Gaetano Basso

Position Title

Economic advisor

Bank of Italy

Gaetano Basso joined the labor market division at the Bank of Italy as a research fellow in 2016 and as an economic advisor since 2017. He got his Ph.D. in Economics at UC Davis (June 2016), where he was also a graduate student affiliate at the Center for Poverty Research. Before starting his Ph.D. he worked at Fondazione Rodolfo Debenedetti (2009-11), to which he is currently an affiliate. Gaetano earned an MSc in economics (cum laude) from Università Bocconi in 2009 and a BA (cum laude) from the same university in 2007. His research interests are in the field of labor economics, economics of immigration, and applied econometrics. He was born in Genova, Italy in 1985. In his free time, he is passionate about policy and economics topics, soccer and cooking.

Content by Gaetano Basso

Emigration and Entrepreneurial Drain

Economic Report on the President

Computerization and immigration: Theory and evidence from the United States

Author(s)

Gaetano Basso, Giovanni Peri, Ahmed S. Rahman

Published in

Canadian Journal of Economics

Publication Date

October 10, 2020

Abstract

Recent technological changes have been characterized as “routine-substituting” because they reduce demand for routine tasks and increase demand for analytical and service tasks. Little is known about how these changes have impacted immigration, or task specialization between immigrants and native-born individuals. In this paper, we show that such technological progress has attracted immigrants who increasingly specialize in manual-service occupations. We also suggest that openness to immigration attenuated the job and wage polarization faced by native-born from technological changes. We explain these facts with a model of technological progress and endogenous immigration. Simulations show that unskilled immigration attenuates the drop in routine employment proceeding from technological change, enhances skill upgrading for native-born and raises economy-wide productivity and welfare.

Internal Mobility: The Greater Responsiveness of Foreign-Born to Economic Conditions

Author(s)

Gaetano Basso
Giovanni Peri

Published in

Journal of Economic Perspectives

Publication Date

August 11, 2020

Abstract

In this article, we review the internal geographic mobility of immigrants and natives in the United States in the recent decades, with a focus on the period since 2000. We confirm a continuing secular decline in mobility already pointed out by the existing literature, and we show that it persisted in the post great recession period. We then focus on foreign-born and establish that, on average, they did not have total mobility rates higher than that of natives. However, their mobility response to local economic conditions was stronger than the response of natives in the period from 1980 to 2017. A review of recent research reveals that the higher elasticity of mobility of immigrants to economic conditions is a combination of lower sensitivity to local prices, higher propensity to move in the early years after immigration, and strong economic success of cities that were immigrant enclaves in the 1980s.

Emigration and Entrepreneurial Drain

Author(s)

Massimo Anelli
Gaetano Basso
Giuseppe Ippedico
Giovanni Peri

Published in

American Economic Association

Publication Date

June 21, 2022

Emigration of young, highly educated individuals may deprive origin countries of entrepreneurs. We identify exogenous variation in emigration from Italy by interacting past diaspora networks and current economic pull factors in destination countries. We find that a one standard deviation increase in the emigration rate generates a 4.8% decline in firms creation in the local labor market of origin. An accounting exercise decomposes the estimated effect into four components: subtraction of individuals with average entrepreneurial propensity, selection of young and college-educated among emigrants, negative spillovers on firm creation and selection on unobservable characteristics positively associated with entrepreneurship.

Anelli, Basso, Ippedico and Peri published in the AEJ Applied Economics

Publication by Giovanni Peri and Gaetano Basso Featured by the White House

New IZA Discussion Paper by Giovanni Peri, Massimo Anelli, Gaetano Basso and Giuseppe Ippedico

Opportunity Lost: The Economic Benefit of Retaining Foreign-Born Students in Local Economies

Author(s)

Giovanni Peri, Gaetano Basso, and Sara McElmurry (The Chicago Council on Global Affairs)

Published in

The Chicago Council on Global Affairs (2016)

Executive Summary:
The United States, home to many of the world’s top universities, is a higher education destination for talented students from across the globe. When foreign-born students are able to find work in local economies after graduation, the positive economic effects extend beyond their incomes, especially since many pursue degrees in sought-after science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields.

Yet the economic contributions of many of today’s foreign-born college students are stifled by an outdated immigration system. The temporary nature of F-1 visas, which are not connected to any immigration visa or opportunity, limits international students’ ability to work after they have completed their degrees. And undocumented students brought to the United States as children and educated in American schools face uncertain prospects for work and citizenship.

A first-of-its kind analysis of aggregate transition rates from college to work among three groups of foreign-born college students indicates that only one group—lawful permanent residents (LPR)— are fully transitioning to work in local economies. Undocumented college students are 20 to 30 percentage points less likely than their LPR peers to find local work after graduation. Aggregate transition rates for F-1 visa holders were close to zero.

Policies that increase work opportunities for F-1 visa holders and undocumented students to the same levels as their LPR peers would increase employment levels and tax revenues in nearly every state in the country. The 10 states with the most F-1 visa holders stand to gain nearly $8.3 billion in wages and $283 million in state taxes. Among the 10 states with the most undocumented students, those numbers are $1.5 billion and $40 million, respectively.

Programs like Optional Practical Training (OPT) and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), which offer temporary employment opportunities for foreign-born students, are moving the needle in the right direction. But it falls to Congress to legislate lasting immigration reform, including the following:

Develop a provisional visa for STEM graduates.
Allocate H-1B visas for STEM graduates.
Allow US states to add geographical incentives to work opportunities for F-1 visa holders.
Facilitate student access to investor visas.

Local economies have much at stake in better retaining talented foreign-born students in their local workforces. But even more important are the longer-term economic effects of fully maximizing foreign-born students’ contributions, particularly to critical STEM and innovation fields, driving US global competitiveness.

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Gaetano Basso

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Economic advisor