I am an applied economist, working on topics in political economy, public economics, the economics of migration, and applied econometrics. I work at the UB School of Economics and the Institut d’Economia de Barcelona (IEB), University of Barcelona.

Matteo Gamalerio
Download
CV
My article on
Lavoce.info
Nada es Gratis
Skype
matteo.gamalerio
Email
IEB page
http://ieb.ub.edu/en/researcher/gamalerio-matteo/
Twitter
@matteogamalerio
Song of the month
Alvvays - Archie, Marry Me
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

published papers

Jun 2022

Dismantling the “Jungle”: Migrant Relocation and Extreme Voting in France. Political Science Research and Methods, Volume 11, Issue 1.

with

P. Vertier and M. Viskanic

Media coverage

Lavoce.info 

Nada es gratis

El Periodico

Tiriamo a Campari

 

links

PSRM

SSRN

IPL working paper series

Large migrant inflows have spurred anti-immigrant sentiment, but can small inflows have a different impact? We exploit the redistribution of migrants after the dismantling of the "Calais Jungle" in France to study the impact...
More
Large migrant inflows have spurred anti-immigrant sentiment, but can small inflows have a different impact? We exploit the redistribution of migrants after the dismantling of the "Calais Jungle" in France to study the impact of the exposure to few migrants, which we estimate using difference-in-differences and instrumental variables. We find that in the presence of a migrant center (CAO), the growth rate of vote shares for the main far-right party (Front National (FN), our proxy for antiimmigrant sentiment) between 2012 and 2017 is reduced by about 12 percentage points. This effect, which crucially depends on the inflow’s size, points towards the contact hypothesis (Allport, 1954).
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
Feb 2020

Manager or professional politician? Local fiscal autonomy and the skills of elected officials. Regional Science and Urban Economics, Volume 83, July 2020.

With

M. Bordignon and G. Turati

media coverage

otto e mezzo, la7

lavoce.info

LINKS

RSUE

SSRN

We provide a theoretical and empirical assessment of why local fiscal autonomy can affect the skills of elected officials in sub-national governments. We first develop a model of politics with different types of politicians and show that -- following...
More
We provide a theoretical and empirical assessment of why local fiscal autonomy can affect the skills of elected officials in sub-national governments. We first develop a model of politics with different types of politicians and show that -- following a tax decentralization reform increasing local fiscal autonomy -- politicians with high administrative skills are elected in rich jurisdictions while politicians with high political skills are elected in poor ones. As a result, voter welfare increases only, or mainly, in rich jurisdictions. We then look for empirical support to these predictions by exploiting the decentralization reforms affecting Italian municipalities in the '90s. These reforms introduced both the direct election of the mayor and new autonomous tax tools for municipalities characterized by large differences in their tax bases. Our estimates -- robust to several alternative stories -- emphasize a differential change in elected officials at the municipal level between rich and poor jurisdictions. These findings provide a new explanation for the observed poor performance of local governments largely financed by grants.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
Jan 2020

Do national political parties matter? Evidence from Italian municipalities. European Journal of Political Economy, Volume 63, June 2020.

LINKS

EJPE

SSRN

Recently several countries have experienced a drop in popularity of national political parties, accompanied by the success of independent movements (e.g. “Civic Lists” in Italy). I exploit the success of “Civic Lists” in Italian municipalitie...
More
Recently several countries have experienced a drop in popularity of national political parties, accompanied by the success of independent movements (e.g. “Civic Lists” in Italy). I exploit the success of “Civic Lists” in Italian municipalities and use them as a comparison group for party-affiliated politicians, to test whether national parties affect fiscal discipline. Using a Regression Discontinuity Design (RDD), I show that party-affiliated mayors are more fiscally responsible: they run lower deficits, accumulate less debt and reduce expenditures. The effect is significant only for municipalities not constrained by fiscal rules. This suggests that national parties act as a substitute for fiscal rules in constraining politicians. Besides, I provide evidence that the discipline of party-affiliated politicians is linked to better career prospects: party-affiliated mayors have a higher probability of being re-elected and better chances of being promoted to higher levels of government. Alternative stories find less support in the data.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser

working papers

Jan 2023

Is Populism reversible? Evidence from Italian local elections during the pandemic [submitted]

with

M. Bordignon and F. Franzoni

links

SSRN

We study the effect of economic insecurity on electoral outcomes using data on municipal elections in Italy. We implement a difference-in-differences approach that exploits exogenous variation across municipalities in the sh...
More
We study the effect of economic insecurity on electoral outcomes using data on municipal elections in Italy. We implement a difference-in-differences approach that exploits exogenous variation across municipalities in the share of inactive workers due to the economic lockdown introduced by the central government to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic. We show that lockdown-induced economic insecurity positively affected the electoral performance of progressive and left-wing parties, while it negatively affected conservative and far-right parties. Conversely, we find no effect for the populist Five Star Movement, local independent parties (i.e., Civic Lists), and electoral turnout. We provide evidence that extraordinary economic measures introduced by the central government to compensate workers for the economic insecurity can explain this shift in partisanship toward the left and the increasing support for pro-EU parties, away from euro-skeptic and populist forces.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
Dec 2022

