When black is better than bonus

Now 36 per cent for second homes available and rented. From next year a furtherfiling to 30 per cent. All subsidy levels that, according to the history of the last few years of home bonus, are below the psychological threshold that entices businesses and citizens to choose the black.

Data compiled by Cna's Fiscal Policies department, published by Il Sole 24 Ore, point to the evidence, lining up the level of investments in renovations from 2011 onwards. When the rebate was less than 50% (i.e., in 2011 and 2012, when the basic allowance was 36%), the level of citizens' expenditure hovered in a range between 15 and 19 billion per year. The increase from 50% upwards led to the immediate emergence of 'submerged' interventions amounting to several billion euro. The investment curve, in fact, our an immediate surge around 30 billion, ten more than in the immediately preceding seasons.

It is here, with the 50 per cent deduction, that the threshold below which citizens and businesses make calculations on the convenience of other ways, with more immediate returns, is set. Going even below 36%, up to 30%, the incentive to go underground risks multiplying. Especially for works with very small amounts, for which the instalment of the incentive tends to disperse the benefit a lot: a 30% deduction, scheduled from 2026, on one thousand euro of expenditure produces 30 euro of discount per year.

Although it must be said that this is empirical evidence, observable in the recent history of construction investment: obviously, there is no discount level below which blackness becomes permissible.