An interesting Column of the Global Labour University provides a historical analysis of the socio-economic development. The country was one the fastest growing industrialised European countries between 1950 and 1990, partly due to low wages which helped competitiveness. The economic landscape was marked by the presence of a few major enterprises (including Fiat, Pirelli, Olivetti) and big state-owned enterprises (Ansaldo-Breda, Fin-cantieri, Eni, Enel, etc.) that provided long-term investment and innovation, facilitating the emergence of plenty of successful SMEs. Nowadays the country suffers a huge lack of long-term investment, especially after implementing austerity measures, and a very high rate of unemployment. The way out of the crisis is through fair taxation (of the resources accumulated in private wealth), an end to the fixation on state deficits, more priority to investment and a (German) wage-led increased demand.
English: http://www.global-labour-university.org ...
For more information, please contact the editor Jan Cremers, Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Labour Studies (AIAS) cbn-aias@uva.nl or the communications officer at the ETUI, Mariya Nikolova mnikolova@etui.org. For previous issues of the Collective bargaining newsletter please visit http://www.etui.org/E-Newsletters/Collective-bargaining-newsletter. You may find further information on the ETUI at www.etui.org, and on the AIAS at www.uva-aias.net.