Structural change of employment dynamics by professions and regions in Italy

The Italian labour market has registered in the last decades a substantial growth in the qualification of human capital, mainly as a consequence of both active job policies and sectorial structural changes. The composition of professional figures has changed across sectors, in favour of the more qualified ones. The object of this paper is to analyse the structure by professions of employment in Italy in the period 1993-2003. The focus is on the adjustment of the composition of professional employment after cyclical shocks and structural changes. The analysis singles out professions with higher growth rates in employment, conditioned to sectorial effects, idiosyncratic trend and cyclical fluctuations. A particular attention is dedicated to the presence of polarization in employment dynamics between high skill and low skill professions.