It's mid-August, which has always been a time for rest and relaxation, but this year is different. The mood is no longer the depressed one of the previous summer. After very hard years that have decimated incomes and jobs, Italians are finally returning on vacation: according to Federalberghi surveys, at least one in two Italians go there this year, an army of over 30 million vacationers, up by 8,6, 2014% compared to XNUMX.
Even the signs coming from the economic situation point out that, even with all the limitations of an epochal crisis that is not yet over, the recovery, albeit frail and lagging behind its European partners, is stronger than the statistics and authorizes some hope as to its solidity and its effects on jobs, even if the state of the South, despite being patchy, cries out for revenge.
The latest Bulletin of the Bank of Italy reminds us that economic activity continues its gradual recovery and that in the next two years it could be higher "thanks to a recovery in investments, which have returned to increase since the beginning of the year" and that from he beginning of 2015 "the share of people hired on permanent contracts has increased significantly" (+252 in the last six months).
It's certainly not all rosy, but the international starlet, net of the Chinese turmoil which will also have some effect on our exports already penalized by Russian sanctions, is giving us a hand: oil is below 50 dollars a barrel, the euro it is significantly devalued against the dollar and the liquidity that Mario Draghi's Quantitative Easing ensures to the banks is abundant and promises to continue.
But Italy also has some merit, for once: the reforms of the Renzi government - starting with the Jobs Act and that of the cooperative banks, without forgetting the first part of the institutional reforms - are starting to produce some effects - both on the labor market and on the banking system – but above all they fuel new confidence among international investors in our country. If the promised tax cut really arrives, consumption will also wake up.
On closer inspection, there would be every reason to celebrate the first steps forward made in the last year and to nourish the hope of further improvements if we do not let our guard down guiltily and delude ourselves that the homework - that is, the reforms - are over .
But there is a worm that risks spoiling the party in the bud and it is the inexhaustible self-harm of which we Italians are masters. When we're on the edge, we're great at escaping danger, but when things start to fall right, we're just as great at ruining our lives. The battle that is announced in September on the reform of the Senate with the assault of the Pd minority on Renzi's premiership - because, net of merit and beyond hypocrisy, that's what it is about - is emblematic of the damage that Italian worstism can Do.
We Italians have always been eccentric, but it has never been seen that the minority of a party works to bring down the government led by its secretary. Now that is a unicum, which will enter history books and political anthologies as an authentic school case. Possibly not to be imitated.
It would be curious to do a survey on the beaches or in mountain resorts to find out how many Italians consider the direct or semi-direct election of senators as the battle of life and how many instead think that the useless duplication of chambers is an institutional anomaly that has been waiting for too long to be cancelled.
The Senate reform, proposed by the Renzi government, may or may not be liked, but at least one has the good taste to spare us the tale of mutilated democracy, on which the President Emeritus Giorgio Napolitano has already expressed himself in an incomparable way with his invitation to " do not undo Penelope's web”. And then don't pretend to forget two irrefutable truths.
First of all, let's not forget that the reform of the Senate proposed by Renzi has been approved as it is twice - once in the Chamber and the other in the Senate - and that parliamentary practice allows changes and improvements to be made even in the third reading to the text but excludes the possibility of adjusting the parts of the constitutional reform under discussion (such as the direct election of senators, which has already been rejected twice) which have already been approved by both houses of Parliament.
The second incontrovertible point is the consequence of the first: putting the basic elements of the reform back on track does not mean improving it at all but - more sincerely - dismantling it, starting from scratch and letting the whole world know that we have been joking so far. It can be understood that the minority of the Democratic Party and its improbable leaders à la Miguel Gotor, who play the battle of their life on this, don't care about Italy's image, but the intrigues of the palace, the parliamentary ambushes and the sad philosophy of the "much the worse, the better” are not exactly the priorities of the Italians and certainly will not help them to get better. Also because, as a refined journalist of the level of Marcelle Padovani, Bruno Trentin's lifelong companion, pointed out a few days ago, if Renzi falls "populisms will go crazy", as the miserable anti-migrant convergences of Grillo and Salvini already testify.
But it's mid-August, come on let's enjoy a few days of rest and set aside for a while the surreal designs of those who are always and in any case against any renewal. Happy holidays and happy mid-August to all readers.
