LIBRI DI ELENA RAGAZZI

L’Ufficio di Presidenza della "Commissione parlamentare d’inchiesta sul fenomeno degli infortuni sul lavoro e delle malattie professionali" del Senato della Repubblica, ha promosso un’attività di valutazione delle politiche di propria competenza, che testimonia, insieme a molte altre, del crescente interesse manifestato dal Senato per il tema della valutazione. La Commissione ha incaricato alcuni esperti del CNR di avviare dapprima uno studio di fattibilità e, a seguire, un’attività di valutazione relativa agli incentivi agli investimenti in sicurezza nei luoghi di lavoro. Il lavoro presenta non solo le caratteristiche del disegno di valutazione (lo studio non è concluso) ma soprattutto l’esperienza fatta nella relazione fra valutatore, committente e ente gestore. Il ruolo particolare della valutazione nella missione degli organi legislativi impone sia caratteristiche specifiche alla valutazione stessa, sia peculiarità nel rapporto con il committente che vengono esaminate nel saggio.

Good territorial policy planning needs preliminary considerations about local needs. The present case study intends to reflect on the importance of policy reference context, starting from the identification of initial trainees’ needs in a vocational training centre in Piedmont. This research experience designs a detection system (social antenna) aiming at identifying systemic needs of students and their families, in order to provide appropriate policy making tools. The multi-dimensionality of trainees’ social disadvantage is addressed by structural equation modeling. The present social antenna is specifically designed to detect the changing needs of young trainees, but the systematization of this methodological approach can guarantee the use of social antennas in different areas and contexts. The fil rouge is the ability to provide policy indications on-the-fly, so that the policy makers can instantaneously (re)orient interventions, depending on environmental changes.

L’articolo intende proporre una riflessione sugli specifici contributi in termini di apprendimento che possono essere innescati da una valutazione ciclica di un programma o intervento pubblico. Il caso proposto è quello dell’indagine di Placement della Formazione Professionale in Regione Piemonte, svolta dal 2011 al 2014. Attraverso una lettura diacronica dei quattro rapporti annuali del Placement , vengono presentate tre dimensioni di analisi che si giovano del confronto intertemporale, rispettivamente connesse alle dinamiche finanziarie, degli esiti occupazionali e degli impatti netti. L’articolo, individuando le principali evidenze emergenti dalle diverse dimensioni d’analisi, discute gli apprendimenti prodotti dalle stesse in termini metodologici e di policy.

Migration and work are truly connected notions in the European social model. Work is a pillar of active citizenship and a fundamental step in individuals’ self-construction. In such framework, vocational education and training (Vet) represent a twofold integration channel, combining both education and work paths. In Italy, the role of Vet is particularly important for first- and second-generation migrants, who are more likely to attend Vet courses than other education paths. However, Vet is commonly perceived like a segregation path, rather than like a port of entry to active citizenship and integration. The present work discusses the hypothesis of "subordinate integration"of migrants into the Italian Vet system. In particular, it examines the effectiveness of VT policies in fostering migrants’ employability. The results of a Cati survey on a representative sample of Piedmont VT students suggest no specific discrimination to the detriment of the immigrants. Moreover, Vet net impact proves to be significantly positive on migrants. Hence, immigrants’ participation to VT seems to denote a sort of "normalization strategy", rather than a subordinate integration scheme.

Il paper analizza il ruolo del Programma di Sviluppo Rurale nel supportare il settore agroindustriale piemontese attraverso una valutazione ex post con metodo controfattuale quasi sperimentale. Il matching è realizzato con il recente algoritmo Coarsened Exact Matching (Blackwell et al., 2009). I risultati indicano nel medio periodo caratteristiche strutturali significativamente più stabili per le imprese beneficiarie, nonostante la perdurante crisi economica. Dal punto di vista metodologico si evidenzia come le tecniche di matching, il timing delle analisi e il management dei dati influenzino fortemente l’analisi di impatto.

The impact assessment of social and labour policies is mainly based on direct inquiry on their recipients. In the case of net impact assessments, one has to observe a group of untreated individuals that is very homogeneous with respect to the treated. However, the very high cost of direct surveys limits their scope, as it prevents large sample size, hindering the reliability of estimates. The access to databases created for different purposes (fiscal, administrative, monitoring) could overcome the above limitations, with much convenience in terms of cost and data quality. This paper presents a validation exercise based on a very broad and complex employment database, the Comunicazioni Obbligaorie (COB), that collects employers’ compulsory notifications in the case of changes in a job contract. This exercise was possible thanks to an extraordinary condition, giving contemporaneous access to two different data sources, the COB database and a direct survey on recipients of vocational training policies in the Piedmont Region. The paper discusses the main differences between employment indicators evaluated on direct survey data and on COB data. Inconsistencies involve the 20% sample. In addition, such inconsistencies do distort the net impact assessment, since the key variables for placement outcomes vary significantly. Hence, whenever administrative databases are used as a source for socioeconomic analyses, extreme caution and critical thinking must be used, verifying the reliability of estimates deriving from their use and comparing results with other sources. In the lack of such preliminary validation, which should be carried out in close collaboration with the regional or national authorities managing the information systems, we run the risk not only to uncritically accept information producing systematic bias, but also to prevent the development of procedures that are essential for the system development.

The paper presents an impact assessment of vocational training courses, which the Piedmont Region co-financed by the ESF, both discussing the methodological feasibility and proposing a quasi-experimental evaluation strategy based on the medium-term job placement of vocational training students. The authors illustrate the operational design and the implementation of the assessment, with particular attention to the identification of a proper control sample, finally identified on the basis of the course noshows and drop-outs. The paper proposes an accurate description of gross and net impact evaluation strategies. The gross impact evaluation is carried out through an analysis of the employment outcomes in the mid-term, while the net impact is estimated through net employment differentials between the main and the counterfactual sample, as well as through a multivariate probit analysis, which investigates the effects of individual characteristics on the probability of being employed a year later the end of the course. The selection bias problem is discussed, illustrating the strategy adopted to identify and counteract its effects. In conclusion, the authors distill this research experience through a series of lessons learned about both the methods and the evaluation assessment of training effectiveness. Key words: vocational training; impact evaluation; counterfactual analysis; sampling; multivariate analysis; selection bias.