The chapter by Bonato, Faini and Ratti (hereafter BFR) examines the debt decision by Italian firms during the 1980s. The chapter was part of a project investigating debt, investment and dividend decisions on the same data base, so I shall say something on the project as well as remark on the study. The BFR chapter presents both an accurate description of what has happened and an attempt to interpret the facts by applying theoretical models presented and discussed in the recent literature of other countries. I shall not deal with the discussion of the models; I shall rather focus on the problems arising when they are applied to the Italian context of the period.

The task of describing what has really happened should not be underestimated. It has entailed an extremely patient work of cleaning and reclassification of the data, which has been carried on for the first time within the present project. Praise is well deserved, and it should go together with hope that the job will be continued so as to provide longer series of comparable data, to the benefit of further research. In fact, by applying rigorous methods to the available data, the chapter shows how unsatisfactory our level of information is in the area of business decisions.