ABSTRACT
As in other OECD countries, globalization forces have also affected the Italian economy; the early-1980s were characterized by one of the heaviest economic crises since World War Two. The Italian labor market is quite rigid and inflexible, which makes it hard for enterprises to cope with increased market insecurity. It is well known that the Italian labor market is strongly segmented into an insider and an outsider market. Well-protected insiders are those male employees near the end of their careers who are employed in medium-sized and large firms. Nevertheless, since the beginning of the 1980s, the labor force participation of this part of the population has declined continuously, and from 1970 to 2002, the percentage of Italian men aged 50 to 64 years in the labor market dropped by about 20 percentage points.
