Selection bias ed incentivi alle imprese nei programmi per lo sviluppo locale: una valutazione ex-post

This paper focuses on the evaluation of an aid scheme included in a larger local development program realized in Italy during the 2000-2006 cycle of EU Structural Funds. It follows a previous analysis (Cusimano, Mazzola, 2014) on the ex-post evaluation of the effects of the aid schemes included in the so-called territorial integrated projects (tips) and aims at identifying the possible presence of selection bias in measuring the effectiveness of the policy. After running an empirical analysis based on several propensity score matching (psm) methods, we show that, at least partially, the positive results previously obtained may not be related to an effective success of the policy, but could indicate a distortive effect of the selection process.