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Comment by mystixx | Hacker News Reader

I'm from Italy as well. As everyone else, I am dissatisfied with how Italy is run, but it's _disgusting_ to see how many Italians living abroad claim the right to hurl mud at Italy. I think the real challenge is to stay here, not to run away abroad.

As a proof, here we ended up talking of mafia and corruption, following common stereotypes and therefore giving a distorted idea of Italy. I think most of the people that are saying "run away" are implicitly trying to justify themselves for their decision to go away from their country and family.

Sadly, more than in culture, food and wine, Italians are the first for the most destructive self-criticism in the world. I have rarely heard a non-Italian speaking so low of his own country, as only Italians can do.

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Providing facts is the best way of debunking sterotypes though. In your statement, I see only patriotism, which isn't very convincing.

Maybe you could start by explaining why Italy comes 56th (between Turkey and Belarus) in the ease of doing business rankings: http://www.doingbusiness.org/rankings

I know all rankings can be criticised, but this one confirms everything I have read about things like rule of law and red tape in Italy.

the very same ranking ranks Italy better than Luxembourg where almost all the American large companies have their European HQ.

It also ranks Malaysia better than Switzerland. Oh, please.

As I said, all rankings are flawed, but if you drill down into the individual factors you'll find out some of the reasons for any surprising results.

Luxemburg is part of a giant tax evasion scheme. That's the only reason why some multi-nationals are doing business there. They don't need "ease of doing business" like a startup does.

I really don't know nearly enough about Malaysia to compare it to Switzerland. Apparently you do.

> I think the real challenge is to stay here, not to run away abroad.

Exactly. And that's why everybody is advising not to start a business there. Do you want extra challenges when you are doing something that is not easy already? Probably you think there is something "heroic" in it, but that's not the case for everybody.

I am an iOS developer. I left a country where I had a job I didn't like (not in iOS, but on Microsoft platforms) for a ridiculous salary, where working for yourself is a suicide. And I was one of the lucky ones. The moment I moved I got triple the salary for a job I liked and later was able to start my own business. Accounting and tax declaration here in NL is really easy, and fiscal pressure is much better. Frankly, since my life got immediately so much better outside of Italy I don't need to implicitly justify my decisions. I have plenty of explicit reason I can list.

You might find it disgusting that Italians throw mud at their own country, I find it sad to see people defending it only because it's their own country, and as such is exempted from criticism. Maybe you are the one trying to implicitly justify your decision to remain.

50% taxes for people earning less than 15000€/year ? Yes is a challenge... to survive.

I tried, I said "I'll stay here, I'll pay taxes, make money and resurrect this country", so they added +10% taxes, reduced the "low income reduction" from people earning 30 000/year (gross) to 15000/year (gross), increased the "retirement fund" costs from 24% to 29% (and will increase up to 33.7% in 3 years they said) so I ended up, in one year, from paying ~30% taxes (plus accountant, required in Italy), to ~45%, increasing to 49% in 3 years.

And NO ONE said here the worst part. I can't believe no one mentioned.

The first year you work (not employed), you have to pay taxes for the first year and THE YEAR AFTER, yes, you have understood it: 90% taxes first year, plus accountant.

Good bye, my beloved country. There are a lot of smart people, but I have no idea how to survive there.

Indeed, I forgot that the first year you pay for the second year in advance, but is indeed true.

I'll be fully honest with you:

I considered staying. I considered doing exactly what you say: staying, working against the current, trying to change things. And then I decided not to.

Why?

Because I fully believe that Italy is doomed beyond any attempt to fix it. You should cut away pretty much 90% of the people holding any position of power in any public office. Trouble is, you can't do it by force. You must do it legally. Legally means asking them - they occupy the very same public office positions who would rule on this. Would they agree to it?

And with whom would you replace them?

The "new" guys, the fresh blood, very quickly adjust to the state of things - otherwise their career prospects (and in some extreme cases life expectancy) are cut sharply.

I really, really believe it can't be saved and therefore made a rational decision to leave and never look back.

It's a battle that can't be won, I decided not to fight it.

Yes italy is the best place to live worlwide but the dire reality of its socio-economic situation to not talk of the ridiculous Startup Visa program is a fact, especially if compared with others similar program worlwide http://en.wescribe.co/t/the-italian-startup-program-startup-...

> I have rarely heard a non-Italian speaking so low of his own country, as only Italians can do.

I'm Turkish studying Italian language and literature at uni, and I can assure you that Turks and Italians are competing a trophy in this race of self-bashing. So much so that I sometimes regret having got into studying italian culture.

Speak to someone from Greece then, they are proud of lots of things as we do but honestly, from my point of view staying in Italy isn't what I define "living".

Also I don't see those who stays there as people willing to overcome a real challenge, but like someone with no guts to move away from his/her place.

Maybe you want to ignore it, but Italy is so much heterogeneous that living here is not always being home: I'm not home. I'm in Italy but I moved away from my place years ago.

It's funny how the same thing can be seen in such different ways. I have been planning since long to go away from Italy and I will eventually go away, but I feel like it's an act of cowardice. You said just the opposite...