Not welcome anymore: the effect of electoral incentives on the reception of refugees [Accepted for publication Journal of Economic Geography]

with

M. Negri

media coverage

lavoce.info

LINKS

SSRN

Do electoral incentives affect immigration policies? Exploiting the Italian system for refugees’ reception and data from Italian municipalities, we show that proximity to elections reduces the probability that a municipalit...
More
Do electoral incentives affect immigration policies? Exploiting the Italian system for refugees’ reception and data from Italian municipalities, we show that proximity to elections reduces the probability that a municipality applies to host a refugee center by 26%, despite the economic benefits arising from these centers. Low electoral competition and high shares of extreme-right voters drive the effect. Our results are rationalized by a theoretical model and can explain the unequal distribution of refugees across and within countries.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
Dec 2022

Refugee reception, extreme-right voting, and compositional amenities: evidence from Italian municipalities [Revision requested Regional Science and Urban Economics] [submitted]

with

M. Luca, M. Viskanic and A. Romarri

Media coverage

Lavoce.info 

Nada es gratis

El Periodico

Tiriamo a Campari

LINKS

SSRN

We use data from Italy to study the political and social impact of a refugee reception policy (SPRAR) directly managed by local governments, whose features recall the conditions of the contact theory (Allport, 1954). Instrum...
More
We use data from Italy to study the political and social impact of a refugee reception policy (SPRAR) directly managed by local governments, whose features recall the conditions of the contact theory (Allport, 1954). Instrumental variables estimates indicate that municipalities that opened a refugee center between the 2013 and 2018 national elections experienced a change in the vote shares of extreme-right parties approximately 7 percentage points lower compared to towns that did not open a refugee center. We document that the positive impact of SPRARs on “compositional amenities” (i.e., local schools) and population growth allows explaining the negative impact on anti-immigrants’ prejudice. Finally, we provide evidence of spillovers in prejudice reduction in neighboring municipalities without a SPRAR.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
May 2022

Fiscal Rules and the selection of politicians: theory and evidence from Italy [Revision requested AEJ: Policy]

with

F. Trombetta

AWARD

Winner of the EEA Young Economist Award at the 2017 Annual Meeting of the European Economic Association – Motivation letter here

LINKS

SSRN

Fiscal rules, or constraints on the policymaking discretion of elected officials, are widely used to regulate fiscal policies. Using data on Italian municipalities, we employ a difference-in-discontinuity design to show a neg...
More
Fiscal rules, or constraints on the policymaking discretion of elected officials, are widely used to regulate fiscal policies. Using data on Italian municipalities, we employ a difference-in-discontinuity design to show a negative effect of fiscal rules on mayoral candidates’ education. The effect is driven by municipalities where fiscal rules meaningfully restrict the action space of politicians. These results are consistent with a formal model of fiscal rules and political selection and highlight a new "general equilibrium" effect of the former. Namely, reducing discretion may alleviate pork-barrel spending, but may also lower the quality of politicians.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
Dec 2021

The Political Economy of Open Borders. Theory and Evidence on the role of Electoral Rules

with

M. Morelli and M. Negri

Institutions matter for the political choice of policies. We study, theoretically and empirically, how different electoral systems affect the immigration policy of a country or city, zooming on the labor market as the main so...
More
Institutions matter for the political choice of policies. We study, theoretically and empirically, how different electoral systems affect the immigration policy of a country or city, zooming on the labor market as the main source of heterogeneous economic preferences on immigration. The general result is that a polity is more open to immigration the less likely it is that policymaking can be determined by a single group of voters constituting a plurality winning party but not holding an absolute majority. There is evidence for this result at all levels in terms of correlations, and we establish causality via regression discontinuity design for the Italian case.
Close
Dec 2019

