I’ll tell you who’s just making a fine on the statutory minimum wage
Genesis and topicality of the debate on the minimum wage. And who in Italy indulges in party polemics. Gianfranco Polillo's analysis
It will have to be Renato Brunetta, in his new position as president of the Cnel, who will deal with the question. How to translate into Italian directive 2022/2041 of 19 October 2022, "relating to adequate minimum wages in the European Union". He will do so by deepening what has already been communicated with the brief given on the occasion of his hearing at the XI Commission (Public and private work) of the Chamber of Deputies, last 11 July. Above all drawing from his long academic experience, having held the chair of labor economics for many years at various universities.
Fortunately, our task is far more limited: to reconstruct the legal and merit background from which the debate on the "minimum wage" or "poor work" that is dominating the pages of the main Italian newspapers arose. And that risks becoming the catchphrase of the coming months. Waiting for the budget law to somehow provide for it. Interesting reconstruction to highlight delays and contradictions. But also the inevitable instrumentality, which usually accompanies such dense events from a political point of view. Just think of what was the political and social confrontation on the "escalator" at the time when Bettino Craxi was the prime minister.
The first mentions of the problem of the "minimum wage" date back to 2017. It was at the Gothenburg summit that it was established that "adequate minimum wages should be guaranteed, which meet the needs of the worker and his family according to the national economic and social conditions, while safeguarding access to work and job-seeking incentives”. Only three years later (September 2020) will President von der Leyen, in her speech on the state of the Union, reiterate that “everyone must have access to minimum wages, whether through collective agreements or legal minimum wages.” Thus the foundations were laid for what will be the Proposal for a Directive of the Parliament and of the Council, which will be made public on 28 October 2020, (COM(2020) 682 final).
Back then, in Italy, it was the end credits of Count II. Nunzia Catalfo, of the 5 stars, was the Minister of Labour. She had been the godmother of basic income, but on the "minimum wage" front her positions had been more than reasonable. Although he had presented a bill since 2014 (AS.1697) in which article 2 provided for, for 2015, a minimum wage of 9 euros gross per hour. Threshold that she herself, on several occasions, had defined as negotiable. It goes without saying that more than 9 years have passed since then. Not even a shadow of the legal minimum wage. The recent statements by Giuseppe Conte are therefore surprising. “The time to study is up. It's time to act." Holy words considering how much water has passed under the bridges of the Tiber, a stone's throw from Palazzo Chigi. Of which the Conte himself had long been the main tenant.
On the European front, however, it took two years to transform that proposed directive, which was mentioned earlier, into Directive (EU) 2022/2041 of 19 October 2022, which the individual national Parliaments are now called upon to ratify. A circumstance that has ended up creating a particular situation in which European commitments have been added to autarkic attempts to solve the problem. In other words, Europe has been the driving force, warming the spirits of an opposition in search of a possible political compass. In fact, in the same month of October, 5 bills were presented and signed by the main leaders. Three from Pd (Laus, Serracchiani and Orlando), one from the Italian Left (Fratoianni) and one of the 5 stars (Conte). The following year, the initiative of Azione (Richetti) was added, but not of Italia Viva.
This, then, is the picture of the current dispute, in which elements of "politics" (the relationship between the parties) merge with those of "policy" (the merits of the issue) in a tangle that will not be easy to untangle. Even more so if we consider the different approaches that have already emerged at the European level. Comparing the two texts – that of the initial proposal and that of the approved directive – certain differences stand out. Also due to the fact that the social partners – trade unions on the one hand, bosses on the other – have failed to find the necessary agreements.
In the first version, article 5 referred to the "purchasing power of legal minimum wages, taking into account the cost of living and the incidence of taxes and social benefits". In the following one, however, only the "purchasing power of legal minimum wages, taking into account the cost of living" was mentioned. Giorgia Meloni, who is betting a lot on reducing the tax wedge, will be less happy. Even more significant, perhaps, is the second difference. The transition from 70 to 80 per cent of the threshold (article 4) on the basis of which the level of union bargaining can be considered satisfactory. Thus avoiding the State the commitment of having to promote further initiatives in favor of its diffusion.
This is a particularly delicate point. From the archive of contracts, filed with the CNEL, it appears that 97 per cent of them bear the signature of the three trade union confederations: CGIL, CISL and UIL. Unless we want to admit that those same organizations are, in some way, responsible for having signed agreements in violation of the minimum wage, it must be deduced that the risk of a possible infringement does not exceed the threshold of 3 percent of the contracts concluded . By applying this percentage to the number of employees, equal to 18.405 million, according to Istat (May 2023), it can be deduced that the number of possible victims should be limited to 552,000. Which is undoubtedly serious, but which has little to do with the figures evoked (4 million workers) in the current controversy.
Which is indicative of the instrumental nature of some positions. Already in the transition from the simple proposal of 2020 to the final text two years later, by the Parliament and the European Commission, the weight of a culture more attentive to solidarity rather than market aspects was evident. In the Italian debate these aspects have been accentuated and, at the same time, barbarized, in the game of mirrors between "politics" and "policy". It will therefore not be easy to find a solution that aims above all at solving the problem of so-called "poor work". In Giuseppe Conte's interview with Corriere della Sera , already mentioned, the demonstration of this assumption. Putting together the minimum wage, basic income, superbonus, and Transition 4.0 and then complaining about "the shortage of tens of billions", for the purposes of the public budget, is certainly not a good omen for solving the problem.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/economia/vi-dico-chi-sta-facendo-solo-ammuina-sul-salario-minimo-legale/ on Wed, 16 Aug 2023 04:22:38 +0000.