Towards manoeuvre

Labour, studying less welfare taxes. Support for 150 thousand Neet

From second-level bargaining to meal vouchers. Calderone: we are working to expand the instruments in favour of workers and families. Self-employment incentives by October.

by Rome Editorial Staff

7 September 2025

2' min read

2' min read

Strengthen second-level bargaining and corporate welfare measures with a simple method, by lowering taxes. This is one of the recipes the Ministry of Labour is aiming at to strengthen wages in view of the next manoeuvre. Illustrating it directly is the Minister of Labour, Marina Calderone.

Welfare push

"We will work to improve second-level bargaining in terms of strengthening and broadening the welfare instruments to be made available to workers and their families, and to broaden the already subsidised tax thresholds to include more items.

Fringe benefits

This year's budget law has already stipulated that, in the three-year period 2025-2027, goods sold and services rendered to employees, amounts paid or reimbursed by employers for energy bills, and also expenses for rent or interest on mortgages do not contribute to forming income, up to an overall limit of EUR 1,000. The limit is raised to EUR 2,000 for employees with children. Figures that could therefore change or list of items that could lengthen.

Meal vouchers

Another measure under consideration, as anticipated by our newspaper, is to raise the tax-free threshold for meal vouchers from EUR 8 to EUR 10.

Congedi

Calderone does not go into details, but draws a line and does so also with respect to the hypothesis of renewing the extension of parental leave at 80 per cent for three months instead of two in 2026. "What we are doing for the family is not a spot intervention but has a structural dimension," said the labour minister.

Support for Neet

In an interview with La Stampa, then, the Minister of Labour recalled that the Siisl platform (Information System for Social and Labour Inclusion) is not only used to provide subsidies, but is a system to create a qualified intersection between labour supply and demand. It is with this in mind that the 'web coach' called AppLI was created: 'We did an experiment with two thousand young people in July, but in September a second phase will begin together with the employment centres, which initially aims to intercept 150 thousand young people and then open up to all'.

Self-employment incentives in the autumn

Calderone went on to say that incentives for self-employment, managed together with Invitalia and Ente Nazionale Microcredito, should start by the end of October (more than a year after the Cohesion Decree): 'We will make one billion euro available for the creation of new enterprises, new professional studios, and new companies between professionals, with a special focus on all activities that are set up in the special economic zone.