Clemente Pignatti

Hey there!

I am a tenure-track Assistant Professor of Economics at the Department of Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods (DEMM) of the University of Milan.

Previously, I was a post-doc at Bocconi University (2022-2024) and I worked in the Research Department of the International Labour Organization (2013-2021).

I obtained a PhD in Economics from the University of Geneva in 2021. During my PhD, I spent a term visiting the University College of London and the Institute for Fiscal Studies.

I am an applied microeconomist with an interest in labour and development economics. I use quasi-experimental research methods and work with survey and administrative data.

In my research, I study how labour market policies, social protection schemes and public institutions affect individual's socio-economic outcomes and public welfare.

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IDEAS/RePEc

Working papers

Children’s Educational Enrollment and Maternal Labor Supply (with A. Tondini)

We investigate the impact of a reform in South Africa anticipating children’s entry into primary school on children’s school enrollment and mothers’ labour supply. We use Census data and exploit month-of-birth discontinuities and the before/after variation introduced by the reform. We report a net increase of 7pp. in school attendance at age 5. However, contrary to an established finding in the literature, we find no impact on mother’s employment and the type of jobs held. We reconcile our finding with those of previous studies by noting that South Africa is characterized by relatively high initial rates of school attendance and relatively low rates of maternal employment. In districts where these contextual factors are more similar to previous studies, we find that higher enrollment does lead to higher maternal employment.

Labor Law Compliance in a Highly Informal Labor Market

I study a reform of the system of labor inspection in Colombia, requested by the US as part of the negotiations for a bilateral trade agreement. I find that an additional inspector increases labor law compliance in the formal sector. Formal employment increases, as informality decreases in both formal and informal firms, but overall employment decreases. Complementary evidence from an enterprise survey shows that formal firms compensate for part of the increase in labor costs by reducing payroll contributions.

Optimal Unemployment Insurance with Program Interactions (with Z. Parolin)

Media coverage: Niskanen Center

We study the interaction between unemployment insurance (UI) and other social transfers exploiting state-level changes to UI generosity and data from the Survey of Income and Program Participation (1990-2013). We find that more generous UI leads to a reduction in the receipt of other public transfers. This results from a short-term decrease in the probability of receiving means-tested programs, like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and a long-term reduction in the probability of receiving Social Security benefits. Accounting for these interactions, the optimal UI replacement rate may be 17 percentage points higher than the current rate in the US.

Monopsony Power and Poverty: The Consequences of Walmart Supercenter Openings (with L. Lehner, Z. Parolin and R. Pintro Schmitt)

Media coverage: The Atlantic

Prior research suggests that Walmart Supercenters exert substantial power over the low-wage labor market, though the consequences of Supercenter openings on household incomes and public finances are less clear. This study uses restricted-access Panel Study of Income Dynamics data from 1970 to 2019 to study how Walmart Supercenter openings affect poverty, tax liabilities, and receipt of income transfers. Using a stacked difference-in-differences approach, we find that the opening of a Supercenter leads to a 2 percentage point (16%) increase in poverty. This increase is channeled through declining annual earnings and persists for 10 years following the Supercenter's entry. Increases in poverty are particularly strong for younger and less-educated adults, and for adults with pre-treatment incomes below the national median. Moreover, Walmart Supercenter openings lead to a $200 (or 16%) per household per year increase in government income transfers received, and a $920 (or 5%) per household per year decrease in tax revenues.

Published papers

Employment and Consumption Responses to the Sudden Withdrawal of Unemployment Benefits (with Z. Parolin), ILR Review (2025)

The authors study the responses to the withdrawal of two generous unemployment benefit (UB) schemes introduced in the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic, exploiting variations across states in the timing of the policy change. Using data from the Current Population Survey, they find that the expiration of UBs increased unemployment-to-employment transitions. However, approximately half of this effect was driven by job recalls. Evidence also shows that unemployed individuals transitioned into lower quality jobs, compared to their previous occupations, and that young job seekers not eligible for UBs were displaced by increased job-search competition. Using both survey and transaction data, the authors also provide complementary evidence on the consumption effects of the policy change. They document a small reduction in consumption after the withdrawal of pandemic UBs for some non-necessary spending categories.

