the econometrics taught by larry klein, but also, in fact i would say especially, due to the quality assurance and encouragement provided by stefano. so, newly married, having just arrived with my wife at penn in late july, i immediately called stefano, who very kindly invited us over for dinner. once there, he launched into a lecture about the requirements of the school, the need to work hard, indeed very hard, as the completion of a phd there would be extremely demanding, about thinking twice before deciding that my wife should stay in the us with me while i was so heavily involved in completing my education, etc. all this in a gentlemanlike manner, but, i would say, not as pleasant as i might have hoped. in the end it all worked out for the best, but we still remember, and in later years we also discussed this with stefano himself, the feeling of slight uneasiness we felt upon leaving his house. well, stefano was indeed special, an extremely gentle and reserved person – i read deirdre mccloskey describing him as “ aristocratic ” in her moving obituary – and yet at the same time a very harsh and demanding one. once you got to know him, you discovered a genuine treasure. the problem was that this process was not quick, nor easy. and his character, his statements and answers were crucial for the way he chose to pursue his us academic career. he was always recognised as a stellar researcher, but his attitude as a cooperative and helpful faculty member was at times questionable and questioned, to say the least. i did not interact much with him as a scholar, not even during my time at penn, even though we exchanged papers and books over the years. our interests did indeed seem a bit distanced, 1 / 4 bis central bankers'speeches without much overlap. he seemed to pay little attention to the macroeconomic, monetary and policy issues i have mostly been working on over the years. for my part, i found his methodological work very insightful but did not have the time, or perhaps the patience, to follow him in his extremely detailed reconstructions of possible “ estimates ” of measures of economic activity, and possibly of well - being, essential to ensure the high quality historical studies that he considered necessary, and worth being involved with. however, i remember his contributions in the 1970s rather well, having read them both at penn and in rome, attending some of his seminars and discussions on railroads and real value added

both terms. both economic theory and proper measurement were prerequisites, in his view, to approaching economic history with sufficient confidence. and at times, though gifted with an exquisite, entertaining and amusing personality, he could be harsh in his judgments and appear rude in his statements. i suppose that this was his way of giving value to what he considered to be absolutely necessary in carrying out research that would stand the test of time and of new ideas. he was indeed a very logical, sophisticated thinker, a true, uncompromising, researcher. but as an academic, and a teacher, for a long time, at least during the time of his us peregrinations, he appeared to me to be rather unsettled, senza pace. so, i was indeed very surprised to discover how good and how appreciated a teacher and student adviser he ended up being in his second academic life in italy, in brescia and in rome. it was indeed somewhat of a surprise, although i should probably have expected it, for me also to find that he had written a thoughtful, clear, acute textbook of lectures in political economy, complete with exercises and very thought - provoking problem sets. unpublished in paper form, it 2 / 4 bis central bankers'speeches is easy to find it on the web ( lezioni di economia politica ). the tools of the art, the approach, are obviously neo - classical, but the way they are used, the awareness of their strengths and weaknesses, is an original and thoughtful contribution in itself. take, for example, the fundamental idea that the study of economics cannot do without ethics. he emphasises this idea in the concluding paragraph, in the 2001 edition, where he argues that such an important point had been clear for some decades, but often forgotten. translating from italian, these are his lines : only a few biased ideologues could argue that the market made ethics absolutely irrelevant ; rather, economics teaches us what can be done by appealing to interests rather than ethics, thus preserving the use of ethics for cases in which they are indispensable. if we want to save oil, for example, it is useless to appeal to the conscience of citizens, it is enough to increase the price of petrol and diesel ; if we want to protect the environment from petty pollution by the public we can only educate citizens to be conscientious. the memory of stefano ’ s long engagement and fruitful collaboration, and friendship