Domestic helpers, with the 50% tax credit a family would save EUR 9,425 a year

As of July 2024, 42.3 per cent of households that make use of the services provided by a regular domestic helper stated that this expense has become difficult to sustain. Also worrying, according to the Fondazione Studi Consulenti del Lavoro, is the trend of the last two years, which shows a steady increase in household difficulties. Compared to the surveys conducted in January 2023 and July 2023, the share of households that consider the rising costs unaffordable has increased from 25.6% (January 2023) to 36.9% (July 2023) to 42.3% (July 2024).

Households with an average level of economic wellbeing are those that register the most significant increase in difficulties: the share of those judging expenditure on domestic helpers to be hardly sustainable doubles from 27.9% in January 2023 to 55.2% in July 2024. Among those with a low and medium-low economic level, the criticalities already noted in previous surveys are confirmed: almost eight out of ten assess the expenditure for domestic helpers and carers as no longer sustainable.

France, which already 30 years ago initiated virtuous reforms in the domestic sphere that have led to a 30% reduction in irregular work, while offering significant support to families and workers. In May 2024, Assindatcolf organised a meeting between the Parliamentary Intergroup on Domestic Work and a French delegation to study the 'French model', a complex system of benefits that provides a EUR 2 relief for each hour worked by the domestic worker and a 50% tax credit for the employer.

The combination of these elements produces a reduction by more than half of the cost borne by the family, which from 20.27 euro (hourly cost including pay - equal to 11 euro - and social security contributions) becomes 9.13 euro. A universal mechanism, immediately usable (thus also ahead of tax return times) and dematerialised because it is online.

The regularisation of 2020 favoured the emersion of a significant number of domestic workers, bringing the irregularity rate down to 51.8%, but according to estimates by the Fondazione Studi Consulenti del Lavoro (Labour Consultants Studies Foundation), the employment contraction in domestic work over the last two years is expected to be accompanied by an increase in undeclared work estimated at around 54% by 2023. According to these projections, in 2023 out of 1,384,000 domestic workers, 632,000 will be regular and 753,000 irregular.
In Italy, a domestic employer is entitled to access limited and insufficient tax benefits, such as the deductibility of contributions paid for his or her domestic helper, caregiver or babysitter, but up to a maximum limit of €1,549.37 per year. Only in the case of a carer hired to care for a dependent person with an income below 40,000 euro is there a minimal deduction of what has been spent on the salary, to a maximum of 399 euro per year, or 19% of 2,100 euro

"Assindatcolf's historic battle," says association president Andrea Zini, "has always been to get families to deduct the full cost incurred for domestic staff. However, over the past few years the country's economic situation has worsened and this has made it increasingly unaffordable to resort to in-home assistance, especially for non-self-sufficiency. This makes it necessary to rethink the tax system, to solve not only the problem of costs but also that of undeclared work. Results that could be achieved with the introduction of tax credits, an instrument that can reach a broader range of deductibles and in a fairer way'.