THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Life is no longer so sweet in the land of “la dolce vita”, with a report finding that more than 11pc of Italian families now live in relative poverty.
Eight million Italians, out of a population of 60 million, are struggling to make ends meet, according to Istat, the national statistics agency on Tuesday.
Of those, 3.4 million are living in absolute poverty, representing 5.7 per cent of the population, up from 5.2 per cent in 2010.
The problem is worst in the sun-baked south, known as the Mezzogiorno, where one in four families now live below the poverty line.
The definition of absolute poverty is based on a basket of necessary goods and services, while relative poverty is measured by average household consumption. » | Nick Squires, in Rome | Tuesday, July 17, 2012
