Europe's Scariest Chart Update: Italy Now Worse Than Portugal

Europe's Scariest Chart Update: Italy Now Worse Than Portugal

http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/defau.../picture-5.jpg Submitted by Tyler Durden on 03/01/2013 11:03 -0500

For the first time in two years, Italy's youth unemployment rate is now higher than Portugal's at a staggering 38.7% (which is where Greece was just two years ago). Apart from Germany (which fell from 8.0% to 7.9%), every other nation saw youth unemployment rates rise with a record 24.2% of European youth unemployed. Greece (59.4%) and Spain (55.5%) remain the most concerning as we noted in the past, austerity sounds straightforward as a policy, until the consequences bite in terms of social unrest.

http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/defau...130301_EU2.jpg


Europe's Scariest Chart Update: Italy Now Worse Than Portugal | Zero Hedge

Italy Is Not Spain - It's Worse

http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/defau.../picture-5.jpg Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/28/2013 20:27 -0500

With Rajoy quietly gloating at his political fraud being off the front-pages thanks to Italian elections, it seems the more we dig into Italian reality, the weaker the story becomes. The meme of the last few years has been that "at least we're not as bad as Greece" and rightly so, for as Bloomberg's Niraj Shah notes today, Greece's poverty rate is a stunning 31% (against Holland's 15.7%). However, while all eyes have been focused on Spain's dismal economy, the sad reality is that Italy is worse than Spain in that its poverty rate is a breath-taking 28.2% (relative to Spain's 27%) - even though the unemployment rates in the two nations are vastly different (Spain 26% and Italy 11.2%). Given this fact it is perhaps not surprising that the 'people' voted against austerity and furthermore, that Italy's CDS has pushed above Spain's for the first time in over a year.

http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/defau...28_poverty.jpg

Chart: Bloomberg Briefs

Italy Is Not Spain - It's Worse | Zero Hedge