Mismatch and labour mobility: Regional inequalities, migration and mismatch in Italy, 1960–86

This study is an attempt to understand why, in the presence of high (and sometimes increasing) differentials in unemployment, internal gross out-migration and net migration rates were dramatically reduced in Italy. Our purpose is mainly a descriptive one. With the help of a newly-created data set, which is analysed here for the first time, we try to construct a consistent picture of the dynamics of migration behaviour within Italy in the years 1960-86. Our explanation is primarily economic, even though we recognise the importance of social and political factors, underlying what has been called the "cultural model hostile to the process of migration'. We try to understand why workers, unlike in the 1960s, do not migrate from the South to the North-Centre of Italy, even in the presence of strong and persistent regional imbalances. There is a discussion of the article by G. Bertola, pp 321-324. -from Authors