Welfare Effects of Unemployment Benefits when Informality is High (with H. Liepmann), Journal of Public Economics (2024)

Media coverage: VoxDev

We investigate the welfare effects of unemployment benets (UBs) in a context of high informality, analyzing rich data that captures informal employment, besides formal employment and non-employment. Difference-in-differences analysis reveals a large consumption drop after the loss of a formal job, resulting from shifts towards lower-quality informal employment and an associated wage penalty. Exploiting a UB kink, we then show that higher UBs delay program exit through a substitution of formal with informal employment, but these effects are small. Overall welfare effects of UBs are positive and large, contrasting the common understanding that UBs are inecient when informality is widespread.

Effects of the Expanded Child Tax Credit on Employment Outcomes (with E. Ananat, B. Glasner, C. Hamilton and Z. Parolin), Journal of Public Economics (2024)

Media coverage: Washington Center for Equitable Growth

The temporary 2021 expansion of the Child Tax Credit (CTC) was intended to reduce child poverty during the hardships of the COVID-19 pandemic. The expansion’s elimination of an existing phase-in with earnings, however, potentially disincentivized labor supply, raising concerns that it would reduce parent employment. We empirically test for employment effects using difference-in-differences analyses with Current Population Survey data. Across many specifications and multiple sub-groups, we find very small, inconsistently signed, statistically insignificant impacts of the 2021 CTC on both labor force participation and employment among adults living in households with children.

The effects of an unconditional cash transfer on parents' mental health in the United States (with Z. Parolin), Health Economics (2024)

Media coverage: VoxEU

The provision of unconditional cash transfers may be one effective policy strategy for improving mental health, but causal evidence on their efficacy is rare in high-income countries. This study investigates the mental health consequences of the 2021 child tax credit (CTC) expansion, which temporarily provided unconditional and monthly cash support to most families with children in the United States. Using data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, we exploit differences in CTC benefit levels for households with younger versus older children. More generous CTC transfers are associated with a decrease in the number of bad mental health days reported by the parents. The effect materializes after the third monthly payment and disappears when the benefits are withdrawn. The CTC's improvement of mental health is larger for more credit-constrained individuals, including low-income households, women, and younger respondents.

Joint provision of income and employment support: Evidence from a crisis response in Uruguay (with V. Escudero and E. L. Mourelo), World Development (2020)

Media coverage: VoxEU

Integrated approaches providing assistance to jobless individuals through the combination of income support and active labour market policies have been increasingly advocated in the policy debate, both by policy makers and international organizations. By helping people tackle immediate needs while promoting labour market reinsertion, these combined approaches are expected to improve labour market and social conditions in a sustainable manner. However, evidence on the effectiveness of this policy approach is extremely scant in emerging and developing economies. This paper studies a pivotal example of this policy trend through the evaluation of a public works programme provided alongside a cash transfer as part of a comprehensive social assistance programme that reached around 10 per cent of households in Uruguay between 2005 and 2007. We use rich administrative data of panel nature to study the effects of (i) participating in the public works programme (active component), (ii) receiving the cash transfer (income-support component), and (iii) benefiting jointly of the active and income-support programmes. Results on measures of labour market participation, employment quality, and civil society participation are non-significant across the board. Point estimates are nevertheless of the expected sign and of reasonable magnitude, suggesting that the programme came close to achieving its objective. Possible reasons of the limited effectiveness of the programme could include limited treatment intensity and lack of human capital accumulation.

Active Labour Market Programmes in Latin America and the Caribbean: Evidence from a Meta-Analysis (with V. Escudero, J. Kluve and E. Lopez Mourelo), The Journal of Development Studies (2019)

We present a systematic review and meta-analysis of impact evaluations of active labour market programmes (ALMPs) in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). We extract 296 impact estimates from 51 programme evaluations to analyse the effects of participation on employment, earnings, hours worked, and formality. Our analysis finds that the probabilities of being employed and in formal employment are the labour market indicators most likely to be positively affected by ALMPs in LAC. Moreover, ALMPs are more successful among women and youth and when they are implemented during periods of economic expansion. Training programmes increase both formal employment and earnings; training is particularly effective when it is more intensive and when explicitly targeting poor individuals.

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