Stop invasion! The electoral tipping point in anti-immigrant voting

with

M. Bordignon, E. Slerca and G. Turati

LINKS

SSRN

Why do anti-immigrant political parties have more success in areas that host fewer immigrants? Using regression discontinuity design, structural breaks search methods and data from a sample of Italian municipalities, we show that the relationship bet...
More
Why do anti-immigrant political parties have more success in areas that host fewer immigrants? Using regression discontinuity design, structural breaks search methods and data from a sample of Italian municipalities, we show that the relationship between the vote shares of anti-immigrant parties and the share of immigrants follows a U-shaped curve, which exhibits a tipping-like behavior around a share of immigrants equal to 3.35 %. We estimate that the vote share of the main Italian anti-immigrant party (Lega Nord) is approximately 6 % points higher for municipalities below the threshold. Using data on local labor market characteristics and on the incomes of natives and immigrants, we provide evidence which points at the competition in the local labor market between natives and immigrants as the more plausible explanation for the electoral success of anti-immigrant parties in areas with low shares of immigrants. Alternative stories find less support in the data.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Current teaching

2022-present
Data Science II: Causal Inference
Lecturer
Universitat de Barcelona, Department of Economics
2022-present
Political Economy
Lecturer
Universitat de Barcelona, Department of Economics
2020-present
Fonaments de la Fiscalitat (Principles of Taxation)
Lecturer
Universitat de Barcelona, Department of Economics
2018-present
Public Finance
Lecturer
Universitat de Barcelona, Department of Economics

Past teaching

2018-2021
Hisenda Pública (Public Finance)
Lecturer
Universitat de Barcelona, Department of Economics
2017-2018
EC338 - Econometrics 2
Lecturer
University of Warwick, Department of Economics
2017-2018
EC9760 - Econometrics, WBS
Teaching Assistant
Warwick Business School
2017-2018
EC9A3 – Advanced Econometric Theory
Teaching Assistant
University of Warwick, Department of Economics
2015-2017
EC902/EC907 - Econometrics A (MSc)
Teaching Assistant
University of Warwick, Department of Economics
2013-2018
EC226 - Econometrics 1
Teaching Assistant, Senior Tutor
University of Warwick, Department of Economics
2016-2017
Introduction to statistics and Stata
Teaching Assistant
Warwick Business School
2014-2016
Econometrics
Teaching Assistant
Warwick Economics Summer School

Office hours:

Office hours: to book an appointment, please send me an email to m.gamalerio@ub.edu

Office: 6105, Torre 6, Universitat de Barcelona, Facultat d’Economia i Empresa, c/ John M. Keynes 1-11, 08034, Barcelona

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

I am an applied economist, working on topics in political economy, public economics, the economics of migration, and applied econometrics. I work at the UB School of Economics and the Institut d’Economia de Barcelona (IEB), University of Barcelona.

Matteo Gamalerio
Download
CV
My article on
Lavoce.info
Nada es Gratis
Skype
matteo.gamalerio
Email
IEB page
http://ieb.ub.edu/en/researcher/gamalerio-matteo/
Twitter
@matteogamalerio
Song of the month
Alvvays - Archie, Marry Me
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

published papers

Jun 2022

Dismantling the “Jungle”: Migrant Relocation and Extreme Voting in France. Political Science Research and Methods, Volume 11, Issue 1.

with

P. Vertier and M. Viskanic

Media coverage

Lavoce.info 

Nada es gratis

El Periodico

Tiriamo a Campari

 

links

PSRM

SSRN

IPL working paper series

Large migrant inflows have spurred anti-immigrant sentiment, but can small inflows have a different impact? We exploit the redistribution of migrants after the dismantling of the "Calais Jungle" in France to study the impact...
More
Large migrant inflows have spurred anti-immigrant sentiment, but can small inflows have a different impact? We exploit the redistribution of migrants after the dismantling of the "Calais Jungle" in France to study the impact of the exposure to few migrants, which we estimate using difference-in-differences and instrumental variables. We find that in the presence of a migrant center (CAO), the growth rate of vote shares for the main far-right party (Front National (FN), our proxy for antiimmigrant sentiment) between 2012 and 2017 is reduced by about 12 percentage points. This effect, which crucially depends on the inflow’s size, points towards the contact hypothesis (Allport, 1954).
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
Feb 2020

Manager or professional politician? Local fiscal autonomy and the skills of elected officials. Regional Science and Urban Economics, Volume 83, July 2020.

