“Industry, the driving force of Italy, propels the European recovery” asserted the Centro Studi Confindustria research centre in its recent report on industrial scenarios (Il Sole24Ore, 21 November). In fact, our manufacturing industry has returned to pre-pandemic activity levels (its added value in current dollars has gone back to 2.2% of the world’s total) and it’s improving in Germany (with production figures 10% lower than what they were before COVID) and France (down by 5%).

Basically, the Italian industry is consolidating its export capacity, breaking new ground in the internal market (also thanks to the Draghi government’s subsidies for the building and consumption sectors), investing in digital innovation and in environmental and social sustainability (with cohesive businesses that are mindful of community, inclusion and solidarity values, and that are more competitive, as the latest Symbola studies on the Green Italy show). And if it were not affected by a major, widespread lack of specialised workforce and the dizzy increase in the price of energy and components – starting with microchips – it could grow even further.

There is no doubt, continues the Centro Studi Confindustria, that the growth of the Italian GDP – a growth of over 6% in 2021 – is largely due to the production efforts undertaken by the Italian manufacturing industry. And while another increase of 4.4% is expected in 2022, much of the data confirms that this financial recovery is not just a rebound following the 2020 crash, as it displays strong indications of structured growth in many sectors (mechanical engineering, electrical equipment, electronics, rubber, plastics, lumber, etc.).

A positive period, then. Not to be wasted, but to be exploited in order to rebuild wealth and a stable job market. But also a period in which to pile up resources that will allow us to pay off the interests on the public debt, incurred to tackle the pandemic crisis and the recession and to allow for continued investments. A proficuous use of the EU funds, following the indications of the PNRR, the Italian recovery and resilience plan (focused on the digital and environmental transition, research and education, reforms in public administration and laws, large strategic infrastructures) is essential in order to strengthen this path of growth – it’s a significant political and economic challenge that involves institutions, political and social forces, enterprises.

The Centro Studi Confindustria also maintains that the number of companies that have radically altered their value production chains, supply chains, supply networks, is increasing. Our manufacturing industry is coming home: a clear change in direction when we think of choices that were popular only a few years ago (when production was relocated to countries that offered lower costs and better conditions, from the Far East to certain areas of Eastern Europe).

Hence, backshoring – or reshoring, if preferred – continues; factories are no longer located abroad and supply chains are getting shorter, replacing those long, protracted ones demanded by international strategies when globalisation was booming, when China and India were the “factories of the world”. Indeed, local social and economic factors are fracturing them – suspensions from a lack of raw materials, jams in the transport system, strains due to tensions of any kind, interruptions caused by cybercrime. Better, then, to try and produce in a safe environment, and therefore bring production and supply chains back home, to more auspicious places where they can be adequately managed and kept in check.

Backshoring tactics that, of course, should not be adopted by each single European country separately, but aimed at turning the whole of Europe into a domestic market, a common production hub to be developed, to become more competitive at an international level.

Sure, global trends won’t disappear, and we’ll keep some manufacturing in the Far East – but in general we’ll increasingly adopt a local-for-local approach, a production system suited to internal markets, and abandon old-fashioned strategies relying on large import and export volumes. This is not at all meant to sound protectionist – it’s merely a shift in competitive attitude, to give companies the chance to strengthen their production skills and their quality in the world’s markets, and in more autonomous and safe conditions.

Maurizio Marchesini, vice president of the Confindustria section dedicated to supply chains and SMEs, believes that “We find ourselves in a very complex transition stage. Digitalisation, sustainability, new assets in the global value chains, are posing significant challenges that not only affect the production systems, but society in general.” And also that “institutions and industry must collaborate, in order to define a road map” for the transition.

This paradigm shift, this deep renewal of corporate culture, are significant. A return of manufacturing in Europe and in its more industrial countries (Germany and Italy, but also France and Spain) needs to be stimulated and consolidated by an appropriate, fully fledged European industrial policy (thankfully, we can glimpse some traces of it in parts of the Next Generation EU Recovery Plan). And those quality and sustainability traits that more strongly define European industry – as opposed to American, Chinese and Indian industries – need to be enhanced and turned into key competitive assets. The automotive industry, for instance, which is undergoing a difficult and socially expensive transition towards electric cars, should in fact be one of the main sectors on which both the European Commission and the best automotive nations (such as Germany, Italy and France) should really focus investments and innovation.

