A sharp and honest piece — the kind of writing that doesn't ask for your approval before making its argument. The biographical lens on Meloni is particularly effective; you've made her trajectory do analytical work that most political commentary leaves to abstraction.
One passage stayed with me after finishing: your observation that Italy's economy is grounded in authentic production — artisanship, design, genuine scientific output — rather than foreign capital or financial engineering. That's a thesis worth an essay of its own. The tension between that tangible economic identity and the Brussels-led framework that seems structurally indifferent to it strikes me as one of the more underexplored fault lines in European discourse. I'd read that piece.
I defended her for a long time and gave her a lot of understanding and much benefit of the doubt because politics is slow work. Initially I thought she was playing the long game but now I have my doubts. It’s starting to look a bit like a lack of ambition. However, she has made some progress on migration by getting the EU to look at things like article 8 of the refugee convention, so I will give her some recognition and praise for that. But overall I can’t help but be disappointed. And that’s even putting aside that she’s Laziale pretending to be a romanista for votes…
I've been going to Italy since the 90s. Everytime, more foreigners, more graffiti, less dynamism. Sick woman of Europe? I feel like I'm losing a lover.
I read this with a home-made Negroni in hand. Meloni meant well, but like so many others abandoned the agendas that got her elected. Meloni’s failure is particularly disheartening because Italy is uniquely positioned amongst its EU peers to reverse the stupidity of 30 years of Malthusian policy. Reasons you cited: globally exportable brands and IP, hard working population, true national identity.
Of the many missed opportunities, which would’ve supported a pro-natalist agenda much better than a “soak the boomers” strategy- she could’ve struck Italy’s own agreements with likeminded trading partners, to enhance competitiveness in commodities and industry, driving job and wage growth. She could’ve lowered taxes and the ridiculous burdens on small businesses in the country. She would’ve antagonized her EU peers, but this would’ve served her well as voters beyond Italy would see that growth could be achieved via alternative tax, energy and trade policies.
The inertias of bureaucracy, geopolitics and corporate entrenchment require a certain degree of savagery to overcome. For all of Trump’s many faults, he is uniquely capable of leading a radical resistance to this inertia, because he (1) has operated in this system his whole life, and (2) isn’t afraid of his own reputation - on the contrary, I think he feasts on the hate.
Some Italian friends, supporters of Meloni, hoped she would channel this type of energy when elected. Her unbecoming accent was an asset to the electorate.
Good article. What could Meloni have done differently? All of Western Europe has lost its hope for a better future. People don't have babies when there is no hope. This makes me sad to write this.
A real problem on economic issues for Meloni is that she and her party have abandoned the corporatist model that the old MSI had embraced and replaced it with the typical neoliberal doctrines imported from America that so many other parties on the Euro Right have also embraced (or have been pressured/enticed to embrace by big business backers).
This is most likely the heart of the reason why Italy's economic woes and bad birth rates are not being solved. Instead of a strong, authoritative state insisting on necessary reforms and requiring that Italian business leaders get behind them, the government remains timidly at the service of the rich and their demands for things like endless cheap labor and the failure to invest in the future of Italian youth and families.
Until a leader or party arises that has the courage to do these things, nothing is ever likely to be corrected, and decline will continue unabated.
You are spot-on with your analysis of Meloni, hopefully she reads your piece and gets back to her gritty working-class persona. On the strategy, I need to push back. The real issue with Italy is the South, as the East is for Germany. There is a vicious circle where the South is non-competitive and acts as both a talent reservoir for the North and as a captive market, paradoxically subsidized through the taxes of Northern workers. It has the effect of creating wage deflation, housing inflation and a negative incentive to innovate for Northern companies.
This vicious cycle needs to be broken, but doing so is the least political expedient thing one could imagine. It would require heavily investing in infrastructure and the rule of law in the South, removing most of the gatekeeping power of Southern politicians, cutting them off from any funding that it isn't for basic public services, and at the same time implementing a strong business deregulation policy. It's a sort of shock therapy, but it will be beneficial mostly for those young people who are energetic and creative and that wouldn't depend upon bureaucrats and politicians to express their animal spirits.
It's a standard pattern that any strongly left or right wing campaign immediately abandons most of its principles when it wins - it's easy to point the finger at EU technocrats in Italy's (and Greece's) case.
One thing that's perhaps under-emphasised here is the massive generational divide in work. Older workers have fantastic contracts and good incomes, younger workers get junk contracts and a pittance - I used to know a 30-something lawyer whose monthly income was under 1000 euros because the industry knew anyone would still take the job. There's an over-reliance on working for the state, and too many private companies are run by elderly founders as kind of archaic padrone who refuse to change of hand over before selling out to a foreign (usually German) company when they get into their 80s.
Birth rates taken as a whole is a mistake, and this puts a stain on an otherwise great piece.
