Increase in incomes and moderate optimism about the recovery in consumption. These are the effects of the government’s economic policies as demonstrated by the latest research by Istat and Confcommercio-Censis. According to what was found by the national statistics institute, the number of Italians at risk of poverty has decreased. In 2023, thanks to public support, from the single allowance for children to energy bonuses to the revision of taxation (starting with the wedge cut), 22.8% of the Italian population was at risk of poverty or social exclusion. The value is indeed decreasing compared to 24.4% in 2022 and is the result of a reduction in the share of the population at risk, which stands at 18.9% (from 20.1% the previous year), equal to just over 11 million people. The government’s initiatives to support the weakest groups have already contributed to reducing inequalities in 2022: the wealthiest families had achieved an income 5.3 times higher than that of the poorest families, down compared to 5.6 times in 2021 .
According to Confcommercio and Censis, in fact, the prospects are destined to improve. The Italian economy is healthy, but families continue to be affected by uncertainty about the evolution of the economic situation, which leads them to delay purchases that are not strictly necessary. The Confcommercio-Censis Observatory on consumption and confidence has highlighted that in 2024, in real terms, “a growth in disposable income of 1.4% and consumption of around 0.9%” is expected. However, from the survey, carried out on a sample of a thousand families, it emerges that the balance between optimists and pessimists on future expectations in the six months is ten points lower than a year ago and a little below the values of 2018. “The intentions of purchases by Italians – explained the director of the Confcommercio research office Mariano Bella – are moderate” and “this specific picture tells us that we are not at all out of the risk zone of returning to rates of change in economic activity around zero comma nothing, as in the twenty years before the pandemic.”
The president of Confcommercio, Carlo Sangalli, remarked that “despite some fragility in some production sectors, the Italian economy is holding up well”. However, he continued, “uncertainty about the future slows down investments and consumption” and “to regain confidence we need, above all, a half-point cut in interest rates by the ECB and speed up the implementation of the tax reform”.
The high cost of money, in fact, meant that the share of mortgage-assisted sales fell from 48.4% in 2022 to 39.9% of the total purchases in 2023. This is what the Nomisma real estate market observatory highlighting that the demand for rentals has grown by 3 percentage points on an annual basis.
In this context, Nomisma continues, the rigidity of real estate values has slowed down sales (-10% to around 710 thousand homes changing hands).
A decline which has also led to drops in prices at a local level even if the national figure is growing (+1.2% for used goods and 1.7% for excellent condition).
