Salary alarm: we are the lowest paid in all of Europe

At the center of the problem is the growth of prices with incomes that remain at a standstill, all aggravated by stagnating productivity

ROME – Then one wonders about the discontent rising among the citizens. Various surveys report the dissatisfaction of most people with their jobs, now the new OECD data offer a key to understanding the reasons. Among the large European economies, we are the country in which real wages have fallen the most: 7.3 percent less in 2022 compared to the previous year, even 12 percent compared to 2008, the year of the great financial crisis.

At the center of the problem is price growth with incomes remaining at a standstill, all aggravated by stagnating productivity. Today the average salary in Italy is 35 thousand euros a year compared to 46 thousand euros in other European countries. We are talking about real salaries, those compared to prices and therefore the real power to purchase goods and services with our income from work. Scholars have long pointed out the crisis points: demographic decline, elderly and poorly educated workforce, not very dynamic capital markets, small size of companies, a still family-type capitalism centered on the logic of control.

This is the alarming picture, which for many citizens is now a serious daily problem, however absent from the political debate, all focused on talking about what will happen in years, on bonuses and referendums on the Jobs Act , which have nothing to do with the drama of wages with ever decreasing purchasing power. A growing social drama, which no political force, however, seems to have the courage to face.