A lustre of crisis is putting Italian families to the test. Not a day passes in which economic categories, trade unions, and consumer associations do not denounce the growing difficulties of families and a progressive decline in consumption. The Caritas reception centres are seeing an increase in the number of Italian families (and no longer just immigrants) coming to their offices to receive economic support.
The presence of charitable organisations collecting food for needy families at supermarket doors is becoming more frequent. As with the production system, however, the difficulties in economic conditions have not only arisen in recent years. Parallel to (and as a consequence of) the stagnation in productivity, household consumer spending has also been flying low. In the pre-crisis period (2000-2007) they grew by a total of 5.3 per cent, an average of 0.7 per cent per year. But with the onset of the crisis and up to 2011, they fell by 1.3% (Istat). According to the Ministry of Economy and Finance, 2012 closed with a very heavy -4.3% and the current year will be -1.7%. In short, a very negative bulletin on which the urgent measures for deficit reduction imposed on our country by European and international bodies have certainly weighed heavily, the actual effectiveness of which is now being reconsidered by those same players.
Compared to the other European countries that have had to carry out retrenchment operations, Italy has so far generally been better able to withstand the impact of the various fiscal measures and cuts, mainly by virtue of lower household debt and greater asset solidity. However, the choices of structural reforms not undertaken in previous years have simultaneously brought all the unresolved knots to the surface. There are no signs of an economic recovery, and this is fuelling a climate of uncertainty and mistrust that leads households to curb spending and consumption as much as possible.
These data alone explain the need and urgency to initiate measures to support a recovery in domestic demand, since we cannot live relying solely on the ability of our companies to be present in foreign markets. It should be remembered, in fact, that while exports are performing well, the vast majority of the production system is very small (9 out of 10 have fewer than 10 employees) and operates on a domestic market, where the concept of domestic now also encompasses Europe. And if domestic demand does not pick up quickly, the difficulties are bound to increase.
This long period of no economic recovery has seen households engaged in careful management of their savings and consumption. Thus, spending strategies have been reshaped, but to try to maintain the status standards achieved, resources accumulated in previous years have been drawn down. However, if one continues to erode what has been set aside without having the capacity to restore it adequately, the risks of relative deprivation increase considerably.
