Italy is broke we are told.
Well there are reasons for this.
This is not an exhaustive list.
Euros 120 billion (£102 billion) – tax evasion
Euros 60 billion – corruption
Euros 230 billion – foregone tax revenues from capital sitting in tax havens*
Euros 45 billion – cost of injuries at work in social insurance and health bills
Euros 25 billion – costs associated with illegal construction and environmental damage
*Italian corporations and the rich have some Euros 500 billion stashed away in Switzerland, the Cayman Islands and other paradisi fiscali. In 2009, the government of billionaire Silvio Berlusconi in 2009 introduced a tax amnesty, or scudo fiscale, on this capital, which allowed them to pay a mere 5,000 euros in tax per 100,000 euros repatriated. Euros 100 billion came back. The country got a mere Euros 5 billion. Half of Italy’s largest companies, and now many of the smaller ones, and the biggest banks are based in tax havens.
Total debt mountain: Euros 1,900 billion
If the Italian government stopped allowing the business class and the rich to rob the state blind it clearly wouldn’t take long to cut that down to size.
And perhaps invest a bit in a future for 22 million jobless, tackle low pay, poverty pensions, a creaking education system…
Figures sourced from Soldi Rubati (stolen money), Nunzia Penelope, July 2011
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