Contemporary paradoxes

We have reached the paradox, Silvio Berlusconi who promised 1 million jobs to win the elections is no longer there but, on the other hand, from the latest data, more than 850 thousand workers are missing, they are not there, they cannot be found and entrepreneurship at all levels is unable to meet growth and demands due to lack of personnel. Poor Silvio, he wouldn't be able to rest, now that there are actually places, no one wants to go and fill them. We are a curious people to say the least, always ready to complain but not inclined to commitment, spoiled and prone to whining but very quick to disappear and make ourselves untraceable when the reality of the facts appears before us as concrete as it is unavoidable. The providential summer torpor is slowly waning, the recovery is slow, the GDP is worse than expected, thousands of desperate people land on our shores every day, but jobs remain tragically vacant. And so, quietly, without any declaration from the political leaders, in the sultry month of July, the long-awaited flow decree was approved by the Council of Ministers: 500 thousand places in the next 3 years, more than 150 thousand residence permits per year between seasonal and permanent workers are a figure even higher than that of those who arrive in Italy illegally, a real revolution for a majority that is however little interested in communicating to its electorate that the centre-right government is the one that more than any other will allow entry and employment contracts work for a foreign workforce and no longer just in the traditional seasonal sectors.

In the last 15 years no government had foreseen so many entries, but very little of this historic decision appeared in the newspapers, much less on television news. However, it is a good and proven rule to always pay attention to what the TV says and even more so, in the torrid heat of summer, to what it "doesn't say". The chronic and tragic lack of jobs has silently transformed into a lack of workers, but this clear reversal of reality does not seem to interest anyone, it is not newsworthy, it almost annoys because it imposes on us an elementary and "cruel" question: do we really want to to work? Apart from an endemic share of slackers, finding a job to support yourself and build a future has always been the practice for entire generations. Perhaps even a humble job to start taking the first steps in a new world waiting to be conquered the occupation we chased in our youthful dreams: when I grow up I want to do it... but today's dreams seem far from this atavistic perspective and the numbers seem to confirm it unequivocally. Served, revered, protected and pampered in the family, life passes without meeting great obstacles nor enthralling emotions, parked in a protected oasis, entire generations seem to patiently wait for something to happen, for someone to provide, for a road to magically light up to indicate a destination. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands are missing plumbers, electricians, bus drivers, social health and telecommunications workers, carers and workers in the construction, mechanical, food and manual shipbuilding sectors... but anyway, as someone prophetically wrote, working is tiring.

Michelangelo Dotta

NP Ottobre 2023