With

M. Bordignon and G. Turati

media coverage

otto e mezzo, la7

lavoce.info

LINKS

RSUE

SSRN

We provide a theoretical and empirical assessment of why local fiscal autonomy can affect the skills of elected officials in sub-national governments. We first develop a model of politics with different types of politicians and show that -- following...
More
We provide a theoretical and empirical assessment of why local fiscal autonomy can affect the skills of elected officials in sub-national governments. We first develop a model of politics with different types of politicians and show that -- following a tax decentralization reform increasing local fiscal autonomy -- politicians with high administrative skills are elected in rich jurisdictions while politicians with high political skills are elected in poor ones. As a result, voter welfare increases only, or mainly, in rich jurisdictions. We then look for empirical support to these predictions by exploiting the decentralization reforms affecting Italian municipalities in the '90s. These reforms introduced both the direct election of the mayor and new autonomous tax tools for municipalities characterized by large differences in their tax bases. Our estimates -- robust to several alternative stories -- emphasize a differential change in elected officials at the municipal level between rich and poor jurisdictions. These findings provide a new explanation for the observed poor performance of local governments largely financed by grants.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
Jan 2020

Do national political parties matter? Evidence from Italian municipalities. European Journal of Political Economy, Volume 63, June 2020.

LINKS

EJPE

SSRN

Recently several countries have experienced a drop in popularity of national political parties, accompanied by the success of independent movements (e.g. “Civic Lists” in Italy). I exploit the success of “Civic Lists” in Italian municipalitie...
More
Recently several countries have experienced a drop in popularity of national political parties, accompanied by the success of independent movements (e.g. “Civic Lists” in Italy). I exploit the success of “Civic Lists” in Italian municipalities and use them as a comparison group for party-affiliated politicians, to test whether national parties affect fiscal discipline. Using a Regression Discontinuity Design (RDD), I show that party-affiliated mayors are more fiscally responsible: they run lower deficits, accumulate less debt and reduce expenditures. The effect is significant only for municipalities not constrained by fiscal rules. This suggests that national parties act as a substitute for fiscal rules in constraining politicians. Besides, I provide evidence that the discipline of party-affiliated politicians is linked to better career prospects: party-affiliated mayors have a higher probability of being re-elected and better chances of being promoted to higher levels of government. Alternative stories find less support in the data.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser

working papers

Jan 2023

Is Populism reversible? Evidence from Italian local elections during the pandemic [submitted]

with

M. Bordignon and F. Franzoni

links

SSRN

We study the effect of economic insecurity on electoral outcomes using data on municipal elections in Italy. We implement a difference-in-differences approach that exploits exogenous variation across municipalities in the sh...
More
We study the effect of economic insecurity on electoral outcomes using data on municipal elections in Italy. We implement a difference-in-differences approach that exploits exogenous variation across municipalities in the share of inactive workers due to the economic lockdown introduced by the central government to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic. We show that lockdown-induced economic insecurity positively affected the electoral performance of progressive and left-wing parties, while it negatively affected conservative and far-right parties. Conversely, we find no effect for the populist Five Star Movement, local independent parties (i.e., Civic Lists), and electoral turnout. We provide evidence that extraordinary economic measures introduced by the central government to compensate workers for the economic insecurity can explain this shift in partisanship toward the left and the increasing support for pro-EU parties, away from euro-skeptic and populist forces.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
Dec 2022

Not welcome anymore: the effect of electoral incentives on the reception of refugees [Accepted for publication Journal of Economic Geography]

with

M. Negri

media coverage

lavoce.info

LINKS

SSRN

Do electoral incentives affect immigration policies? Exploiting the Italian system for refugees’ reception and data from Italian municipalities, we show that proximity to elections reduces the probability that a municipalit...
More
Do electoral incentives affect immigration policies? Exploiting the Italian system for refugees’ reception and data from Italian municipalities, we show that proximity to elections reduces the probability that a municipality applies to host a refugee center by 26%, despite the economic benefits arising from these centers. Low electoral competition and high shares of extreme-right voters drive the effect. Our results are rationalized by a theoretical model and can explain the unequal distribution of refugees across and within countries.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
Dec 2022

Refugee reception, extreme-right voting, and compositional amenities: evidence from Italian municipalities [Revision requested Regional Science and Urban Economics] [submitted]

with

M. Luca, M. Viskanic and A. Romarri

Media coverage

Lavoce.info 

Nada es gratis

El Periodico

Tiriamo a Campari

LINKS

SSRN

We use data from Italy to study the political and social impact of a refugee reception policy (SPRAR) directly managed by local governments, whose features recall the conditions of the contact theory (Allport, 1954). Instrum...
More
We use data from Italy to study the political and social impact of a refugee reception policy (SPRAR) directly managed by local governments, whose features recall the conditions of the contact theory (Allport, 1954). Instrumental variables estimates indicate that municipalities that opened a refugee center between the 2013 and 2018 national elections experienced a change in the vote shares of extreme-right parties approximately 7 percentage points lower compared to towns that did not open a refugee center. We document that the positive impact of SPRARs on “compositional amenities” (i.e., local schools) and population growth allows explaining the negative impact on anti-immigrants’ prejudice. Finally, we provide evidence of spillovers in prejudice reduction in neighboring municipalities without a SPRAR.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
May 2022

