  This paper presents the first empirical assessment of the causal relationship
between social capital and health in Italy. The analysis draws on the 2000 wave
of the Multipurpose Survey on Household conducted by the Italian Institute of
Statistics on a representative sample of the population (n = 46,868). Our
measure of social capital is the frequency of meetings with friends. Based on
IV and bivariate probit estimates, we find that individuals who meet friends
every day or at least two times a week are approximately 11% to 16% more likely
to report good health.
