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Economy

Who Wants To Work For The Post Office? Snapshot Of Italy's Uncertain Future

Why are no locals in the northern Italian city of Verona applying for the once prized permanent job posting? The answer is found elsewhere.

Postal worker in Italy delivers mail to apartment mailboxes

A postal worker delivers mail in Italy

Fotogramma/Abaca via ZUMA
Niccolo Zancan

Forget the myth of permanent employment, the secure job for life. In Verona, they are looking for postal workers, but can't find them. They can't find them in Bolzano or Turin either. There is a labor shortage in the post offices of Italy's northeast, and a shortage in the northwest.

The letter carrier's position has never been in such high demand as it is today. To tell the truth: few actual letters though many more packages to deliver. Postal workers are offered a one-year fixed-term contract at 1,100 euros per month, before having the opportunity to move up the ranks and secure a job for life within two to three years. A national contract, annual leave, health insurance and workers rights. Yet the last call for applications in Verona was almost completely empty.


"We are looking for applicants, but we are getting fewer and fewer than we would like," says Alessandra Bastianello, delivery manager at Poste Italiane in the province of Verona. "Maybe they don't come because they don't know how easy it is to apply, or maybe they don't know that we can offer job security and career prospects. It's not at all clear that those who start out as postal workers will do this job forever. There are paths to growth. Some people started out that way and now run a small office. Here in Verona alone, we have taken on 56 people in 2020 and 47 in 2021."

Economic recovery in action

Verona may be a wealthy city, but during the darkest period of the COVID-19 lockdown, 6,000 people out of a population of 259,000 had applied for vouchers, with the municipality only able to help half of them. In the past ,far fewer requests for support were submitted, all of which were accepted.

The economy has picked up though, and over recent months even the province’s largest logistics companies have been struggling to find workers. "The mailman's job is tiring, riding around on a scooter in the rain, freezing temperatures and blistering heat. You are always outside, you have to be organized and know the territory well," explains Antonio Lo Presti, general secretary of the Union of Postal Workers of Verona (CISL). "The data is objective. We are having a hard time finding new mail carriers."

So why is there a lack of new postal workers? There are several reasons. In Veneto, many young people have the opportunity to earn more money from their first job. In the past, it was also easier to get in, the process was faster. "Even the entrance tests are complicated," says Lo Presti.

A postman rides on a scooter with gloves and mask in Italy

A postman on a scooter in Italy

Pierre Teyssot/Image of Sports/Newscom via ZUMA

Another factor is clearly linked to the management of those benefitting from the "citizens' income" program, which started in 2019, considered a first step toward a Universal Basic Income to provide a basic welfare stipend for those who don't have a job. Lo Presti says that people on "citizens' income" are not called for this type of job. "Yet they should be called and many times they should be the first," says Lo Presti. "Poste Italiane cannot call them directly, but the employment centers should make the link between the two parties. This does not happen. I don't know why. But nobody calls them. The citizenship income is a fundamental instrument, but it is not very concrete."

Of the 10,200 unemployed people hired in the last three years by the municipality of Verona, only 40 were employed for public service work in the schools, maintenance and gardens of the city. Today, there are 3,284 people in Verona who need help.

Restaurants, tourism and the service sector are still suffering.

"The vast majority are fragile people, with various. difficulties, and I do not think it will be easy to integrate them into the labor market," says the city councilor in charge of social policies, Maria Daniela Maellare. "I can't explain this lack of postal workers. Perhaps there is a problem with the selection criteria. In Verona, the labor market is recovering almost everywhere, but restaurants, tourism and the service sector are still suffering.”

So they are looking for letter carriers in the city of Verona. In Italy's rich northeast. You need a driver's license to take the test on the 125cc scooter provided by the company. Finally, if chosen, workers are offered a secure salary, 1,100 euros per month and more: the famous permanent job post.

Mail carriers are sought after in the plains and valleys, in the mountain villages. All over Italy's northern and central regions. In three provinces of Emilia, in two of Tuscany. Advertisements call for qualified letter carriers, able to cover the routes and be responsible in their deliveries. It is not true that Italian workers are not willing to get involved, to change, to search. In the next few months, in Verona itself, 59 permanent jobs will be created at the Post Office: 57 of them are workers from other parts of Italy.

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Economy

Lex Tusk? How Poland’s Controversial "Russian Influence" Law Will Subvert Democracy

The new “lex Tusk” includes language about companies and their management. But is this likely to be a fair investigation into breaking sanctions on Russia, or a political witch-hunt in the business sphere?

Photo of President of the Republic of Poland Andrzej Duda

Polish President Andrzej Duda

Piotr Miaczynski, Leszek Kostrzewski

-Analysis-

WARSAW — Poland’s new Commission for investigating Russian influence, which President Andrzej Duda signed into law on Monday, will be able to summon representatives of any company for inquiry. It has sparked a major controversy in Polish politics, as political opponents of the government warn that the Commission has been given near absolute power to investigate and punish any citizen, business or organization.

And opposition politicians are expected to be high on the list of would-be suspects, starting with Donald Tusk, who is challenging the ruling PiS government to return to the presidency next fall. For that reason, it has been sardonically dubbed: Lex Tusk.

University of Warsaw law professor Michal Romanowski notes that the interests of any firm can be considered favorable to Russia. “These are instruments which the likes of Putin and Orban would not be ashamed of," Romanowski said.

The law on the Commission for examining Russian influences has "atomic" prerogatives sewn into it. Nine members of the Commission with the rank of secretary of state will be able to summon virtually anyone, with the powers of severe punishment.

Under the new law, these Commissioners will become arbiters of nearly absolute power, and will be able to use the resources of nearly any organ of the state, including the secret services, in order to demand access to every available document. They will be able to prosecute people for acts which were not prohibited at the time they were committed.

Their prerogatives are broader than that of the President or the Prime Minister, wider than those of any court. And there is virtually no oversight over their actions.

Nobody can feel safe. This includes companies, their management, lawyers, journalists, and trade unionists.

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