What Are the Main Jobs in Italy?

Hernán Piñera/CC-BY-SA 2.0

The main jobs in Italy are in the tourism industry, the automobile industry and textile manufacturing. The service sector accounts for the most jobs in Italy, employing 61.9 percent of the of the Italian workforce. Examples of in-demand service sector jobs include nursing, teaching and hotel management.

Job competition is steep in Italy due to a major recession that has impacted employment since 2008. Jobs are particularly hard to find among recent college graduates. Youth unemployment rates are at an all-time high of 40 percent. Despite the challenges, employment can still be found in Italy’s automobile industry, which is the country’s largest employer. Fiat is the dominant company within the Italian automobile industry, and it plans on expanding to more countries in the future to continue its growth.

Italy also has a strong machinery industry, which makes it a suitable country for engineering jobs. The tourism sector also creates many jobs including tour guides, baggage carriers and bellhops, hotel managers and recreation workers. The Italian corporations with the biggest workforces include Fiat, Benetton, Finmeccanica and Pirelli. In addition to employment in large corporations, small family-operated businesses find success in Italy because they often benefit from the tourism industry. The economy of northern Italy is much stronger than in the south, and many southern Italians migrate to the north to look for work.