A newly published staff management “guide”

A theory inspired by our reality, and, as such, not rigid but, just like reality, comprising multiple aspects, all interconnected with each other – a complex theory for a complex reality. It cannot be otherwise when dealing with the theme of human resources in business and the best way to approach it. This is the concept underlying the book curated by Ernesto D’Amato (a manager with extensive corporate experience) and that includes a number of contributions written collaboratively, all sharing the same feature: all the authors are managers. More like corporate routine practice, then, than academic theory.

This approach explains the book’s title and subtitle: Il manuale delle risorse umane. Scritto da manager per futuri manager (A human resource manual. Written by managers for future managers). Indeed, this work really reads like a “manual” – it is not about abstract concepts, but rather embodies a concrete working tool presenting readers with a wide range of corporate cases and good HR practices. Its aim is to instigate a profitable learning process whereby, as said above, concrete examples give rise to theories, and not vice versa.

The book is structured into four sections, each corresponding to a major theme: corporate organisation in general terms, practices in human resource management, welfare, work discipline and trade union relations. It includes about 30 accounts by managers from major companies – from Sanofi to Trenord, from Generali to Ikea, from Bosch to Manpower, and many others. A little over 300 pages, this book collects real practical experiences, recollected and narrated by people who are really involved in the management of human resources, and also includes new solutions and strategies implemented by those who deal with genuine organisational issues every day. Moreover, together with some more traditional advice, this guide includes insights in topics such as research, talent enhancement, smart working, work safety, gender equality, and individual and work ethics, which nowadays are key to any business.

This is an excellent book curated by D’Amato, a great collection of guidelines that managers of today and tomorrow will find extremely useful when in need of some direction. To be read and reread.

Il manuale delle risorse umane. Scritto da manager per futuri manager (A human resources manual. Written by managers for future managers)

Ernesto D’Amato (curated by)

Guerini Next, 2021

Research undertaken on the relationships existing between Italian design and Italian industries investigates the complex connections that give form and substance to good Italian corporate culture

Good manufacturing culture, encapsulating technical skills, taste and human values. And the best place for it is Italy. These are the themes discussed by Maria Antonietta Sbordone (from the University of Campania Luigi Vanvitelli, Department of Architecture and Industrial Design) and Davide Turrini (University of Ferrara, Department of Architecture), in their recently published contribution on MD Journal.

“Designed & Made in Italy. Invarianti, transizioni, nuove mappe valoriali” (“Designed & Made in Italy. Invariants, transitions, new value maps”) is an attempt to capture the series of connections linking design and Made in Italy, identifying some constant points among many variables affected by time and a changing economic and social context.

In their introduction, Sbordone and Turrini write, “In Italy, which in general has shown a lack of substantial and continued investments by large industrial companies and of consistent, large homogeneous orders, the relationship between design and manufacture has historically included the factor of “taste” – a complex, heterogeneous cultural phenomenon that incorporates unique and recognisable semantic and formal values, as well as traits related to quality manufacturing and commerce. Nowadays, this phenomenon displays further degrees of complexity and variance: in increasingly fluid national and global contexts, delocalisation processes are rampant; the social fabric of the middle class, historical protagonist in turning consumption into a concept of the imagination in management and manufacturing, is unravelling; buyers’ awareness of what the real value of goods should be is weakening, while the perception of quality is being affected by increasingly random variables.”

These are the reflections that inform this research work, whose structure is quite straightforward: the authors first investigate the different connections observed within what, for convenience’s sake, is termed Made in Italy; then they explore the “Convergence points between creativity and manufacture”; and finally they assess the impact of change, with an analysis of the “design variations in the new value chain.”

This essay by Maria Antonietta Sbordone and Davide Turrini is not always easy to read, but it does help to better understand the really complex system of relationships that underlie great part of the best Italian industrial manufacture.

Designed & Made in Italy. Invarianti, transizioni, nuove mappe valoriali (“Designed & Made in Italy. Invariants, transitions, new value maps”)

Maria Antonietta Sbordone, Davide Turrini

MD Journal, 9, 2020

“I believe in the mystery of words and that words can become life, destiny, just as they become beauty.” Leonardo Sciascia knew how to use words well, with measured rigour and strong expressive power, and left a valuable legacy behind him – novels and essays that, still today, tell of conflict and pain, timid hopes and sensible plans for a better future.

