Unit WELFARE ECONOMICS AND GLOBALISATION

Course
International relations
Study-unit Code
A003328
Curriculum
Cooperazione internazionale e state building
Teacher
Lucia Mangiavacchi
Teachers
  • Lucia Mangiavacchi
Hours
  • 63 ore - Lucia Mangiavacchi
CFU
9
Course Regulation
Coorte 2024
Offered
2024/25
Learning activities
Caratterizzante
Area
Economico
Academic discipline
SECS-P/01
Type of study-unit
Obbligatorio (Required)
Type of learning activities
Attività formativa monodisciplinare
Language of instruction
Italian. International students are welcome to attend. The professor can suggest bibliographical references also in English. Answers to the exam can be written also in English.
Contents
The course deals with the issue of economic well-being and its distribution within countries and between countries at a global level. After a brief theoretical introduction to welfare economics, the course provides the tools to analyze economic welfare from an empirical point of view through the use of individual data. The course also devotes space to the analysis of poverty with particular attention to child and female poverty. The second part will be dedicated to the study of public policies aimed at reducing poverty and inequalities and to the methods of evaluating these policies. The last part will be dedicated to the role of human capital, and in particular of public investment in education as a key variable for the reduction of inequalities in the distribution of well-being and for the fight against poverty.
Reference texts
Reading list of articles and book chapter on the Unistudium platform.
Educational objectives
(i) Conceptualization of the idea of ¿¿economic well-being and its possible measurement.
(ii) Knowledge of data and methods for measuring economic well-being, poverty and inequality.
(iii) Knowledge of welfare state regimes and policies aimed at reducing inequalities and encouraging social mobility.
(iv) Provide the tools necessary for understanding and critical analysis
of academic articles and institutional reports on development, poverty and
inequalities.
(v) Ability to conduct analyzes of well-being, poverty and inequality starting from survey data.
(vi) Knowledge of the role of human capital as a variable of socially sustainable economic development.
Prerequisites
Basic knowledge of microeconomics, mathematics and statistics.
Teaching methods
The topics will be developed mainly with lectures. There will also be organized lessons such as "flipped classroom": in this case the students will have to read some academic papers and discuss them in class. The students will also work together with the teacher on a short research work on the topics addressed during the course.
Learning verification modality
Delivery of a paper on a topic chosen from the contents of the course to be agreed with the teacher (2/3 of the final grade). Presentation of an article among those proposed in the reading list (1/3).
Extended program
1. Economic well-being: (i) conceptual framework, (ii) measurement and (iii)
data.
2. Inequalities: (i) inequality in the distribution of income and wealth, (ii) inequality of opportunity, (iii) inequality of
type.
3. Poverty: (i) poverty lines, (ii) indices, (iii) multidimensionality.
4. Policies for poverty and inequality reduction.
5. Policy evaluation methods: experimental and non-experimental methods.
6. Human capital and economic development: (i) educational performance, (ii) human capital and the family, (iii) human capital and inequalities.
Obiettivi Agenda 2030 per lo sviluppo sostenibile
1. Zero poverty; 4. Quality education; 5. Gender equality; 10. Reduce inequalities.
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