Abstract

This paper deals with the issue of the introduction of a legal minimum wage, as well as how to make it consistent with the Italian legal, institutional, and collective bargaining framework. To this aim, an economic and legal analysis will be carried out on the interaction between mandatory remuneration and the role played by collective bargaining in our legal framework. A proposal will be tabled with the purpose of introducing a guaranteed minimum wage for workers with a view to combining the effectiveness of collective bargaining as a regulatory source between workers and firms, and the support offered by legislation. The recent initiatives on minimum wage, promoted within the EU, will be discussed, and their impact on the Italian system in both economic and legal terms will be evaluated