Here’s the key word: future. In fact, Sciascia wrote a collection of articles (published by Bompiani in 1989 and later on by Adelphi in 2017) called “To future memory”, to which title he promptly added “If memory had a future” – an ironic and nostalgic subtitle, expressing awareness of our limited human condition.

The suggestive beauty of words, the suitably restrained power of writing. And even if it’s not entirely true that “the world, in the end, exists in order to end up as a book”, as Stéphane Mallarmé believed, we can be certain that one of the fundamental characteristics we, human-animals, possess, is that of processing life through storytelling. Stories add substance to our existence, poetry some charm; we gain a sense of perspective that prevents our life from depleting itself into experience, from vanishing into a fleeting moment.

In his recent book, La nuova manomissione delle parole (New ways of tampering with words) Gianrico Carofiglio recalls the teachings of Israeli historian Yuval Noah Harari, and tells us that “the cognitive revolution that allowed Homo sapiens to gain the upper hand over other animal species consists precisely in the ability to devise and tell stories, in the aptitude of building metaphors. And stories – spanning from the legends of ancient religions to the myths of mass society – hold together our large human communities and enable undertakings that, without the ability to narrate the past and imagine the future, would otherwise be impossible.”

Through writing and narration, humans defy death and conquer time. Therefore, stories and writing are essential in order to tell and interpret a reality in flux while leaving some traces that go beyond the limits of our self-awareness behind us – back to those two words so dear to Sciascia (and to all writers): memory and future.

Thus, learning that high school students started a petition on change.org to ask for the abolition of written examinations in the 2022 finals, and that it collected 30,000 signatures, comes as a painful surprise. True, written examinations are more difficult while oral examinations entail other aptitudes: the ability to improvise, the confidence to present, the capability to perfunctorily discuss concepts without delving into them, personal likings. Yet, as per the Latin proverb, verba volant, scripta manent (“spoken words fly away, written words remain”), and, indeed, a written piece is evidence that a concept, an account or a story, have been thoroughly understood. Writing is the ability to synthesise information, to provide clear, accurate descriptions.

”When writing is scary”, remarked Paolo Di Paolo on la Repubblica (8 November). It’s scary for young students, before an exam, but it’s also scary for adults, when they find themselves, bewildered, in front of a blank page to be filled with intelligible thoughts and opinions or a written page whose sense cannot be fathomed. And impoverished language means impoverished human culture – it leads to individual deterioration, social wounds, exclusion.

Data from INVALSI, the Italian National institute for the evaluation of the education system, is worrying, as it confirms the growing ignorance of our children: 44% of high school students doesn’t reach the minimum average in Italian, and 51% in maths. And figures are even worse in the South of Italy and in families in financial hardship.

In general, in terms of education, the big picture appears extremely serious. Indeed, Italy comes in last in Europe in terms of university graduates (just 19.6% in the 25 to 64 age range, compared to the EU average of 33.2%) and has a very high rate of people with a very low education level: 13 million people with just a lower secondary school qualification. A bleak figure, not merely in relation to the prospects of economic growth, but also and above all for a more widespread socially balanced development.

Will making exams easier improve the situation? Of course not.

Looking beyond the fact that the whole Italian education system is in need of major changes, and the amount of investment these would entail (the Draghi government’s PNRR, the Italian recovery and resilience plan, and the measures announced by the Minister of Education Patrizio Bianchi are nonetheless a step, albeit a small one, in this direction), the country needs to take on a social and cultural battle: make some efforts in promoting reading and writing, for a start, and in teaching how society, economy, employment, businesses, communities can be better and further narrated.

Rem tene, verba sequentur (“Grasp the subject, the words will follow”), goes another Latin proverb, and, also, Nomina sunt consequentia rerum (“words are consequences of facts”). A deep bond connects things and words, facts and nouns, and writing strengthens it.

Writing allows people to collect their thoughts, to thoroughly express feelings and desires, to substantiate choices, to translate a complex reality into a better organised, more manageable one, which others can then share and understand.

True, we live in a society where images and immediacy are prevalent, dominated by “show and tell” and a coveted “instant fulfilment” (“Instant economics – The real-time revolution” was the title of an investigation on financial frenzy and rash consumerism published in The Economist issue of 23 October). The language of social media, where communication is done through “Likes”, has compressed and polarised judgement into fanatical love or hate, and actual writing is reduced to express bare invective or amazed wonder. The power of communication has expanded, yet restraint is nowhere to be seen, and the way words are manipulated is crippling.

