There are more and more unobtainable people and the national production system is suffering as a result. Of the 5.5 million hires scheduled for the year, almost half (47.8%) are difficult (and often impossible) to find. Above all, there is a lack of graduates in electronic and information engineering (74%), ITS graduates in the energy sector (87.5%), graduates of technical-professional institutes in the fashion system (63.6%) and professional qualifications in wood address (71%).
The shortage of qualified professional figures is now a constant in the Italian labor market, and the data from the Excelsior 2024 information system confirm a worrying trend: unavailability rates reaching 70% for some profiles, to the detriment of the needs of a struggling production system find the skills you need. Despite the difficulties, Italian companies plan to hire a total of 691 thousand graduates in 2024, with a peak in requests for economics (205 thousand) and engineering (143 thousand) courses, followed by training areas related to teaching and training.
Among the most requested, but also most difficult to find, profiles are graduates in electronic and information engineering, where the mismatch exceeds 70%. Things are no better for healthcare-paramedic and medical-dental fields, where around two thirds of the candidates requested by companies are nowhere to be found. Significant difficulties are also recorded in the scientific and technological sectors, with particular reference to the chemical-pharmaceutical and scientific-mathematical fields.
Not just graduates. Among intermediate technical figures, graduates of technical and professional institutes represent a crucial pool for companies, which aim to include around 1.4 million of them in 2024. However, procurement difficulties exceed 60% in sectors such as the fashion system, mechatronics, electronics and construction. Among the most requested five-year diplomas are administration, finance and marketing (462 thousand positions), tourism and hospitality (274 thousand), mechanics and energy (139 thousand) and transport and logistics (107 thousand) addresses.
Particularly critical is the case of profiles coming from vocational education and training (VET) courses, for which companies have planned 2.1 million hires. However, almost half of these workers are difficult to find, with peaks of unavailability exceeding 70% for profiles specialized in wood, thermo-hydraulic and electrical systems.
The difficulties in finding also extend to graduates of the ITS Academy, highly specialized courses that aim to train superior technicians in advanced technological fields. Sectors such as energy, chemistry and fashion record significant gaps between supply and demand, with unavailability reaching 61% overall. Mechatronics, information technologies and business services are the most requested sectors, but even here the numbers are not enough: for example, for the energy sector, 87.5% of the requested technicians cannot be found.
Demographic aging is at the root of the crisis and therefore the situation risks worsening in the coming years. The challenge is clear: bridging the gap between supply and demand, in a system that, in order to grow, needs increasingly specialized and qualified workers. But time is running out, and the cost of late action may be too high.
