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Italian here, living abroad. If you plan to move, you'll need to learn the language unfortunately. I think the average English knowledge of the population has s

Italian here, living abroad. If you plan to move, you'll need to learn the language unfortunately. I think the average English knowledge of the population has significantly improved over the last ~10 years, but dealing with bureaucracy (with its own special/weird language) still requires some level of understanding of written Italian. In terms of quality-of-life I'd recommend Tuscany, but as an expat Milan might be the best choice. Good luck.

R0b0t1 5y ago
I asked parent's question to an Italian and got basically the same thing but with the rider that tech jobs in Italy are few and far between and generally not desirable. Can you comment on that? Maybe parent was hoping for a visa surfing situation, I dunno.
- dougmwne 5y ago
  I understand that the good jobs are generally only in Milan and that the cost of living there is not good in comparison to local salaries. Not an issue for me personally, though I understand it’s a major issue in the country.
- mmarq 5y ago
  Milan being the exception, tech jobs in Italy are generally bad and low paid. Large consultancies tend to work on government projects (often useless or extremely boring), smaller companies still make websites for the baker down the road for 500€. If you are lucky, at the end of your career you may earn more or less what a 23 year old German or Briton earn on their first job. It is totally normal to look for experienced developers and offer 20K euros per annum.
- apignotti 5y ago
  I am not sure I fully agree, but the quality of the job really depends on the employer. Italy is characterized by _lots_ of small/medium sized businesses (not startups, actual profitable businesses often decades old). Some of them producing state-of-the-art tech in many different industries (Aerospace, Defense, Pharma, etc). The issue with this highly fragmented industrial environment is that it might be difficult to know what it is like to actually work somewhere before spending some time there. Companies tends to be unique. There are also offices from all the well known names (Google etc...), but usually these are sales oriented. I'd still call them "tech jobs" though. About Visas, as an Italian citizen I don't have direct experience. I suspect it might be difficult to get one. Of course EU citizens can do what they want. There might be (relatively) easy paths to citizenship for people with italian ancestry though.
  - mmarq 5y ago
    Small and medium sized employers are very bad places to work. The Italian definition of small company is one with less than 15 employees, these companies avoid much regulations and practically employ at-will, when they don’t use temporary contracts. A company is considered large if it employs more than 50 people. An Italian medium sized company, would be considered small everywhere else. In small and medium sized companies, salaries are extremely low, unpaid overtime is the norm and career progression is close to impossible. They are usually family-run, and the only way to progress is to marry the son/daughter of the owner. They can't hire competent people because they can’t afford to pay what abroad would be the salary of an entry level engineer and working conditions are so bad that everybody who can joins large or foreign companies or becomes a public servant, so they can’t work on anything serious, in lack of a better word, and often end up being a sort of expensive Amazon Turk for larger companies.

R0b0t1 5y ago

I asked parent's question to an Italian and got basically the same thing but with the rider that tech jobs in Italy are few and far between and generally not desirable. Can you comment on that? Maybe parent was hoping for a visa surfing situation, I dunno.

dougmwne 5y ago
I understand that the good jobs are generally only in Milan and that the cost of living there is not good in comparison to local salaries. Not an issue for me personally, though I understand it’s a major issue in the country.
mmarq 5y ago
Milan being the exception, tech jobs in Italy are generally bad and low paid. Large consultancies tend to work on government projects (often useless or extremely boring), smaller companies still make websites for the baker down the road for 500€. If you are lucky, at the end of your career you may earn more or less what a 23 year old German or Briton earn on their first job. It is totally normal to look for experienced developers and offer 20K euros per annum.
apignotti 5y ago
I am not sure I fully agree, but the quality of the job really depends on the employer. Italy is characterized by _lots_ of small/medium sized businesses (not startups, actual profitable businesses often decades old). Some of them producing state-of-the-art tech in many different industries (Aerospace, Defense, Pharma, etc). The issue with this highly fragmented industrial environment is that it might be difficult to know what it is like to actually work somewhere before spending some time there. Companies tends to be unique. There are also offices from all the well known names (Google etc...), but usually these are sales oriented. I'd still call them "tech jobs" though. About Visas, as an Italian citizen I don't have direct experience. I suspect it might be difficult to get one. Of course EU citizens can do what they want. There might be (relatively) easy paths to citizenship for people with italian ancestry though.
- mmarq 5y ago
  Small and medium sized employers are very bad places to work. The Italian definition of small company is one with less than 15 employees, these companies avoid much regulations and practically employ at-will, when they don’t use temporary contracts. A company is considered large if it employs more than 50 people. An Italian medium sized company, would be considered small everywhere else. In small and medium sized companies, salaries are extremely low, unpaid overtime is the norm and career progression is close to impossible. They are usually family-run, and the only way to progress is to marry the son/daughter of the owner. They can't hire competent people because they can’t afford to pay what abroad would be the salary of an entry level engineer and working conditions are so bad that everybody who can joins large or foreign companies or becomes a public servant, so they can’t work on anything serious, in lack of a better word, and often end up being a sort of expensive Amazon Turk for larger companies.