A report from the Di Vittorio Foundation (the national CGIL institute for economic and social research) points the finger at the wage gap between Italian employees and those of the other five major economies in the euro area. In 2019, the average Italian wages, in the OECD statistics, are equal to about 30 thousand euros gross per year, a slight increase compared to 2000, but a decrease compared to 2007. Only Spain has slightly lower wages. As can be seen from the table, in Italy 27% of employees have wages below 15 thousand euros gross per year.
The gap compared to other countries, already wide and widened between 2007 and 2019. In this period, German wages increased by 5,430 euros (equal to + 14.7%) while Italian wages decreased by 596 euros (-1.9%). In recent years the Netherlands and Belgium, with the highest average wages, have nevertheless registered growth; Germany and France, with average wages at an intermediate level among the six countries, recorded the highest wage increases; finally, Italy and Spain, with the lowest average wages, are both characterized by long-term stagnation. Tax leverage does not improve things, quite the contrary. The data show that in 2019 Italy recorded the highest tax wedge (39.2%) in the case of single-income couples with two children and a salary equivalent to the average one estimated by the OECD. The Italian net family wage is worth a share that fluctuates between 60 and 70% of the German one, also due to a taxation system that penalizes lower gross family wages in Italy.
Furthermore, Italy has a high average number of hours worked per year per employee and at the same time the lowest share of wages as a percentage of GDP. How can this be explained? For Fulvio Fammoni, at the helm of the Di Vittorio Foundation, “In Italy we work more because of the low technological capacity and low investments in innovation of our economic system but we are paid much less. In 2020 the pandemic and the consequent productive and employment repercussions will worsen this picture. an intervention on the quantity but also on the quality of employment that stops the continuous increase of poor work; a new phase of bargaining that renews national contracts that have been blocked for too long, a tax reform that recovers resources for wages.
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