Regional Wages and the North-South Disparity in Italy after the Unification

Abstract

Information on wages has never been exploited in the longlasting debate on North-South disparities in Italy in the aftermath of the national Unification. The present article is based on a wide array of data on provincial wages in the building sector over the period 1862-1878. Nominal wages in the Centre-North and the South, including the Islands, were similar, because of the high wage levels in Sardinia and Sicily. In the peninsular South, nominal wages were about 10-15 percentage points lower than in the Centre-North. Yet, whenever the difference in prices is taken into account, any disparity between Centre-North and Mezzogiorno fades away.