Dr Renata Bottazzi

We look at how strongly shocks to asset values affect labour supply, using Italian data.

We estimate marginal propensities to consume from wealth shocks for Italian households in the early part of the Great Recession. Large asset price shocks in 2008 underpin an IV estimator. A euro fall in risky financial wealth resulted in cuts in annual total (non‐durable) consumption of 8.5‐ 9 (5.5‐5.7) cents. There is evidence of effects on food spending. Responses of total and nondurable spending to changes in housing wealth are 0.2 to 0.3 cents/euro. Point estimates of the effect of the financial wealth shock are larger if the youngest and/or oldest households are excluded. Results indicate that responses to the wealth shock were stronger for those who became pessimistic about the stock market, and for those owners of risky assets who also held mortgage debt. Counterfactuals indicate financial wealth effects were important (relative to other factors) for consumption falls in Italy in 2007/08.

We investigate whether different ages of first-time house buying lead to persistent differences in homeownership between cohorts.

We estimate marginal propensities to consume from wealth shocks for Italian households.

Using survey data spanning multiple house-price cycles over nearly forty years, this paper documents the association between house prices and homeownership at age thirty.

We model individual demand for housing over the life-cycle, and show the aggregate implications of this behaviour.

We estimate the portfolio effect of changes in social security wealth exploiting a decade of Italian pension reforms. The Italian Survey of Household Income and Wealth records detailed portfolio data and elicits expectations of retirement outcomes, thus allowing us to measure expected social security wealth and assess to what extent Italian households perceive the innovations brought about by the reforms. We find that households have responded to cuts in pension benefits mostly by increasing real estate wealth, and that this response is stronger among households able more accurately to estimate future social security benefits. We also compute that for the average household consumable wealth increases by 40 percent of the reduction in social security wealth.

This paper uses a structural model to address the question of why home-owners with large mortgage debt work longer hours than those without such debt.

We estimate the effect of pension reforms on households' expectations of retirement outcomes and private wealth accumulation decisions exploiting a decade of intense Italian pension reforms as a source of exogenous variation in expected pension wealth. The Survey of Household Income and Wealth, a large random sample of the Italian population, elicits expectations of the age at which workers expect to retire and of the ratio of pension benefits to pre-retirement income between 1989 and 2002. We find that workers have revised expectations in the direction suggested by the reform and that there is substantial offset between private wealth and perceived pension wealth, particularly by workers that are better informed about their pension wealth.

We estimate the effect of pension reforms on households expectations of retirement outcomes and private wealth accumulation decisions exploiting a decade of Italian pension reforms as a source of exogenous variation in expected pension wealth.

This paper analyses the relationship between female labour market participation and mortgage commitments in life-cycle set up. In particular it examines whether a mortgage qualification constraint has any effect on female labour market participation.

We estimate the effect of pension reforms on households' expectations and wealth accumulation decisions.