This is also why we need to rediscover the profound value and meaning of words and regain the distance that good writing demands in order to “talk” about itself, define the world, narrate experiences and feelings, with perspective and self-awareness. We need to overcome this fear of writing, and reacquire a taste for clarity and, thinking of Sciascia, for beauty.

The need for sophisticated tools able to handle disarray

When things get complicated, we need to equip ourselves with more discerning and sophisticated tools. This is true for everyone, including – especially – those who manage production organisations dealing with constant market fluctuations, and Alessandro Cravera’s book is based on this premise.

Indeed, Allenarsi alla complessità. Schemi cognitivi per decidere e agire in un mondo non ordinato (Preparing for complexity. Cognitive schemes for making decisions and acting in a disorderly world) is a good tool to acquire know-how useful for handling disarray.

The work is based on the fact that the skills and strategies we use every day to manage uncertainty and tackle trade-offs and unforeseen issues are no longer suitable to our current social and organisational context. Things have changed, not only due to uncertainty but also by the fact that every variable, every action and every dynamic are linked and interrelated between them, which has an impact at both local and global levels. Cravera skilfully outlines all this and then remarks how we nonetheless keep on relying on “managers” or opinion makers who can only offer us simplistic and inadequate answers, while we should be doing the exact opposite.

Through an interdisciplinary approach that combines management issues with philosophical, psychological and sociological aspects, Cravera’s book plays its part in building culture and teaching about complexity while emphasising a particular point: rather than applying best practices or management models, what really makes a difference is being able to interpret how the context in which companies operate and grow is changing.

The argument unravels over a little more than 150 pages – it starts by defining what complexity and interconnection are, then continues by exploring how to “operate in an interconnected world”, and which investments and skills are needed to do so effectively. “In order to face the challenges of tomorrow,” concludes the author, “we need leaders who know how to steer us through complexity, who can predict the impact their actions will have and evaluate risks and opportunities for the future generations.” Something that is not as easy to achieve as one might think.

Allenarsi alla complessità. Schemi cognitivi per decidere e agire in un mondo non odinato (Preparing for complexity. Cognitive schemes for making decisions and acting in a disorderly world)

Alessandro Cravera

Egea, 2021

Smart working examined from two perspectives that end up complementing each other

Working from home, studying from home. New forms of corporate organisation and education that are changing the structures of factories, offices and schools. A change of culture – in both producing and learning – that needs to be fully understood, as well as practically integrated in everyday life. “PCTO per l’acquisizione di competenze di smart working” (“PCTO for the acquisition of smart working skills”) is the title of a research paper by Gennaro Iaccarino, Lucia Bartoli, Ilenia Fronza and Luis Corral, which attempts to combine the tools and rules of corporate smart working with those of remote learning through a PCTO (Pathways for transversal skills and orientation) experience based on a business simulation focused on the acquisition of smart working skills.

The authors start by analysing employment needs, with a focus on which skills are required for work to be “smart”, then they scrutinise the outcomes of a business simulation project carried out by a final year class in a high school technical institution – one way to verify how good PCTO paths are, as they aim to provide innovative goals that take into account the rapid changes currently affecting the world of employment and production.

After having clarified the concept of smart working, the authors explore the relationships between “digital skills and education” before proceeding with the analysis of the smart working business simulation carried out with the students.

In their conclusion, they succeed in combining current smart working practices with school education: “As it happens with any sudden, unexpected change, smart working has posed a number of issues and difficulties that, little by little, we will have to tackle if, as it seems, this new way of working will become standard for many employees. Legislation will have to pay greater care to

the issue of smart working than it has until now; trade unions, companies and workers will have to discuss the various problem areas extensively in order to reach shared and convincing solutions. Schools, too, will have to teach students the necessary skills required to adopt this new mentality, without forgetting, however, that their goal is also to develop citizens capable to apply critical thinking and initiative, rather than just a workforce passively accepting any demand from companies and market.”

