One of the fat, dumb and happy at the median--
net worth over $140,000 according to Credit Suisse? Or, one of
those on strike today;
A general strike called by two major Italian trade unions on Friday hit
schools, hospitals, airports, highways, ports and public transport
across the country, as public and private sector workers protested
against unpopular reforms to the labor market and cuts to public
spending.
And those are the
Italian haves. They're worried that the
have-nots might be allowed to replace them, if
hiring and firing was easier;
Italy's National Institute for Statistics reports that 17 percent of
Italians, about 10 million people, live in relative poverty. More than
six million - 10 percent - live in absolute poverty, mostly in the
country's southern regions. While a record number of Italian families
are struggling to get by, experts point out it is the country's youth,
many of whom have never held down of full-time job, who have the most to
be worried about.
"The young people in Italy have been bearing the weight of the high
turnover jobs and the older people have decided never to change jobs in
order not to lose that job security," says Elisabetta Addis, economics
professor at the University of Sasseri, referring to what many in Italy
call "employment apartheid."
Rising inequality that
Thomas Piketty isn't concerned about?
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