention now turns to the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR),[1] the document that will guide the allocation of public resources in the coming years, and that – in terms of quantity of resources and speed of effort – is destined to have a very significant impact on the growth model pursued by our country. The Prime Minister's reference to Italy as a "cultural great power," and the role of culture not simply in terms of attracting tourists but of a "humanistic heritage of our identity recognized at the international ...

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2021-02-22 Cesare Conti

Towards an Advanced Approach to Enterprise Risk Management

A recent position paper published by the Italian Association of Financial Industry Risk Managers (AIFIRM) in collaboration with PwC demonstrates the presence of an evolved best practice on the subject of Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) in non-financial companies,[1] i.e. of a best practice strictly integrated with ESG policies (environmental, social, and governance factors), with the purpose and performance of businesses. However, unfortunately, the indicators on the spread of that best practice are not comforting, and not only in Italy, to tell the truth.[2] The spread certainly depends on the ...

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