Italy

The rise in the age at first marriage means that young people spend a longer time living in the parental family, which is favored over alternatives such as premarital cohabitation.

According to the data from the Multiscope survey "Family, Social Subjects, and Childhood Conditions" carried out in 1998 by ISTAT, only 2 percent of youths (4% of males compared to 2.5 percent of females) between the age of eighteen and thirty-four are living with a partner, 3.8 percent are living alone, and roughly 60 percent are living in the parental family, a higher percentage than in earlier years. In fact, in 1990 about 52 percent of youths in the same age group were living with their families. The experimenting of alternative family models, such as cohabitation and living alone, does not seem to attract Italian young people, who traditionally leave the parental home at the time of marriage. Prior to this, they rarely have the opportunity to live alone both because students usually attend university in the town in which their family lives and because of a lack of social policies that promote an early departure from the parental family (absence of unemployment benefits and grants to students). To this one must add the difficulty in obtaining housing caused by a lack of subsidized loans or government financing. The growth in new family structures is due, therefore above all to marital instability, and in fact one-person households are made mainly of divorced men and women.

The 1990s showed some evidence of change. There was a slight increase in the percentage of one-person households among the young. Living alone, though, involved mainly people between the ages of thirty-five and fifty-four, while the percentage of lone elders (55-75 years) decreased because both men and women were living longer.

Gender differences are striking: the great majority of nonwidowed singles are males (29.4% TABLE 2

compared to 24.3% of females) living in central and northern towns, where the percentage of divorces and separation is higher. This is because in Italy, mothers usually receive custody of their children. In the south there is a smaller percentage of singles (16.7%). Marriages are more stable in this region, which also has the highest percentage of families that include an elderly member (Cer 1999). The larger number of elderly people, mainly women, that live alone in the north does not imply an absence of family ties. Usually the single elder is well-placed in the family solidarity network, giving and receiving both material help and solidarity from younger family members. In this light, the intensity and frequency of family relationships is a forced response (Saraceno 1998) to the lack of adequate government family policies.

The need for adequate social family policies is growing. In Italy more than in other European countries, two great demographic changes are underway: a marked fertility decrease (1.2 children per woman) and a progressive aging of the population. The decrease in young people and the increase of the elderly pose serious questions on the future of health and retirement policies. In 2050 there will be two elderly citizens per young person (Cer 1999). This forecast represents a threat to the persistence of family solidarity networks: the dwindling younger generations will have difficulties meeting the needs of an increasing number of elderly family members. Presumably the increase in single elderly citizens will be a cause of increased government expenditure on health and retirement benefits, and the growth in numbers of the nonactive (those retired, or too young or old to work) versus the active population will pose a problem for the pension system.