Information for this page was compiled during December 2023 and January 2024. As Member States are currently transposing the EU minimum wage directive, national legislation can be subject to change. Eurofound intends to update these profiles in early 2025. Users are invited to contact Eurofound if they are aware of changes.
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Industrial relations and collective bargaining in Italy are, in general terms, not regulated by statutory legal sources. Despite art. 2099 and arts. 2067-2081 of the Civil Code (R.D. 262/1942) do in fact provide basic statutory regulation on wage and collective bargaining, the civil code entered into force in 1942 – before the drafting of the Republican Constitution and even before the end of the so-called ‘corporative legal system’, a system based on public juridical personality abrogated after the fall of fascism. As a result, to date, many of the above-mentioned provisions on collective bargaining have been – formally or by means of interpretation – repealed, as strictly related to corporativism and not in line with relevant Republican Constitution’s provisions.
The structure of collective bargaining is articulated on multiple levels:
This complex structure, in the absence of an up-to date legal framework for collective bargaining, is the result of the self-determination of trade unions and employers' organizations.
According to recent authoritative estimates the number of sectoral collective agreements in Italy is just below 1000, with 57% of them – covering around 54% of employees) not renewed after the expiry of their period of validity (CNEL, 2023). In some sectors proliferation of collective agreements is ongoing and marked – for instance, in the commerce sector alone, over 300 agreements are currently valid or ultra-active. This situation, apart from potentially contributing to a downwards trend for minimum wage levels, makes it challenging to have a complete overview of sectoral minimum wages.
Extension mechanisms are not in force, and whether to apply or not a collective agreement (and if yes, which one) is employer prerogative, who will apply it to all employees. Only employers associated with an employers’ organisation that signed a collective agreement are bound by the application of that agreement.
As for Constitutional-level provisions related to the topic of minimum wages, the following should be mentioned:
The latest CNEL (National Economic and Labour Council) report of 12 October 2023 provides a comprehensive analysis of collective bargaining coverage in Italy, highlighting it to be close to 100%, thus complying with the EU Directive's benchmark of 80% exempting Italy from introducing further supportive measures for collective bargaining provided by art, 4(2) of the Directive. The report mentions ongoing efforts to address data gaps in the agricultural and domestic sectors – to date, employers operating in these two sectors are exempt from the reporting obligation on the applied collective agreement. An additional 4% of workers are employed in the public sector, though their specific collective agreements are not declared. The study points out that only 1% of private sector employees, excluding those in agriculture and domestic work, have unknown contract coverage. This small percentage is attributed to delays in updating new codes in the Uniemens system (the administrative compulsory reporting system for employers) or to employers using a generic code despite applying a specific collective agreement.
Minimum wages are a trade unions and employers’ organisations prerogative. Adjustments of minimum rates depends on the will and – especially – on the contractual power of the social partners.
With the premise that membership strength statistics are based on self-declarations by trade unions, CGIL (Confederazione Italiana Generale del Lavoro) declares the highest number of members, followed by CISL (Confederazione Italiana Sindacati Lavoratori) and UIL (Unione Italiana del Lavoro). These are arguably the main Italian trade unions, representing workers in all the economic sectors in Italy and leading collective bargaining processes in virtually all industries and sectors. Their social, political, and union influence is higher than that of all other trade union organisations, also in terms of territorial anchoring and of ability to negotiate with employers’ organizations. They are confederations of sectoral trade unions federations.
Employers’ organizations’ landscape is highly fragmented. Confindustria is arguably the most representative in terms of membership strength, representing the share of companies employing the largest proportion of the Italian workforce. It represents all kind of companies, though – historically – with a focus on large manufacturing companies. Other very large organizations involved in sectoral collective bargaining (and therefore in minimum wage setting) can be classified by industries, sectors and type of companies represented (manufacture, tertiary, agriculture or transport; large companies or SMEs; cooperatives; banking and credit institutes; etc.)
For a comprehensive list of trade unions and employers’ organisations, as well as further information regarding their sectoral scope of operation, see Eurofound, Representativeness of the social partners in European cross-industry social dialogue, (pp. 94-95).
Social partners must resort to additional bargaining rounds for minimum wage adjustments. This takes place every three years for the renewal of both the economic and normative parts of collective agreements (in accordance with the inter-confederal agreement of 15 April 2009). However, most sectoral agreements stipulate a clause providing for ultra-activity of the provisions in case of late renewal. Wage floors are therefore binding – despite not subject to increases – in case of renewal delays.
A lively public debate on the appropriateness of revising the system of minimum wage setting – with a number of political and social actors in favour of the introduction of a statutory minimum wage – is currently ongoing. The latest proposal ‘Conte et al. (1275)‘ included a statutory floor to which social partners would be bound when negotiating wage, but the ongoing legislative procedure seems to lean towards a somehow ‘milder’ reform, which would not include a minimum provided by law.
