Hi, I am currently a Postdoctoral Researcher at Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM) in the ‘Labour in the Low Carbon Transition’ (LILT) research group.
I am an applied environmental economist studying how climate change affects health and labor markets, exploring its unequal impacts, long-term consequences, and the potential of adaptation strategies.
I obtained my PhD in Science and Management of Climate Change from Ca’Foscari University in May 2025.
Curriculum Vitae (Updated November 2025)
Email: giulia.valenti@feem.it, giulia.valenti@unive.it
Bluesky: @giuliavalenti.bsky.social; LinkedIn: giulia-valenti
Office: Corso Magenta, 63, 20123 Milano MI
Working Papers
(with Filippo Pavanello)
Abstract (click to expand): In 2004, Italy introduced a national program to address heat-related health risks, combining public awareness campaigns, heat-wave warning systems, and hospital protocols. Leveraging administrative mortality data and high-frequency temperature variation, we show that the program reduced heat-related mortality by more than 57% on days at or above 30°C. To identify the mechanisms, we exploit the staggered introduction of heat-wave warning systems across provinces and show that treated areas experienced substantially larger reductions in heat-related mortality. We further document that information disclosure plays a key role in driving these reductions. Overall, our findings underscore the importance of public adaptation policies that rely on information provision to cost-effectively mitigate the health impacts of extreme temperatures.
(with Francesco Vona)
Abstract (click to expand): We investigate the effects of heat waves on individual earnings using rich retrospective panel data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE), matched with high-resolution weather data from the E-OBS dataset. Our analysis covers over 32000 workers across 14 European countries from 1955 to 2019, spanning a wide range of sectors and occupations. Our identification leverages plausibly exogenous variation in heat-wave exposure by comparing individuals from different cohorts within the same generation and sub-region, while controlling for individual fixed effects, occupational sorting, and covariate balance. We find that each additional day of a heat wave reduces annual earnings by 0.31%, corresponding on average to a loss of $159.63 per year. The effect is particularly pronounced in outdoor heat-exposed occupations, with an average annual loss of $272.57, and is especially strong among workers performing manual and clerical tasks. Importantly, the impact is substantially mitigated in countries with highly centralized collective bargaining systems. Finally, our findings indicate that heat waves exacerbate existing income inequalities, disproportionately harming individuals with lower education, lower income, and disadvantaged family backgrounds.
Temperature and Health Capital: Long-Term Consequences of Exposure in Childhood
(with Catarina Midões, Francesco Vona and Enrica De Cian)
Abstract (click to expand): This paper investigates the impact of temperature shocks, measured by the duration of heat and cold waves, on a comprehensive health measure. The proposed metric encompasses a broad range of illnesses that can be triggered or exacerbated by temperature exposure. Within a human capital framework, we approximate health capital loss using the number of days lost due to disability, quantifying the severity of poor health across various life stages. Our results reveal that exposure to heat waves during childhood, particularly before the age of 10, has long-term effects on adult health. It increases the likelihood of developing illnesses and significantly affects both the severity (measured by days lost due to disability) and the duration (years impacted by illness) of morbidity in later life. The heightened sensitivity to high temperatures during childhood can be attributed to physiological factors in development that limit the ability to regulate body temperature effectively. Furthermore, children may have a restricted capacity to express discomfort caused by thermal stress and to adopt protective measures against extreme heat. Our findings show that the effect of exposure during childhood is persistent over time and that childhood exposure significantly shapes the subsequent accumulation of health capital, with potential compensatory behaviours appearing unable to fully mitigate the consequences. Our findings contribute to the assessment of climate change damages and their distributional implications by investigating long-term health consequences. Additionally, our study provides valuable insights into the literature on early childhood shocks, by considering the under-explored role of temperature shocks.
Work in Progress
The (long-term) consequences of austerity policy on mortality and temperature relationship: Evidence from Italy
(with Filippo Pavanello)
Macroeconomic Repercussions of Heatwave Impacts on Labor Productivity in European Regions
(with Amsalu Woldie Yalew, Francesco Bosello, Catarina Midões and Gabriele Standardi)
Presentations
2025: Internal Seminar at the Policy Evaluation Lab, PIK (invited, scheduled November 2025), 66th Annual Conference of the Italian Economic Association (SIE), EAERE Annual Conference, AERE Summer Conference, IZA Workshop on Climate and Environmental Economics, ifo Workshop on the Economics of Adaptation to Climate Change, Workshop IdEP in Sustainable Economics, IAERE Annual Conference
2024: Internal Seminar at the Department of Environmental Science and Policy of the University of Milan (invited), EAERE Annual Conference, Early Career Workshop on the Environment, Climate Change and Diasters: Socio-Economic Impacts and Adaptations (GSSI), Maastricht Workshop on Applied Economics of the Environment, IAERE Annual Conference, 4th Italian Workshop of Econometrics and Empirical Economics: Climate and Energy Econometrics, Inequality and the Environment Symposium for Early-career Reaserchers (Sciences Po’s Center for Research on Social InequalitieS, World Inequality Lab)
2023: SISC 11th Annual Conference
2022: XIV ESPAnet Italian Conference, ETUI Conference - The nexus of climate change and welfare: towards a new concept of the welfare state
Teaching
Fall 2024, 2025: TA in Global and Climate Change Economics (20h), MSc in Environmental and Food Economics (University of Milan)
Spring 2025: TA in Economics and Policy of Climate Change (22h), BA in Environmental Science and Policy (University of Milan)
Fall 2021: TA in Mathematics (30h), BA in Economics, Markets and Finance (Ca’ Foscari University of Venice)
Fall 2020: TA in Statistics (30h), BA in Physical Engineering (Ca’ Foscari University of Venice); TA in Calculus (45h), BA in Physical Engineering (Ca’ Foscari University of Venice)
Blogs
L’infanzia sotto attacco climatico, Equilibri Magazine, 2025
Diseguaglianza economica e emissioni nocive: quale relazione?, Il Menabò di Etica e Economia, 2020
Additional Info
Website: Thanks to Gautam Rao for making his GitHub repository available.