PCTO per l’acquisizione di competenze di smart working (“PCTO for the acquisition of smart working skills”)

Gennaro Iaccarino, Lucia Bartoli, Ilenia Fronza, Luis Corral

DIDAMATICA, Paper 50

Narrating Milan, in these times of reawakening and recovery, avoiding clichés. Trying instead to discern, between fact and fiction, the deeper meaning embodied in London mayor Sadiq Khan’s recent statement – “London and Milan, beacons of the environment” – in light of the innovative policies chosen to safeguard and enhance sustainable development (Corriere della Sera, 4 November).

Politics don’t necessarily need to be a part of this, we can turn to poetic epiphanies instead. And recall, for instance, Umberto Saba‘s verses, “Among your stones and your fogs I’m on vacation. I take a rest in Piazza del Duomo. Instead of stars, every evening words light up.”

Lines taken from Canzoniere, a collection of poems published by Einaudi in 1965, which illustrates the nature of a city whose pace of life allows for moments of stillness and reflection, and whose spirit shows a strong inclination for conversation, narration and, indeed, poetry, as well as an attitude closely informed by a readiness to do, plan, undertake, work and, as befitting the capital city of books and newspapers, by a tendency to narrate.

Milan, a city of engineers-cum-philosophers (Leonardo Sinisgalli) and intellectuals who support a “polytechnic culture” (Elio Vittorini), of theatre-loving entrepreneurs (like the Pirelli, Borletti and the Falck families, founders of the Piccolo Teatro of Paolo Grassi and Giorgio Strehler), of humanist bankers (Raffaele Mattioli, president of the Banca Commerciale Italiana) and industrialists who also act as patrons and sponsors. Even today, as Alberto Savinio said, Milan has to be lived and narrated – “I listen to your heart, city…”, he proclaimed with loving inquisitiveness during the difficult first years of the 1940s, discovering a Milan that was “learned and meditative”, “romantic”, “all stone and hard on the outside” but also “softened by gardens on the inside”.

Saba’s “stones”. Savinio’s “stones”. And now? Now we have “stones” combined with the glass and steel of the bright Porta Nuova and CityLife skyscrapers. The “stones” of the outskirts, which many are trying to “mend” under the guidance of Renzo Piano. And also the “stones” of universities, whose new sites are springing up side by side historical buildings in the Bovisa and Bicocca districts (the University of Milan on via Festa del Perdono, the Catholic University a step away from the Basilica of Sant’Ambrogio, the Polytechnic University on Leonardo Da Vinci square), and the Bocconi and IULM campuses in the south of the city or in the MIND (the “Milan Innovation District”) area that celebrated the international success of Expo 2015.

Past and present, memory and innovation. As becomes a metropolis hosting 200,000 university students and attracting thousands more from all over the world. Milan, educated and talented, where good teachers live. Or – and why not? – “Milan laughing and having fun…” or “Milan far away from the sky / between life and death your mystery goes on…” as in the lyrics of singer-songwriter Lucio Dalla.

Is it really a mystery? Perhaps, the key to interpret what we could term Milan’s “dynamic humanism” lies precisely in its unusual blend of classical culture, scientific knowledge and entrepreneurial vocation. And, above all, in its ability to see labour as a serious commitment that entails care for the quality of products and production processes and pride in a work well done – as part of one’s identity, of an individual who belongs to a community, of a worthy citizen. Let’s recall, once more, the key message of the decree issued by the Archbishop of Milan, Heribert of Antimiano, in 1018: “Those who know what work is come to Milan. And those who come to Milan are free people.”

In order to narrate this great tide of transformation that, even after the pandemic and recession crises, is still washing over us, let’s take a look at the large urban map of this ever-changing metropolis, and see what’s been going on lately.

Starting with the MilanoSesto project, one of the major European initiative for urban regeneration, which is progressing as fast as Hines’s work on the Foster+Partners project concerning the area that, since the 1980s, was home to the colossal Falck Steelworks: a space measuring 1.5 million square metres, on which housing, services companies and offices will rise. A “city of health” designed by Mario Cucinella with a futuristic train station designed by Renzo Piano, as well as plenty of green (10,000 new trees) and structures for social housing to provide low-income students and inhabitants with affordable accommodation. Likewise, the former Macello district is also being developed for social housing, thanks to an intervention by REDO, a “benefit company” managed by Carlo Cerami, with contributions by the Fondazione Cariplo, Cassa Depositi e Prestiti and Intesa San Paolo – “Housing with low environmental impact and at a low cost,” explains Cerami.