Birth rates should be divided into women or couples that have at least one child and women or couples that do not have children.
These two cohorts have radically different motivations behind their reason to not have children.
The biggest impact on the declining fertility rates is social superspecificity. There is also a discussion about what is considered a decline, because comparing today’s data with historical data is misleading.
She lost me when she did a selfie with her new bff Modi at the colisseum.
I thought she was all about rejecting creepy rapacious male-dominated cultures? Turns out she wants to import the worst male sex-pests in the entire world.
Analisi interessante. Quando si parla del futuro dell’Italia entrano in gioco tanti aspetti insieme: economia, lavoro, potere d’acquisto e fiducia delle famiglie. Sono temi che incidono concretamente sulla vita quotidiana e rendono il dibattito ancora più importante. Anche per capire meglio l’impatto economico personale, strumenti pratici come https://calcolostipendiosnetto.it.com/ possono essere utili.
Honest commentary, I don't agree on all points but overal shareable. The unsaid remains the lack actual competence: Meloni has been very good while barking at the opposition, whereas on power, she surrounded herself with a poor, corrupted set of ministers, 'burocreats', if we wanna be polite. She holds no ability to do anything herself, nor the political structure this country sinks in allows for any real change to be even through of. The problem is mostly cultural. Italy deserves to actually fall in a default state, its populace deserve to once again meet true poverty, higher death rate and the definitive shattering of the welfare state. Meloni is not that different from whoever governed this country since the end of the first republic: an ill-informed socialist, who can't relinquish the idea that the state has to provide some sort of inefficient, undeserved aid to older people, rather than build an environment which actually fosters growth and wealth.
Woman doesn't realize the problem of feminism. What else is new? If women didn't vote would legal and illegal immigration be the same? If 51% of women work then the job market has been grown by 1/3, how does that not make wages lower?
Yes men are more feminized, a few dudes being "macho" is not counter evidence, even women who claim that they are not feminists have feminist presuppositions making them difficult to date, they are materialistic and egoistic.
The part where the reasons for the low fertility rate contradicts itself with your conclusions and contains mistaken assumptions. In the sense that a lot of info war propaganda we're all bombarded with wants us to ignore the primacy of the economic aspect: families with numerous children need a primary breadwinner able to provide or in the case of welfare, are addicted to state help. In Italy for instance religious communities like 'comunione e liberazione' get around this by forming formidable solidarity mechanisms. Also, mass immigration contributes to keeping wages low (as you wrote in your conclusion), but the same is true about internal immigration (south to north). We Italians need to start accepting that the North/South development issues were intentionally created. Obviously it's a much more complex issue than just a few words in a comment.
In terms of your conclusions, the first one (immigration) is clearly partly why FdI won and the government is failing on this (as you also pointed out; 450k legal immigrants becomes 1.5m with family reunification and it's too much too quickly to absorb without consequences on culture; it's interesting to note the Italian Left is just as insane as the USA progressives on this issue).
The second conclusion (bureaucracy) is shareable, except Italy actually works perfectly for how its been designed and for whom it's been designed. There are a number of instances of regions, and individuals, who have been able to reform public management styles, only to then be ignored or removed. This means that it's not accidental if Italy appears to be so dysfunctional to the casual observer who is unable to look under the surface. Culturally, Elite power still acts as a constraint to creating a successfully competitive economy.
Your third point (boomer costs) is unworkable. Many families survive on the benefits given to boomers, like pensions. I've only ever heard the phrase "diritti acquisti" in Italy to justify ill-gotten gains. Unfortunately the pension system acts like a carrot and a stick holding the entire country hostage. So it's natural that the private citizen attempts to save as many resources as they can and invest in property. To then blame the private citizen for trying to save themselves from an unjust system is a terrible strategy.
I quite enjoyed reading about Giorgia. Unfortunately you, like most Italians, missed the fact that she was pre-selected to win the 2022 elections by her exclusion from the Draghi government. In this sense she's a team player and she clearly isn't willing to rock the boat. Italy is both lucky and unlucky. It's lucky because old global wealth includes Italian families, so Italy is protected, but it's unlucky because it's not really a sovereign country. France, Brussels and especially Washington DC and TelAviv make the important decisions about Italy. Mattarella, like the Italian President's before him, is there to make sure of that.
Grazie mille per quello Alessandra. Io ho fatto un scambio culturale a Rovereto dieci anni fa alla fine di scuola secondaria da Australia, poiche' l'italia e' un paese molto vicino dal mio cuore.
Quindi, primeramente io sono stato piu' rilievato che la Meloni c'e' stata elezionata per cambiare quelli questioni irreconciabili nella politca italiana cui primi primo ministri non abbiano avuto la voglia di cambiare. Pero' anche sto vedendo problemi con la sua termine nel potere al momento.
