Looking for a Star: Evaluating the Effect of the Cohesion Policy on Regional Well-Being

Giuseppe Albanese, Vincenzo Carrieri and Maria Maddalena Speziali
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Maria Maddalena Speziali: Magna Graecia University

No 14521, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: This paper presents new evidence on the last concluded wave (2007-2013) of the EU cohesion policy. We depart from the broadly used GDP-growth approach and evaluate the impact of EU Structural Funds (SFs) on a battery of regional well-being indicators including economic, educational, health, and demographic outcomes. We exploit the SFs assignment rule to construct a fuzzy RDD. Our results reveal an overall null effect of the policy. We further identify how regional (i) quality of government (ii) human capital and (iii) urbanization impact the policy's effectiveness. We conclude that these characteristics affect the relationship between SFs and economic outcomes only.

Keywords: cohesion policy; regional well-being; Fuzzy RDD (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C21 H51 H52 I31 R11 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 33 pages
Date: 2021-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-geo, nep-tid and nep-ure
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Published - published online as 'Beyond GDP: assessing the impact of the 2007–13 EU Cohesion Policy' in: Regional Studies, 03 Jun 2024

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