And that’s not all – more construction sites are opening, for the regeneration of working-class neighbourhoods like the San Siro and Gratosoglio districts. In fact, Stefano Boeri’s concept of a “vertical forest” is developing between the Lorenteggio and the Naviglio Grande districts, a future neighbourhood steeped in urban greenery, on the edge of the area where the former Porta Genova train station used to be, currently under regeneration. Moreover, renovation works on the Velasca Tower, in the middle of the city, are progressing rapidly, while the global Blackstone real estate fund has invested 1.5 billion to acquire 14 historical buildings in the fashionable “Quadrilatero della Moda”, the upscale shopping area between via Montenapoleone and via Spiga.

The list could go on, to include streets and squares, brownfield sites to be regenerated and residential areas to be enhanced. Construction sites and cranes. Celebrity architects’ projects and renovations. All is in flux, as also shown by Unioncamere data concerning the Lombardy region: in 2021, turnover has increased by 37.4% in the construction field – a veritable boom, with Milan at its heart.

And here’s something else we should consider: Milan at the heart of it. A big city. An open-minded city. A hub where ideas, initiatives, financial resources, corporate activities, as well as people, intersect. Whose strong suit is to know how to build relationships and bring together diversity; turn diversity into a value; generate values able to support widespread development trends.

Then again, this is what metropolises are: motion, transformation, and – why not? – metamorphosis.

Indeed, Milan should be conceived as a large bright rectangle, just as in the image captured by commander Luca Parmitano from the International Space Station in 2017: a network of lights, shining from the north-west of Turin and Genoa to the north-east of Padua, Venice, Udine and Trieste, bounded on the north by the Alps and, on the south, by the dynamic region of Emilia, thriving with medium-sized businesses. A metropolis forming a grid that encompasses big, medium and small cities, industrious towns and industries scattered throughout the regions, transport routes running along the great A1-A4 motorway axes (from east to west, from north to south) and the high-speed railways. High-tech infrastructures that have deeply changed the area’s economic and social geography.

This is one of the most economically and socially integrated, dynamic and developed regions in Europe. It’s a platform that connects continental Europe with the Mediterranean, a group of territories rich in positive social capital, positioned among competitiveness and solidarity, where fairly efficient public institutions collaborate with private companies that are able to retain presence on the global markets. Innovative, cohesive companies committed to environmental and social sustainability. A complex world, full of lights but also of shadows and contradictions – in both economic and social terms – and yet a world that’s changing for the best.

Milan moves forward within these boundaries: growing, innovating, and integrating. Hardly perfect but nevertheless, over time, aware of its own fragility, of its own limits.

Milan, city of enterprise and critical awareness.

The awareness we need, as people, to get ready for the coming of a new Umberto Saba in need of rest and shelter and discovering, once more, that “in Piazza del Duomo, instead of stars, every evening words light up.”

The 2021 Nobel Prize awarded by the Sveriges Riksbank recognises the value of focusing on what is really going on, including in the economy

Observing reality in order to demonstrate the theory that explains it. Even when the complexity of the problems being addressed appears almost insurmountable and impossible to solve. In any case, there’s no laboratory to be seen. Which, on the other hand – when you look at what happens in companies, of whatever type – would always be a limiting factor. Even though it would be simpler. Hence the importance of the achievement of David Card (University of California, Berkeley), Joshua D. Angrist (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) and Guido W. Imbens (Stanford University), who were awarded the “Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel” for the year 2021. A major recognition, and one that is particularly beneficial for that area of economics which seeks to understand reality through what are referred to as “natural experiments” – or in other words, those studies carried out via observation, in which the control and the variables of interest are not artificially manipulated by the researchers, but rather can be influenced by nature, or by other factors beyond the control of the researchers. In simple terms, it is an attempt to bring reality and its changes and transformations closer to theory. This, in fact, is what often happens in companies, and more generally in human organisations.