Fiscal Rules and the selection of politicians: theory and evidence from Italy [Revision requested AEJ: Policy]

with

F. Trombetta

AWARD

Winner of the EEA Young Economist Award at the 2017 Annual Meeting of the European Economic Association – Motivation letter here

LINKS

SSRN

Fiscal rules, or constraints on the policymaking discretion of elected officials, are widely used to regulate fiscal policies. Using data on Italian municipalities, we employ a difference-in-discontinuity design to show a neg...
More
Fiscal rules, or constraints on the policymaking discretion of elected officials, are widely used to regulate fiscal policies. Using data on Italian municipalities, we employ a difference-in-discontinuity design to show a negative effect of fiscal rules on mayoral candidates’ education. The effect is driven by municipalities where fiscal rules meaningfully restrict the action space of politicians. These results are consistent with a formal model of fiscal rules and political selection and highlight a new "general equilibrium" effect of the former. Namely, reducing discretion may alleviate pork-barrel spending, but may also lower the quality of politicians.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
Dec 2021

The Political Economy of Open Borders. Theory and Evidence on the role of Electoral Rules

with

M. Morelli and M. Negri

Institutions matter for the political choice of policies. We study, theoretically and empirically, how different electoral systems affect the immigration policy of a country or city, zooming on the labor market as the main so...
More
Institutions matter for the political choice of policies. We study, theoretically and empirically, how different electoral systems affect the immigration policy of a country or city, zooming on the labor market as the main source of heterogeneous economic preferences on immigration. The general result is that a polity is more open to immigration the less likely it is that policymaking can be determined by a single group of voters constituting a plurality winning party but not holding an absolute majority. There is evidence for this result at all levels in terms of correlations, and we establish causality via regression discontinuity design for the Italian case.
Close
Dec 2019

Stop invasion! The electoral tipping point in anti-immigrant voting

with

M. Bordignon, E. Slerca and G. Turati

LINKS

SSRN

Why do anti-immigrant political parties have more success in areas that host fewer immigrants? Using regression discontinuity design, structural breaks search methods and data from a sample of Italian municipalities, we show that the relationship bet...
More
Why do anti-immigrant political parties have more success in areas that host fewer immigrants? Using regression discontinuity design, structural breaks search methods and data from a sample of Italian municipalities, we show that the relationship between the vote shares of anti-immigrant parties and the share of immigrants follows a U-shaped curve, which exhibits a tipping-like behavior around a share of immigrants equal to 3.35 %. We estimate that the vote share of the main Italian anti-immigrant party (Lega Nord) is approximately 6 % points higher for municipalities below the threshold. Using data on local labor market characteristics and on the incomes of natives and immigrants, we provide evidence which points at the competition in the local labor market between natives and immigrants as the more plausible explanation for the electoral success of anti-immigrant parties in areas with low shares of immigrants. Alternative stories find less support in the data.
Close
Download
Download
Open pdf in browser
Open pdf in browser
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Current teaching

2022-present
Data Science II: Causal Inference
Lecturer
Universitat de Barcelona, Department of Economics
2022-present
Political Economy
Lecturer
Universitat de Barcelona, Department of Economics
2020-present
Fonaments de la Fiscalitat (Principles of Taxation)
Lecturer
Universitat de Barcelona, Department of Economics
2018-present
Public Finance
Lecturer
Universitat de Barcelona, Department of Economics

Past teaching

2018-2021
Hisenda Pública (Public Finance)
Lecturer
Universitat de Barcelona, Department of Economics
2017-2018
EC338 - Econometrics 2
Lecturer
University of Warwick, Department of Economics
2017-2018
EC9760 - Econometrics, WBS
Teaching Assistant
Warwick Business School
2017-2018
EC9A3 – Advanced Econometric Theory
Teaching Assistant
University of Warwick, Department of Economics
2015-2017
EC902/EC907 - Econometrics A (MSc)
Teaching Assistant
University of Warwick, Department of Economics
2013-2018
EC226 - Econometrics 1
Teaching Assistant, Senior Tutor
University of Warwick, Department of Economics
2016-2017
Introduction to statistics and Stata
Teaching Assistant
Warwick Business School
2014-2016
Econometrics
Teaching Assistant
Warwick Economics Summer School

Office hours:

Office hours: to book an appointment, please send me an email to m.gamalerio@ub.edu

Office: 6105, Torre 6, Universitat de Barcelona, Facultat d’Economia i Empresa, c/ John M. Keynes 1-11, 08034, Barcelona