In Italy, there are specific wage cases based on several types of workers. For example, internship remuneration is differentiated by the internship type and by region. Curricular internships, aligned with educational programs, may not guarantee a salary, depending on regional regulations. In contrast, extracurricular internships, which are geared towards professional development for recent graduates, unemployed, or people with disabilities and other disadvantaged categories, require a mandatory minimum remuneration (formally an ‘allowance’), with the specific amount set by regional laws. According to the guidelines established by agreement between national government and Regions (within the so-called ‘State-Region Conference’) in 2013 (and revised in 2017) this allowance cannot be set lower than €300 gross per month by each Region or autonomous province. Depending on the Region, the allowance granted varies between €300 and €800 gross per month.
Another case where the minimum wage may vary is that of an apprenticeship contract. Apprenticeships in Italy are aimed at youth training and employment, spanning across three categories for individuals aged 15 to 29. These include qualifications within a work environment, professional learning of a trade, and higher education and research opportunities. Companies hiring apprentices benefit from salary and contribution advantages, such as lower salary levels compared to collective agreements (the possibility of classification of the worker at up to 2 levels below the level to which he/she is entitled under the relevant national collective agreement) or percentage-based wages related to service years, along with favourable contribution treatments. Wages for apprentices are usually set by sectoral collective agreements, but a general statutory regulation exists and is currently represented by arts. 41-47, d.lgs. 81/2015.
Finally, for workers not covered by collective bargaining, wages can be freely negotiated by the involved parties, yet they must adhere to the Constitution's stipulated principle of adequacy and proportionality, ensuring the worker and their family can maintain a dignified standard of living (Article 36(1)). If wage disputes arise, workers may seek judicial intervention. Labour courts, in the absence of statutory provisions regulating the issue, have– in accordance with a consolidated jurisprudence – employed the basic wage provided for by the relevant sectoral collective agreement signed by ‘comparatively most representative trade union organizations at national level’ as a parameter to assess the compliance of the wage to the principles enshrined in the Constitution.
The minimum-wage debate developed in Italy with the proposal of two concepts: the Minimum Economic Treatment (Trattamento Economico Minimo, TEM) and the Comprehensive Economic Treatment (Trattamento Economico Complessivo, TEC). These form part of the wider reform of the model of industrial relations aimed at modernizing the collective bargaining framework and enhancing collective bargaining agreements. The concepts of TEM and TEC were formalized by social partners (Confindustria, CGIL, CISL, UIL) by Inter-confederal Agreement on 28 February 2018.
The TEM is the base salary level to be defined in the national collective agreements by sector. The TEC is composed by the TEM and all other economic treatments provided for in the national collective bargaining agreement common to all workers in the sector.
Overall, it can be argued – despite a clear definition lacks consensus among experts – that the basic minimum wage in Italy, as regulated by collective agreements, consists of the following elements:
These first three elements are to date, depending on the collective agreement, either provided separately or merged in a comprehensive basic rate.
The national sectoral collective agreements define the items that together make up the TEM and TEC.
The CNEL (National Economic and Labour Council) publishes a comprehensive and detailed yearly report called ‘Report on the labour market and collective bargaining’. It encompasses all labour market-related fields providing authoritative up-to-date information on employment and unemployment (with sections on particular categories such as young workers, women or immigrants), active labour market policies, endogenous and exogenous factors influencing the labour market, sectoral collective bargaining, local collective bargaining, legislative developments and social security measures.
The national register of collective agreements, implemented in the form of a database, provides publicly available documentation on sectoral collective bargaining. Social partners provide the full text of collective agreements, and information on signatories, period of validity and sector is provided by the database. Each sectoral collective agreements is assigned a code to facilitate research.
Another useful publicly available instrument is the administrative data on coverage based on compulsory declarations made by employers through the Uniemens system, available via the CNEL official website. It is updated on a yearly basis. The main limitation is the lack of data regarding employees in the public sector and regarding agricultural and domestic workers (to date, employers operating in these two sectors are exempt from the reporting obligation on the applied collective agreement).
The academic discourse surrounding minimum wages has been remarkably vibrant in recent years, following the development of public interest and political proposals of statutory minimum wage introduction. The number of publications on this topic is extensive, making it impossible to list them all comprehensively. Worth mentioning, among the whole body of recent literature, is a comprehensive publication from 2023, comprising a collection of articles authored by leading figures in academia, experts, and representatives from major social partners. These contributions stemmed from a conference held at the University of Pisa in February 2023. It is publicly available and entirely dedicated to the issue of minimum wages.
Among publicly and freely accessible journals that have been most active, in recent years, in the publication of articles related to the minimum wages, the following should be mentioned:
Finally, the Association for International and Comparative Studies on Labor Law and Industrial Relations (ADAPT) represents a relevant forum for minimum wage related issues (among several other topics in the field of industrial relations and labour law). The material provided, articles, and publications are publicly available.