Obstacles include inadequate wages and informal networks to find work

Aim on employment in the South is the main incentive for hiring envisaged by the Budget Bill 2026, under consideration in the Senate (AS 1689). It is a partial discount of social security contributions to be paid by employers who will hire on an open-ended basis or stabilise workers (excluding executives)in the regions of the Single Zones of Southern Italy, that is, in Abruzzo, Basilicata, Calabria, Campania, Molise, Puglia, Sicily and Sardinia. At stake are 825 million euro for the three-year period 2026-2028. The details of the facilitation will have to be established by an implementing decree that will take into account the effects on employment of the incentives provided for by the Cohesion Decree (Decree 60/2024), to hire young people, women and the long-term unemployed in the single ZES. These incentives close on 31 December 2025, i.e. they are only valid for hirings that will be made before the end of this year.

As from 1 January 2026, unless the Budget Bill is amended during the parliamentary procedure, the new incentive will remain in place, which, however, does not have a specific focus on young people, and the old 50% discount of contributions in force since 2017 for hiring under 30s who have never held an open-ended employment relationship. The latter aid operates for 36 months after hiring and is capped at EUR 3,000 per year.

In the first half of 2025 youth hirings incentivised by contribution relief amounted to 72,280, up 58% compared to the same period in 2024. The balance at the end of the year could be even more positive, if we consider the fact that the total contribution relief up to 500 euro per month for hiring under 35 envisaged by the Cohesion Decree was only implemented in May 2025, thus one year after the regulation that envisaged it. Applications could therefore be more numerous in the second half of the year.

Incentives to hire are certainly relevant to support youth employment, considering the fact that the unemployment rate in the 15-34 age group remains at 12.3%, thus double the national average. And in the same age group it reaches 22.6% in the South (Istat data referring to the second quarter of 2025).

Apart from recruitment costs, there are, however, other critical issues in the path that takes young people from training to work. One of these is the inadequacy of wages, as highlighted by the Plus 2024 survey by Inapp (National Institute for Public Policy Analysis), entitled 'The (difficult) school-to-work transition of young people', conducted on a sample of 45 thousand individuals, representative of the national territory, and published in September 2025.