I second this. "I think the real challenge is to stay here, not to run away abroad". It hurts me hearing those expats talking shit about our country. I can't imagine how they change perception of Italy to everyone they get in touch with.

To those of you, stop bashing and start being the first change you want to see.

Explain me how do you pretend to change something when your clients are paying 50% of what the clients in other countries are willing to pay (if they pay, 'cause lots really like to delay payments indefinitely), while your suppliers are constantly banging your door to pay (rightly) them, and while your government 5 days a week is trying everything possible to shut your business down?

Be serious, go abroad for 3 months. Start a limited company, be a self-employed person and you'll finally understand the obnoxious bureaucratic process one needs to undergo and what kind of unimaginable amount of things one needs pay to keep his/her business running in Italy.

You won't find anyone who disagrees with you on this. This is not the point, however. Everyone in Italy is disappointed.

But if you're going abroad, there are good chances that you're one of those who can make the difference.

And if those who can make the difference go abroad, how do you pretend to change things here?

Let me only say that this: if Italy is a sinking boat, people who leave the country, they don't have guts, they're all so many Schiettino.

The captain is the one who is not supposed to leave the boat, not everyone else...

"Guts" for what? Did you notice that we stopped even having elections? Sorry, but I don't see why people should sacrifice themselves and their families just to keep this up.

Dunno man, it feels like people still living in Italy are poisoned by the level of madness there is.

In other words: http://i.imgur.com/dA5IUA1.png

Expat here.

I always thought that the perception of a country in foreign eyes is due to the contact with people of said country.

I try to remember every day that the perception that my friends and collegues abroad have of Italy is due in some small part to my own actions as a representative of that country.

So please, let's try to avoid generalizing. Not all Italians abroad are mercenaries or quitters that shit on they country they were born in.

I would say that most of us aren't.

I'm not Italian. My opinion of Italy is not great, but not because of ordinary Italians speaking badly of it, rather because of the likes of Berlusconi. People voted for him!? It matches my experiences there, such as being unable to buy a train ticket without the guy in the booth trying to rip me off. I eventually got fed up and when I went to a major sporting event which should have cost me €300+, I just bought an official some beers.

I finally moved to Germany. I tried, but could not bear it anymore. I miss my family and friends oh so badly, but staying? It would have been even worse.

Those who stay are the ones with the real courage, people say. No, I'm really sorry, but those who stay are those who have their shoulders covered (by family, maybe) and may have some long-standing interests that give them enough stability to try what they want.

But, they won't change anything. The system is rigged, you cannot take the power away from those who hold it and who are in charge of the big, important decisions. That is, unless you are ok to play their conservative and self-preserving game, actually becoming part of the skewed systems. Look at what the Movimento 5 Stelle has already become.

Recently we even tried with oligarchy - officially called the government of the professors, it was a government made of the Italian "best minds" and it was appointed directly by the President of the Republic. It may have saved us, but it didn't really kickstarted the economy back. We're now in a triple-dip recession, ask any economist and he would gladly lecture you about our very interesting case.

We're a country where a lot of people saved and still manage to save, and that has naturally turned us into a very conservative country, where every little change is seen as a menace for the status quo.

Long story short, if you want to do something with your life and you have no settled financial interested (or you can manage them from abroad) you flee and put your studies and experience to good use. Otherwise you stay and either get involved in the mess or try to stay out of it and see yourself beaten to the punch by incompetents and people that are just ok with marching aligned with the old and distorted system.

Anyway, I'm not one of those self-deprecating Italian whiners. I don't hate my country. I just think the problem lies with the biggest part of our fellow Italians. It's a problem so hard to entangle and define that giving up is really the only viable solution.

Thank you for your comment, you really express my thoughts. I'm sicking of hearing people say that, just because they're not willing to expat or because they have their shoulder covered. I wanted to live with my boyfriend, have my own house, buy me a new computer, etc... I couldn't do it in Italy. I could just work and live at home with my parents so I didn't had to pay rent and expenses. A lot of my friends does that but I'm 26 and I deserve to be independent, so I expat. Do you people think that is the simple way? I assure you that it isn't.

What does "shoulder covered" mean?

It's an Italian way of saying that means you have someone (usually parents or relatives) who can help you get out of trouble. Literally sort of, "coat for the winter".

Yeah sorry, that's some Italian crawling through my English. It means "having a parachute" or maybe even "having your back covered". In other words, moving from a safe economical ground where you can easily return just in case anything goes wrong. Practically it means having rich parents or a stable financial situation because of your family's wealth.

Thanks.

I'm 3rd generation of Italians that emigrated to Brazil. Regions with lots of Italian immigrants like Buenos Aires in Argentina or Sao Paulo in Brazil can resonate with every feeling in this thread.

Do not take it personally, but I cannot think of any major problem attributable to Italy to be any better in Brazil or Argentina.

So you disagree that Italian immigration politically influenced these places? Not that every Portugal and Spain former colonies are doing great, but in Latin America (with exception of Venezuela) they probably will do better than Brazil and Argentina in the near future.

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