@techreport{eprints3893,
          author = {Loredana Fattorini and Mahdi Ghodsi and Armando Rungi},
       publisher = {IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca},
            type = {EIC working paper series},
           month = {February},
     institution = {IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca},
            year = {2018},
           title = {Cohesion Policy Meets Heterogeneous Firms},
             url = {http://eprints.imtlucca.it/3893/},
        abstract = {In this paper, we empirically test the effects of the EU ?cohesion policy? on the performance of
about 500,000 European manufacturing firms after combining regional policy data at NUTS-
2 level with firm-level data. In a framework of heterogeneous firms and different absorptive
capacity of regions, we show that financing of ?cohesion policy? by European Regional Development
Fund (ERDF) aimed at direct investments in R\&D correlates with improvement of firms?
productivity in a region. Conversely, funding designed at overall Business Support correlates
with negative productivity growth rates. In both cases, we registered an asymmetric impact
along the firms? productivity distribution, where a stronger impact can be detected in the first
quartile, i.e. less efficient firms in a region. We finally argue that considering the heterogeneity
of firms allows a better assessment of the impact of ?cohesion policy? measures.},
        keywords = {Keywords: firm performance, total factor productivity, cross-country analysis, convergence,
regional policy.  -  
JEL Classification Numbers: D22, D24, E23, F15, L25.}
}