Convegno Scientifico Istat Roma Aula Magna 10.12.19 L’immigrazione in Italia: i dati e gli attori istituzionali via Cesare Balbo,16

1. La statistica per la ricerca:
caratteristiche, integrazione e impatto della presenza straniera in Italia
L’immigrazione in Italia: i dati e gli attori istituzionali
Roma, 10 dicembre 2019
Prof. Furio Camillo Rosati
Università di Roma «TorVergata»
CEIS - Centre for Economics and International Studies
ICID - The Italian Centre for International Development

2. Outline
 The overall picture
 The integration of immigrants
 The effect of immigration
 Some open questions
Reference: Mariani, R. D., Pasquini A. and Rosati, F. C. «Elementary facts
on Italian immigration.What do we know about Immigration and its
impact in Italy» (forthcoming)

3. The overall picture. Some elementary facts
 As of 2018, the percentage of the immigrant
population with respect to the native population is
about 9, with a relatively higher concentration in the
North and in the Centre.
Source: Authors' elaboration on ISTAT data.
Notes: Areas are classified according to NUTS 1 level.

4. The overall picture
2012
North-West North-East Centre South Islands Italy
Africa 0.25 0.24 0.13 0.17 0.28 0.21
Asia 0.18 0.17 0.20 0.14 0.21 0.18
South America 0.13 0.04 0.07 0.04 0.03 0.08
Europe 0.41 0.53 0.55 0.62 0.42 0.50
High-income Countries 0.04 0.03 0.05 0.04 0.06 0.04
2018
North-West North-East Centre South Islands Italy
Africa 0.25 0.22 0.14 0.22 0.32 0.21
Asia 0.20 0.19 0.23 0.19 0.21 0.20
South America 0.11 0.04 0.07 0.03 0.02 0.07
Europe 0.41 0.53 0.51 0.52 0.40 0.48
High-income Countries 0.04 0.03 0.05 0.03 0.04 0.04
Source:Authors' elaboration on ISTAT data. Notes: High-income countries include: EU15, EU EFTA, North America and Oceania. Europe includes all EU countries excluding
those in EU15.Areas are classified according to NUTS 1 level.
Share of immigrants by area of origin

5. The overall picture
Composition of Italian immigration by nationality
(top 10 countries)
2012 2018
Romania 20.90 Romania 23.30
Albania 11.20 Albania 8.60
Morocco 10.20 Morocco 8.20
China 4.90 China 5.70
Ukraine 4.50 Ukraine 4.60
Moldova 3.30 Philippines 3.30
Philippines 3.20 India 3.00
India 3.00 Moldova 2.60
Peru 2.30 Bangladesh 2.60
Poland 2.10 Egypt 2.30
Total 65.60 Total 64.20
Source:Authors' elaboration on ISTAT data.

6. The overall picture Percentage of immigrants by municipality size
Panel A
Municipality population 2012 2018
Italy 7.32 9.33
Less than 100,000 6.76 7.45
Up to 250,000 7.06 9.06
More than 250,000 9.52 14.04
Panel B
Municipality population 2012 2018
Less than 100,000 29.20 24.41
Up to 250,000 51.97 53.13
More than 250,000 18.83 22.16
Source:Authors' elaboration with ISTAT data.
Notes: In Panel A the immigrant share is computed as percentage of the native population, while in Panel B it is computed as share of the total immigrants.

7.  The concentration by
area of origin is rather
similar across the
territory

8. The integration of immigrants. Geographical segregation?
 Integration is defined as the absence of differences in socio-economic outcomes – such as education
and labour market outcomes – between immigrants and natives (Alba & Nee, 1997).
 Fist of all, we look at the geographical integration of immigrants. In case of no integration, we talk
about balkanization – the process of fragmentation of a region into smaller regions inhabited by segregated
populations.

9. Geographical segregation
 The Duncan Segregation Index
𝑆 =
1
2
𝑚
𝑅 𝑚
𝐼
𝑅 𝐼
−
𝑅 𝑚
𝑁
𝑅 𝑁
Year Duncan Index
2012 0.28
2013 0.28
2014 0.28
2015 0.27
2016 0.27
2017 0.26
2018 0.26
Source:Authors’ elaboration on ISTAT data

10. Geographical segregation
Source:Authors' elaboration on ISTAT data.
Notes: In purple municipalities where the share of residing immigrants with respect to
the total of immigrants is higher than the natives’ equivalent.
Duncan Segregation Index
Immigrants concentrate more, with respect to
the native population, in the Centre-North of
Italy.

11. Geographical segregation Comulative net flows of immigrants from 2012 to 2018
Immigrants have a relatively high internal
mobility rate (higher than natives).These
movements tend to reallocate with respect to
areas of first arrival and to change in labour
demand.
Source: Authors’ elaboration on ISTAT data

12. Geographical segregation.
Internal movements
Partial correlation
(controlling for income pc, public budget, natural pop increase, year and area fe)
 Immigrants tend to move where also
natives go.
 Internal movements after arrival can
increase the concentration over the
territory.

13. Geographical segregation.
Economic condition
Partial correlation
(controlling for public budget, natural pop increase, year and area fe )
 At the local labour market level we find
a slightly positive correlation between
the share of immigrants from low-
income countries and the per-capita
income of the Local Labour Market.

