How much does state aid mitigate employment losses? Local policy effects at a time of economic crisis
利用意大利市级项目数据，评估欧盟区域政策在经济危机时期对就业和工厂数量的影响，发现对企业的定向支持显著增加了就业和工厂数量。
We evaluate the effectiveness of the most extensive experiment of income redistribution, that is, the European Union regional policy, at a time of economic crisis. By exploiting geographical discontinuities in fund eligibility, we analyse comprehensive data on all publicly funded Italian projects at the municipality level. We find a positive impact of localized support to firms with a sizable increase in employment and the number of plants in intensively treated areas. The result is an important policy lesson concerning the effects of place-based policies at a time of a long-lasting recession, such as that engendered by the Covid-19 crisis.