A sharp and honest piece — the kind of writing that doesn't ask for your approval before making its argument. The biographical lens on Meloni is particularly effective; you've made her trajectory do analytical work that most political commentary leaves to abstraction.
One passage stayed with me after finishing: your observation that Italy's economy is grounded in authentic production — artisanship, design, genuine scientific output — rather than foreign capital or financial engineering. That's a thesis worth an essay of its own. The tension between that tangible economic identity and the Brussels-led framework that seems structurally indifferent to it strikes me as one of the more underexplored fault lines in European discourse. I'd read that piece.
I defended her for a long time and gave her a lot of understanding and much benefit of the doubt because politics is slow work. Initially I thought she was playing the long game but now I have my doubts. It’s starting to look a bit like a lack of ambition. However, she has made some progress on migration by getting the EU to look at things like article 8 of the refugee convention, so I will give her some recognition and praise for that. But overall I can’t help but be disappointed. And that’s even putting aside that she’s Laziale pretending to be a romanista for votes…
I've been going to Italy since the 90s. Everytime, more foreigners, more graffiti, less dynamism. Sick woman of Europe? I feel like I'm losing a lover.
I read this with a home-made Negroni in hand. Meloni meant well, but like so many others abandoned the agendas that got her elected. Meloni’s failure is particularly disheartening because Italy is uniquely positioned amongst its EU peers to reverse the stupidity of 30 years of Malthusian policy. Reasons you cited: globally exportable brands and IP, hard working population, true national identity.
Of the many missed opportunities, which would’ve supported a pro-natalist agenda much better than a “soak the boomers” strategy- she could’ve struck Italy’s own agreements with likeminded trading partners, to enhance competitiveness in commodities and industry, driving job and wage growth. She could’ve lowered taxes and the ridiculous burdens on small businesses in the country. She would’ve antagonized her EU peers, but this would’ve served her well as voters beyond Italy would see that growth could be achieved via alternative tax, energy and trade policies.
The inertias of bureaucracy, geopolitics and corporate entrenchment require a certain degree of savagery to overcome. For all of Trump’s many faults, he is uniquely capable of leading a radical resistance to this inertia, because he (1) has operated in this system his whole life, and (2) isn’t afraid of his own reputation - on the contrary, I think he feasts on the hate.
Some Italian friends, supporters of Meloni, hoped she would channel this type of energy when elected. Her unbecoming accent was an asset to the electorate.
Good article. What could Meloni have done differently? All of Western Europe has lost its hope for a better future. People don't have babies when there is no hope. This makes me sad to write this.
Good article.
A real problem on economic issues for Meloni is that she and her party have abandoned the corporatist model that the old MSI had embraced and replaced it with the typical neoliberal doctrines imported from America that so many other parties on the Euro Right have also embraced (or have been pressured/enticed to embrace by big business backers).
This is most likely the heart of the reason why Italy's economic woes and bad birth rates are not being solved. Instead of a strong, authoritative state insisting on necessary reforms and requiring that Italian business leaders get behind them, the government remains timidly at the service of the rich and their demands for things like endless cheap labor and the failure to invest in the future of Italian youth and families.
Until a leader or party arises that has the courage to do these things, nothing is ever likely to be corrected, and decline will continue unabated.
You are spot-on with your analysis of Meloni, hopefully she reads your piece and gets back to her gritty working-class persona. On the strategy, I need to push back. The real issue with Italy is the South, as the East is for Germany. There is a vicious circle where the South is non-competitive and acts as both a talent reservoir for the North and as a captive market, paradoxically subsidized through the taxes of Northern workers. It has the effect of creating wage deflation, housing inflation and a negative incentive to innovate for Northern companies.
This vicious cycle needs to be broken, but doing so is the least political expedient thing one could imagine. It would require heavily investing in infrastructure and the rule of law in the South, removing most of the gatekeeping power of Southern politicians, cutting them off from any funding that it isn't for basic public services, and at the same time implementing a strong business deregulation policy. It's a sort of shock therapy, but it will be beneficial mostly for those young people who are energetic and creative and that wouldn't depend upon bureaucrats and politicians to express their animal spirits.
I'd pretty much agree.
It's a standard pattern that any strongly left or right wing campaign immediately abandons most of its principles when it wins - it's easy to point the finger at EU technocrats in Italy's (and Greece's) case.
One thing that's perhaps under-emphasised here is the massive generational divide in work. Older workers have fantastic contracts and good incomes, younger workers get junk contracts and a pittance - I used to know a 30-something lawyer whose monthly income was under 1000 euros because the industry knew anyone would still take the job. There's an over-reliance on working for the state, and too many private companies are run by elderly founders as kind of archaic padrone who refuse to change of hand over before selling out to a foreign (usually German) company when they get into their 80s.
Birth rates taken as a whole is a mistake, and this puts a stain on an otherwise great piece.
