Symbol photo: a family in front of a delicatessen in Rome
Poverty in Italy: The country is the third largest economy in the EU, but many people do not get a piece of the pie. Every tenth person lives in poverty in Italy. How unconcerned children can start life depends on three factors.
This is poverty in Italy
Italy is the eighth largest economy in the world, the third strongest economic power in the European Union. The majority of the population does not benefit from this. Out of almost 60 million people in Italy, 5.6 million live in poverty - almost every 10th Italian! 2.9 million people in Italy even live below the poverty line!
According to the "Istituto Nazionale di Statistica", at what point does one become "poor" in Italy?
| Household size | Poverty line/month |
|---|---|
| 1 person | 629,29 € |
| 2 persons | 1.048,81 € |
| 3 persons | 1.394,92 € |
| 4 persons | 1.709,56 € |
| 5 persons | 1.992,74 € |
| 6 persons | 2.265,43 € |
| 7 and more persons | 2.517,14 € |
Child poverty in Italy
In Italy, about 1.4 million children are affected by absolute poverty. That means every 7th child, in southern Italy it is even every 6th child. Nationally, this number remained relatively stable from 2020 to 2021, with a relative worsening of the situation for children in central Italy over the same period.
Whether children in Italy grow up in poverty is strongly dependent on three factors: 1. their parents' occupation, 2. their nationality and 3. their place of residence:
- 16.1 per cent of worker households with children are affected by poverty, 27.2 per cent of jobseeker households with children.
- 36.2 percent of foreign households with minors are affected by poverty, but only 8.6 percent of Italian households with minors. If one parent of the minors is foreign, the figure is 30.7 per cent.
- Children are more likely to live in poverty if they grow up in a metropolitan area. For cities with more than 50,000 people, the share of child poverty was 13.2 per cent, for cities with fewer inhabitants it was 11.1 per cent.
Source: IStat, July 2022 (figures from 2021)
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Living below the poverty line in Italy
The social gap in Italy: money in the north, poverty in the south. The risk of living in poverty is more than four times higher in the south. The Basilicata region is Italy's sad frontrunner.
Basilicata is the poorest, economically most backward region in Italy. About 20 percent of the population still live from agriculture, significantly more than the Italian average of 8 percent. The region does not have its own airport.
The only large-scale enterprise is a Fiat plant in Melfi, which was set up in the early 1990s with state subsidies. In 2004, production went on strike because wages here were 20 per cent lower than in the rest of Italy. In 2010 there were strikes again because staff were being cut.
The three richest and three poorest regions in Italy
Source: Statista 2021 (IStat 2020 figures)
These are the percentages in the 20 regions of Italy
| Regions | Share of households living below the poverty line |
| Basilicata | 23,4 % |
| Calabria | 20,8 % |
| Campania | 20,8 % |
| Apulia | 18,1 % |
| Molise | 17,9 % |
| Sicily | 17,7 % |
| Sardinia | 13,9 % |
| Abruzzo | 12 % |
| Brands | 9,3 % |
| Umbria | 8 % |
| Liguria | 6,9 % |
| Friuli Venezia Giulia | 6,8 % |
| Veneto | 6,7 % |
| Lombardy | 6,7 % |
| Tuscany | 5,9 % |
| Piedmont | 5,7 % |
| Latium | 5,7 % |
| Aosta Valley | 5,4 % |
| Emilia-Romagna | 5,3 % |
| Trentino-Alto Adige | 4,3 % |
Source: statista 2022/Istat, July 2021
With only about half a million inhabitants, the Basilicata region is very sparsely populated. Between 1950 and 1970 alone, a third of the population emigrated. The spiral of poverty in Italy.
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written by Annie Kayser, first published 1 October 2022
