I am a fourth-year PhD student at the Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies in Pisa, working under the supervision of Maria Enrica Virgillito and Giovanni Dosi. My research lies at the intersection of labor economics, macroeconomic dynamics, and political economy. I study how (labor market) power and market structure shape income distribution, with a particular focus on worker bargaining power, the labor share, and the macroeconomic consequences of distributive conflict.

I pursue my research across complementary dimensions. At the macroeconomic level, I develop theoretical macrodynamic (reduced form) models and conduct empirical analysis of aggregate distributive-inflation regimes. At the meso and micro levels, I examine industry and firm-level occupational structures to understand how worker power affects income distribution, especially the declining labor share in US manufacturing and wage dynamics.

From January to June 2026, I will be a visiting PhD student at the Department of Economics, University of Massachusetts Amherst, under the supervision of Arin Dube.

Research Interests

• Labor Economics & Political Economy: Worker bargaining power, wage-setting mechanisms, labor share dynamics, income distribution

• Industrial Organization & Sectoral Heterogeneity: Technological regimes, market structure, occupational hierarchies within industry and firms

• Macroeconomic Dynamics: Nonlinear dynamics, distributive-inflation and learning regimes, aggregate consequences of distributive conflict

Contact

Email: davide.Usula@santannapisa.it
Office: Institute of Economics, Piazza Martiri della Libertà 33
Department: Institute of Economics
University: Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies
City: 56127 Pisa, Italy