As such, it is perhaps no coincidence that the theme of labour was among those most closely studied by the three winners of this year’s Nobel Prize in economics. This is immediately apparent from stated reasons for which the award was given. Card received his prize “for his empirical contributions to labour economics”, while Angrist and Imbens were recognised “for their methodological contributions to the analysis of cause and effect relationships”. The work of the three was complementary, and used the “natural experiment” methods: the empirical contribution came from the first of these three economists, while the other two dedicated their efforts to the methodological element. More specifically, David Card studied the effects of the minimum wage, immigration and education on the labour market, and concluded that when the first increases, there is no decrease in employment; furthermore, investing in schooling contributes to the future success of students within the world of work. Joshua Angrist and Guido Imbens, meanwhile, provided the tool necessary in order to read the experiments carried out by Card, demonstrating the ways in which it is possible to draw precise conclusions regarding the cause and effect of a phenomenon from natural experiments, or to put it another way, from the careful observation of reality in accordance with a refined method that leaves people the freedom “to choose”.

A series of complex yet fascinating themes, then, which led these three economists to achieving such an important recognition, many of which can be explored through a number of the books they have written. In 2016, Card wrote Wages, School Quality, and Employment Demand, and back in 1995, he co-authored the book Myth and Measurement: The New Economics of the Minimum Wage. Meanwhile, in 2014, Angrist published Mastering ‘Metrics: The Path from Cause to Effect , the precursor of which was Mostly Harmless Econometrics: An Empiricist’s Companion., back in 2009. Finally, Guido W. Imbens published Causal Inference for Statistics, Social, and Biomedical Sciences: An Introduction, in which “natural experiments” are discussed and compared with other means of explaining reality.

Wages, School Quality, and Employment Demand

David Card

Oxford University Press, 2016

Myth and Measurement: The New Economics of the Minimum Wage

David Card, Alan B. Krueger

Princeton University Press, 2015 (revised edition)

Mastering Metrics: The Path from Cause to Effect

Joshua D. Angrist, Jorn-steffen Pischke

Princeton University Press, 2014

Mostly Harmless Econometrics: An Empiricist’s Companion

Joahua D. Angrist, Jorn-steffen Pischke

Princeton University Press, 2009

Causal Inference for Statistics, Social, and Biomedical Sciences: An Introduction

Guido W. Imbens, Donald B. Rubin

Cambridge University Press, 2015

The Governor of the Bank of Italy provides a clear summary of the relationship between development and the financial behaviour of citizens

Savings to help companies. A well-known, virtuous mechanism, above all in challenging times like these. Ignazio Visco (Governor of the Bank of Italy) analysed the relationship, functions and connections associated with saving, during his recent address to mark World Savings Day 2021.

After having placed a few key details of the period that the economy and society are currently experiencing in context – and more specifically the efforts to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic -, Visco focuses on the “legacy of the two previous episodes of crisis”, noting first and foremost that the return of production “alone” at this point would not be sufficient, before going on to take a closer look at the link between “the savings put aside by families and the strengthening of the financial structure of businesses”. Specifically, the Governor states: “In order to ensure that savings are effectively channelled to support the activities of the businesses resident in our economy, it is essential to (…) take action, above all with regard to the financial instruments on offer. This would increase the potential of attracting foreign fund investments, and in so doing, draw benefits for the developments anticipated with regard to the creation of a genuine single capital market within the European Union.” This is one of the key points at the heart of Visco’s argument: savings can provide concrete help to businesses, as long as the right tools are available. But in isolation, this is not enough, as the Governor goes on to say, because “in addition to the measures designed to increase the range of financial instruments available for businesses, there are also those created with a view to increasing protection for savers and investors. Fairness and transparency in the dealings between intermediaries and clients are also fundamental in attracting investment.” This is one of the core elements of a healthy economy: trust is an effective “fuel” for any development. The goal to be achieved, says Visco, is very important, and regards access to savings for productive investments on the one hand, as well as access by businesses – especially those of small and medium size – to the capital market on the other.

As ever, Ignazio Visco keeps things clear and simple, even when discussing complex issues that are evolving and changing. An address to be read, and then re-read.

Address by the Governor of the Bank of Italy. World Savings Day 2021

Ignazio Visco

Bank of Italy, 2021

“Exit Only” is the very fitting title of a book by Giulia Pastorella, a young manager who is at once very Milanese and very international (a degree from Oxford, specialist study at Sciences Po in Paris and at the London School of Economics), published by Laterza and written in order to document “what Italy is getting wrong with the qualified, highly-trained people that are fleeing the country”: namely, scarce recognition of merit, very little investment in high-level research and training, a low quality public administration, salaries that fail to reflect skills, and companies that are reluctant to let the most enterprising and talented young people move up the career ladder. As it currently stands, Italy, unfortunately, is not a country that can fulfil the hopes and dreams of the new generations. As such, these individuals are voting with their feet, and getting out while they can.