Birth rates should be divided into women or couples that have at least one child and women or couples that do not have children.
These two cohorts have radically different motivations behind their reason to not have children.
The biggest impact on the declining fertility rates is social superspecificity. There is also a discussion about what is considered a decline, because comparing today’s data with historical data is misleading.
She lost me when she did a selfie with her new bff Modi at the colisseum.
I thought she was all about rejecting creepy rapacious male-dominated cultures? Turns out she wants to import the worst male sex-pests in the entire world.
Analisi interessante. Quando si parla del futuro dell’Italia entrano in gioco tanti aspetti insieme: economia, lavoro, potere d’acquisto e fiducia delle famiglie. Sono temi che incidono concretamente sulla vita quotidiana e rendono il dibattito ancora più importante. Anche per capire meglio l’impatto economico personale, strumenti pratici come https://calcolostipendiosnetto.it.com/ possono essere utili.
Honest commentary, I don't agree on all points but overal shareable. The unsaid remains the lack actual competence: Meloni has been very good while barking at the opposition, whereas on power, she surrounded herself with a poor, corrupted set of ministers, 'burocreats', if we wanna be polite. She holds no ability to do anything herself, nor the political structure this country sinks in allows for any real change to be even through of. The problem is mostly cultural. Italy deserves to actually fall in a default state, its populace deserve to once again meet true poverty, higher death rate and the definitive shattering of the welfare state. Meloni is not that different from whoever governed this country since the end of the first republic: an ill-informed socialist, who can't relinquish the idea that the state has to provide some sort of inefficient, undeserved aid to older people, rather than build an environment which actually fosters growth and wealth.
Woman doesn't realize the problem of feminism. What else is new? If women didn't vote would legal and illegal immigration be the same? If 51% of women work then the job market has been grown by 1/3, how does that not make wages lower?
Yes men are more feminized, a few dudes being "macho" is not counter evidence, even women who claim that they are not feminists have feminist presuppositions making them difficult to date, they are materialistic and egoistic.
Good article otherwise
Interesting essay. A few comments below.
The part where the reasons for the low fertility rate contradicts itself with your conclusions and contains mistaken assumptions. In the sense that a lot of info war propaganda we're all bombarded with wants us to ignore the primacy of the economic aspect: families with numerous children need a primary breadwinner able to provide or in the case of welfare, are addicted to state help. In Italy for instance religious communities like 'comunione e liberazione' get around this by forming formidable solidarity mechanisms. Also, mass immigration contributes to keeping wages low (as you wrote in your conclusion), but the same is true about internal immigration (south to north). We Italians need to start accepting that the North/South development issues were intentionally created. Obviously it's a much more complex issue than just a few words in a comment.
In terms of your conclusions, the first one (immigration) is clearly partly why FdI won and the government is failing on this (as you also pointed out; 450k legal immigrants becomes 1.5m with family reunification and it's too much too quickly to absorb without consequences on culture; it's interesting to note the Italian Left is just as insane as the USA progressives on this issue).
The second conclusion (bureaucracy) is shareable, except Italy actually works perfectly for how its been designed and for whom it's been designed. There are a number of instances of regions, and individuals, who have been able to reform public management styles, only to then be ignored or removed. This means that it's not accidental if Italy appears to be so dysfunctional to the casual observer who is unable to look under the surface. Culturally, Elite power still acts as a constraint to creating a successfully competitive economy.
Your third point (boomer costs) is unworkable. Many families survive on the benefits given to boomers, like pensions. I've only ever heard the phrase "diritti acquisti" in Italy to justify ill-gotten gains. Unfortunately the pension system acts like a carrot and a stick holding the entire country hostage. So it's natural that the private citizen attempts to save as many resources as they can and invest in property. To then blame the private citizen for trying to save themselves from an unjust system is a terrible strategy.
I quite enjoyed reading about Giorgia. Unfortunately you, like most Italians, missed the fact that she was pre-selected to win the 2022 elections by her exclusion from the Draghi government. In this sense she's a team player and she clearly isn't willing to rock the boat. Italy is both lucky and unlucky. It's lucky because old global wealth includes Italian families, so Italy is protected, but it's unlucky because it's not really a sovereign country. France, Brussels and especially Washington DC and TelAviv make the important decisions about Italy. Mattarella, like the Italian President's before him, is there to make sure of that.
Grazie mille per quello Alessandra. Io ho fatto un scambio culturale a Rovereto dieci anni fa alla fine di scuola secondaria da Australia, poiche' l'italia e' un paese molto vicino dal mio cuore.
Quindi, primeramente io sono stato piu' rilievato che la Meloni c'e' stata elezionata per cambiare quelli questioni irreconciabili nella politca italiana cui primi primo ministri non abbiano avuto la voglia di cambiare. Pero' anche sto vedendo problemi con la sua termine nel potere al momento.