Households must also be convinced of the importance of investing in knowledge: Italy ranks second last in the European Union on the proportion of young people aged between 25 and 34 with tertiary education; it is ranked first for the share of young people aged between 15 and 29 who neither study nor work.
This is a loss of individual opportunities that exposes them to the risk of exclusion and is a waste for society as a whole. Notwithstanding the high degree of efficiency and quality for which research in Italy in renowned, the State invests about € billion in its university system, half of what countries similar to Italy invest relative to GDP.