The growth the Italian economy lost because of the decline in international trade competitiveness is estimated to have amounted to more than half a percentage point each year. Italian industry consists of a few large corporations and a myriad of small and medium-sized firms.
The 1996 census found that three quarters of manufacturing employment was in firms with fewer than 250 employees: some 550,000 firms, or 99.7 per cent of all manufacturing companies in Italy.