This phenomenon is widespread, and can be observed in many other European countries too, but here on home soil, it is aggravated by the fact that the majority of those with the greatest skills and ambitions leave Italy, and are not replaced by equal numbers of young people from other countries arriving in their place. To cut a long story short, then, Italy is losing precious human capital, even after having invested a huge amount in training.

The trouble is that even in these difficult times, as the Budget Law (which dictates many of the choices of the future) is being prepared, public discourse appears to be largely ignoring the fate of young people, work and much more. Instead, the focus is on the so-called “quota 100”, or in other words, on pensions and on people who want to leave the workforce ahead of the limits imposed by the Fornero law (an essential reform passed in 2011 with a view to maintaining both public finances and intra-generational equity).

The majority political parties (the Lega Nord first and foremost) and trade unions (with CGIL front and centre) are pushing early retirement, while others, turning their attention to young people, prefer to insist on welfarism (the so-called citizens’ income), whilst simultaneously failing to commit to active labour policies that can ensure more and better professional opportunities for the young men and women in search of good employment.

There’s a heavy atmosphere, and it is one which encourages this emigration of the “brains” of the country – it is, after all, the best way out of the “crisis of the future”. So it really is “Exit Only” for the “betrayed generation” (the latter is the hard-hitting title of a report on Italy’s young people, published in “La Stampa” on 28 October).

Let’s jog our memories with a few figures: “In 2019, a total of 70,000 people under the age of 40 left the country. In the last ten years, almost half a million young men and women have departed,” stated Economy Minister Daniele Franco during a ceremony at the Guardia di Finanza headquarters last week, before adding that “young people emigrate because the country is not growing much, and this in turn is partly because we don’t value these individuals; we fail to make full use of their energy and their talent. This is particularly true in the southern regions.”

Some more data as food for thought, then: Giulia Pastorella, in the book referred to above, reminds the reader that for the decade spanning 2008-2018, Italy was second in Europe in terms of the difference between graduates living abroad and at home. In other words, the rate of “brain drain” is faster than the rate of “brain production”. And speaking of the latter, the numbers are already too low: in Italy, only 17% of people hold a university degree, compared to the EU average of 30%.

This situation could now be subject to radical change, however, not least by making proper use of the resources made available by the EU’s Next Generation Recovery Plan (and well adapted into the Draghi government’s NRP, or National Recovery and Resilience Plan), channelling the money into high-quality training, innovation and sustainability.

As such, it is hard to argue against those who insist that we must stop discussing early retirement and turn our attention instead to active labour policies, to training, to welfare decisions and to new social security measures that can keep up with the trends of a rapidly-changing market. In the same vein, we must focus our efforts on rewriting a generational pact that seeks to bridge the chasm between the more protected social classes, with their trade unions (or in other words, those who currently hold permanent jobs, the majority of whom are men aged 50 or over, working in the civil service or in large companies) and the more disadvantaged workers, above all young people and women. All this in the awareness that at some point, we will also need to start addressing the issue of social security cover for the younger generations: when will they be able to retire, and with what kind of income? And how can we try to make supplementary pension schemes work?

Antonio Misiani, the Democratic Party’s Deputy Minister of Economy, puts it like this: “Young people must be the priority: many of them are at risk of ending up with pensions that will leave them on the breadline. To avoid this, we must really push people to contribute to pension funds, and introduce a minimum level.of subsistence. The freedom of choice of workers with regard to their retirement age should be extended, with an actuarial recalculation: those who leave early get less” (Corriere della Sera, 1 November). A serious discussion, then, and one which brings government, trade unions and companies to the table;the polar opposite of the propaganda on the “quota 100” pension scheme.

The debate should be focused around these key issues, keeping in mind that we are a country with a falling birth rate, destined to grow old (that is, unless we make forward-looking choices in favour of family), with an increasingly unbalanced relationship between the young and the old, people of working age and pensioners.

Otherwise, in the absence of long-term reforms and investments, young Italians will continue to leave in their droves. And despite its excellent capacity for enterprise, its creative culture and its brilliant design flair, Italy will be doomed to decline. A deeply unhappy downturn.