The anti-establishment movement continues to gain ground in Italy, driven by younger generations frustrated with the labor market, and could be a sign of things to come in Europe, The Wall Street Journal reports.
In Italy, populist parties the Five Star Movement and the right-wing, anti-immigration League won the March 4 election – Five Star won 32 percent and the League took 17 percent – and both campaigned on promises many thought were incompatible with Europe's budget rules, including Five Star's flagship of universal income for the poor and the League's scheme of a flat tax rate of 15 percent for companies and individuals.
But younger adults were hooked.
Almost 30 percent of people age 20-34 in Italy are unemployed, in school or in a training program, according to Eurostat, and the number of Italians under 34 in absolute poverty more than doubled to 10 percent between 2010 and 2016.
"Young Italians are, in general, very frustrated by their condition and disappointed by the current political situation," Alessandro Rosina, a Milan-based professor who helped conduct a study on Italian youth for the Toniolo Institute, told The Atlantic before the elections. "The traditional parties are the main [people] accused by the Italian millennials: because they failed to improve their condition during the past governments, because they are not in tune with their language and their demands."
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