Italy. Para-subordinate workers and their social protection

This chapter focuses on para-subordinate workers in Italy, i.e. individuals who are legally self-employed but who are often “economically dependent” on a single employer. The chapter first presents the welfare provisions that para-subordinate workers are entitled to receive, pointing out that the disadvantages facing para-subordinate workers relative to employees have been recently reduced. Afterwards, making use of the most suitable available longitudinal data, statistics about the evolution over time of the number and characteristics of para-subordinate workers are shown and the first phase of the working career of para-subordinate workers is observed, assessing vulnerability in terms of earnings level, employability and accrual of pension contributions over a ten-year period.