How do Immigrants Affect Local Public Finances? Evidence from Italy

Rama Dasi Mariani, Anna Maria Mayda, Furio Camilllo Rosati and Antonio Sparacino

No 19596, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: In this paper we estimate the causal impact of immigration to Italy on local public finances, at the municipality level (Comuni), between 2008 and 2015. We make use of administrative data to analyze public revenues and expenditures disaggregated by type. We find that, after the arrival of immigrants, total (current plus capital) revenues increase while total expenditures are not affected, giving rise to an increase in the surplus of the municipality (all outcome variables in the paper are defined in per capita terms). The arrival of immigrants increases current revenues and, in particular, property tax revenues, fees, and other revenues, as well as transfers from other levels of government. We show that there is an increase in property tax revenues from “secondary residences†, which are often rented out and are subject to higher taxation compared to owner-occupied units. On the expenditure side, immigrant inflows lead to greater current spending in total and on various items such as: garbage collection, local police, cultural programs, and public transportation. Capital expenditures decrease instead, when immigrants arrive.

Keywords: Immigration (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F22 H41 H7 J61 J68 R5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024-10
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://cepr.org/publications/DP19596 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:19596

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
https://cepr.org/publications/DP19596

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research 33 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DX, UK.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CEPR ().