The Italian Government and Its Economy (Magic?)

After having been in Italy for about two months, the questions immediately began to develop and have consistently evolved ever since. “How the hell do people live here? I mean, how can they afford it? It’s so bloody expensive?” I kept asking Anna.

I think that the best way to explain this issue is to first provide you with some facts:

Gas and or Diesel prices are roughly twice the price of what we pay in the US.
Most all food is ala carte in restaurants, meaning that when you order chicken, that’s what you get, chicken and nothing else. This is an important fact because, when you add it all up (Soup or salad, a main dish, veggies and desert) you will generally find that it runs about 20.00 euro per person to eat (This would be a moderately priced restaurant, not including wine).
The exchange rate is currently 1.5 dollars to 1 euro, so that 20.00 euro dinner is $30.00 per person!
Real Estate costs (As best I can tell as we have looked at about seven or eight properties for sale) are roughly twice as much per square foot as they are in Los Angeles! This was a shocker to us!
Utilities are outrageous. We have a 2600 square foot place (And use only about 1800 square feet of it) and our utilities (Gas, phone and electric) run us an average of 1300.00 euro per month (This is about $2000.00)

The average Florentine makes only 1000.00 euro per month! When these numbers became clear to me over time, the question begged for an answer. How do they live? I asked my neighbor Jeanette Nardi this question. She simply turned around and looked at me with a smile on her face and said “Its magic!”

Obviously it can’t be magic, but I still can’t find a complete explanation for this enigma. Certainly the average Florentine can’t possibly live the life style that we are blessed to live here in Florence. I do know that many people rarely use their heaters with the exception of the coldest nights in winter (Where temperatures can get into the high 20’s) opting to simply bundle up in extra clothes and blankets to save on the heating bill. Additionally, the average apartment/flat here in Florence is somewhere around 800 square feet, keeping both electric and heating costs much lower. This certainly aids in the explanation as to why so many of my fellow “Gym Rats” use the showers at the club as it costs nothing to use the water at the Palestra versus at home.

Consider this additional fact about Italy, that the North is much better off financially than the South. If you look at a map of Italy, the North constitutes everything from Rome to the Swiss/Austrian border therefore certainly including Florence. Conditions are so bad in the South that some have told me that they think that Italy is in constant danger of civil unrest as the poverty and standard of living in places like Naples and throughout what is known as “The Boot” are down right unreasonable. The result is a country that has a very small if not no middle class, a large lower class (Or large percentage of people near what we would think of as the poverty line) and a small to medium upper class.

Italy, has had a long history of political challenges, which is evident even in present times. At the time of this writing, the government is in disarray (You may have recently read about the resignation of Romano Prodi, Italy’s Prime Minister) and elections are soon to follow with the former controversial Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi likely to win and serve for the third different time!
In Naples, the situation is terrible as residents have had to endure yet another major trash collecting strike (Which has become common place in this region). If these Neapolitan trash troubles sound familiar, it's no wonder. The Italian region of Campania has been experiencing a garbage crisis for almost 14 years, during which time little has changed beyond the contents of the overflowing bins. Indeed, it's become so routine that there's now a predictable pattern. First, the Camorra—the local mafia, which controls the city's garbage industry—stuffs the area's dumps and incineration facilities with garbage imported from northern Italy and other European countries. That leaves nowhere to put the local garbage, forcing collectors to let it pile up on the streets! Next, angry residents burn the garbage, spewing dioxins into the air. Eventually the government squeezes space out of existing dumps to alleviate the problem temporarily. At the time of this writing, some areas have not had trash collected in nearly six weeks!!!
Some people have intimated to me that the problem is so bad in the South that its only a matter of time before we see the civil unrest that many people fear. The mafia appears to be the source of the problem as it is active at even the highest levels of the Italian government. I have often felt that understanding the inner workings of the US government is difficult, but it pales in comparison to figuring out how things work around here. It appears to be a complicated mess as there are so many unseen forces in play with the Mafia and Catholic Church as the backbone of corruption.
In my daily interactions with friends, I often find myself trying to consult with them on their jobs and how to improve their financial situation. Time and again the answer that I get from these people is that of a defeated society, one that has in many ways lost hope. “Its not like it is in your country, we can’t get ahead here and the situation is hopeless as we have so much corruption in our government that the Italian people know that it’s a lost cause” one person told me. My good friend and cooking teacher Marcella tells me that the major difference between Americans and Italians is that “Americans know that with hard work and a vision they can get ahead in life, but Italians know that there is no hope for them to achieve financial success and therefore they simply are afraid to have hope.”
Yes, it’s a very sad situation for us as we begin to grow fond of many people here who have become our friends. We see a sadness inside of them that troubles us greatly. One friend of mine named Serena, who works at the gym told me only yesterday that she had worked sixteen straight days without a day off! Another friend Chiara who works as a supervisor for one of the leading high end tour companies in the world told me that her contract does not allow her to be paid for overtime. In fact, last week she was on the road for four straight days looking at properties throughout Italy, working in many cases fifteen hour days. She was only paid for eight!
To say that our appreciation for the American system has skyrocketed would be a fair statement. We are very lucky indeed…