14. The employment of immigrants
Share of immigrants in empolyment by NACE sector
2012 2018
Agriculture, forestry and fishing 14.82 18.57
Manufacturing 9.00 10.50
Construction 21.49 18.46
Wholesale and retail trade 5.07 6.67
Accommodation and food
service activities
17.27 20.27
Transportation and storage 10.15 10.91
Information and communication 1.36 3.18
Financial and insurance activities 0.28 0.55
Real estate activities 7.49 6.51
Public administration and
defence
0.00 0.00
Education, human health and
social work activities
3.24 3.15
Other services 43.25 57.95
Distribution of immigrants by NACE sector
2012 2018
Agriculture, forestry and fishing 5.02 5.92
Manufacturing 19.32 19.27
Construction 15.55 9.74
Wholesale and retail trade 8.12 9.08
Accommodation and food
service activities
8.44 9.69
Transportation and storage 4.94 4.73
Information and communication 0.40 0.80
Financial and insurance activities 0.09 0.16
Real estate activities 7.99 7.08
Public administration and
defence
0.00 0.00
Education, human health and
social work activities
5.41 4.98
Other services 24.73 28.53

15. The employment of immigrants
 The geography of sectors where immigrant workers
are mostly employed.
Source:Authos’ elaboration on ISTAT data.
Notes: Colours indicate the sector of highest employment of immigrants in the
province (NUTS3)

16. Immigrants’ economic conditions
 Evidence is rather limited and not very robust.
 In terms of employment, immigrant workers show a high probability of being employed, but they are segregated in
manual jobs.This is true even after controlling for formal education (Fullin & Reymeri, 2011).The higher incidence
of over-education among immigrants – relatively to natives – is not attenuated by years spent in Italy (Dell’Aringa
& Pagani, 2011).
 The overall immigrants’ and natives’ variance of wages is mostly explained by the within group inequality
(Ceccarelli et al., 2014).

17. The education of immigrants’ children
 The school performances are measured through the
INVALSI test scores.
 The disadvantage of immigrant students is relatively
large and persists also for the second generation
immigrants.
AcademicYear
First Generation Second Generation
Grade 2 Grade 10 Grade 2 Grade 10
2011/12 -13.6 -5.4 -7.5 -12.8
2012/13 -15.1 -15.0 -8.7 -12.3
2013/14 -18.0 -15.3 -10.5 -10.2
2014/15 -22.1 -21.0 -13.7 -24.6
2015/16 -23.6 -17.9 -14.9 -16.9
2016/17 -24.2 -18.8 -17.9 -5.1
2017/18 -19.5 -10.5 -12.7 -9.0
Source: Authors’ elaboration INVALSI data.
Notes: Differences are expressed as percentage of native students’ scores.
Immigrant learning gap
as percentage of native test scores

18. The education of immigrants’ children.
Learning gap
Source:Authors’ elaboration on INVALSI data.
Notes:The outcome is reading test scores for grade 10.
OLS coefficients
 After controlling for background
characteristics, the learning gap is reduced but
persists (see Murat, 2002; Barban & White,
2011; Di Liberto, 2015).
 The learning gap is decreasing over time,
especially for second generation students.
 The length of stay in Italy greatly affects the
school performance of immigrant students (Di
Liberto, 2015)

19. The impact of immigration on natives
 The presence of immigrants tend to reduce South – North migration of natives mobility and to displace low skilled
workers
 Analyses looking at the impact of immigration on natives’ labour market oucomes are rather scant and mainly refer
to a period earlier than 2000, when immigration was a less prominent phenomenon
 Also with respect to the productive structure the evidence is scarse and not particularly robust
 More solid evidence on human capital formation.The share of first-generation immigrants has a small negative impact
on natives’ learning outcomes (especially reading).The effect of non-native students on native peers is higher the
higher the presence of immigrants in the classroom, the lower the education level of natives and the higher the
linguistic distance between immigrant and native students

20. Some open questions

21. Data needs and the definition of migrant
Consistency in the data.

22. Who is a migrant: non citizens, foreign born or..
Source:Authors’ elaboration on ISTAT data

23. Is naturalization exogenous?
Source:Authors’ elaboration on ISTAT data
Note: Naturalization Rate by Province

24. Net and gross flows
Source:Authors’ elaboration on ISTAT data

25. Distribution of immigration costs
What do we know
 Wages and employment of low
skilled natives can be affected (?)
 In education, low-performing
children are the most affected by
the presence of immigrant peers
in the class
What we do not know
Distribution of other costs:
 Housing
 Congestion in public services
…and many more

26. Spatial concentration of natives and immigrants

27. Concentration of immigrants within LLM

28. Distribution of immigrant students by native socioeconomic status
Category of Socio-Economic
background of natives
(class average)
Average number of 1st
generation immigrants
(unconditional)
Average number of 1st
generation immigrants
(conditional)
Low 0.88 2.12
Middle 0.99 2.01
High 0.46 1.45
Source:Authors’ elaboration on INVALSI data

29. Attitudes towards immigration
Source:Authors’ elaboration on ISTAT data.
Observations: 2026
Notes: Data refers to Round 6 (2012) and Round 8
(2016) of the European Social Survey in Italy.
Many
14%
Some
37%
Few
33%
None
16%

30. Cultural identity
Source: Bisin and Tura (2019)

31. La statistica per la ricerca: caratteristiche, integrazione e impatto della presenza straniera in Italia
Prof. Furio Camillo Rosati (CEIS, Università di Roma «Tor Vergata»)
Thank you