Contro la povertà in Italia servono misure concrete

Persistent poverty, and the the risk of poverty-trap, has been analyzed looking the to income transition between deciles of a longitudinal sample in European countries, the UK and in Italy, from 2010 to 2013: in the case of Italy the analysis is complemented with a food-based measure of poverty to highlight to the counter-cyclical behavior of poverty and the lack of a safety net. We show the that in Europe, and in Italy, poverty persistence has increased and enlarged, and the risk of a poverty trap heightened. We compare Europe with the War on Poverty in the US and conclude that, in spite of a half-century effort poverty is still a problem: however persistent poverty in Europe could be eliminated with an economic policy focused on the young people: Europe is going through a prolonged demographic crisis of the young people which is associated to their economic crisis. In Italy a new proposal could be an opportunity to reverse the economic and generational imbalances: resources devoted are however still inadequate and the eligibility criteria too tight.