The United States and Italy are interdependent on each other for various products. For example, we often see Americans wearing Italian designer clothes, while on the other hand; Italians covet the American brand clothes. As a nation, Italy has been on a steady decline with their exports to the United States. Italy has exported 238.2 billion dollars of total in 1997; 242.3 billion dollars of total exports in 1998; and 148.6 billion dollars of total exports in 1999. On the reverse side, Italy has always imported less United States products in each respective year, giving them a positive U.S. trade balance for the past three consecutive years.
As a member of many of the major economic organizations, Italy has grown to establish itself as the world’s sixth largest economy. Italy’s economy has branched out into many sectors of today’s aggressive market and has established different sizes of firms and companies worldwide. However, due to economic dynamism, there is an income divergence between northern and southern Italy. This remains as one of the nation’s most prominent economic problems. The government of Italy has taken measures to regulate the various “monopoly” type firms and large conglomerations. These firms deal largely with the importation licensing of foreign goods, with the exception of certain agricultural items. Practically all goods coming from the United States are permitted to be brought into Italy without import licenses.
The Italian government broke up the telephone monopoly in Italy in three ways. Privatizing Telecom Italia, establishing a new communications authority, and allowing the original monopoly to be challenged by smaller based companies, achieved this. The end of this monopoly led to more service exports, which constitutes more firms providing more services to countries worldwide. Importation laws in Italy have recently become stricter, therefore lessening the amount of products brought into the country. An example of these regulations deals with food products, namely meat and health products. Any product entering into Italy must meet certain standards. Since many products do not meet the strict requirements, there has been a rather large drop-off in imported goods.
Also contributing to decreased imports are the investment barriers. Foreign policy is encouraged in Italy, however, many permits are required to allow foreign industrial projects. This in turn leads to the positive trade balance in that the rate of importation is far less than the rate of exportation. To improve international competitiveness, Italy aids many different industries and firms in deprived areas of their economy. They achieve this by establishing membership of various economic organizations such as the World Trade Organization and the European Union. Their support encompasses export insurance, travel grants, and interest rate subsidies. Their subsidies include massive financial assistance to benefit the exportation of their goods in the long run.
Despite all of the positive aspects of Italy’s assistance to the worldwide economy, the United States placed Italy on their “Priority Watch List” in 1998. The United States went through with this measure as a result of Italy’s lengthy broadcast quotas, and failure to produce efficient copyrights for sound recordings, computer software, and film videos. This whole situation is actually taken much more seriously than one would think. The US government has recently taken action in creating legislation, which will penalize Italy for failure to adhere in the future. It is obviously an issue of high importance if the United States is going to take the time to monitor these minute actions of Italy. Although there is a favorable balance of trade in Italy, there are some problems with certain exports to other nations. As an example, one of the Italian products that is in question is grain-oriented electrical steel.
This product has been accused of being “dumped.” “Dumping” occurs when a foreign product is sold in the United States for a cheaper price than in the country that the product originated in. As a result, the Sunset Review decided to begin investigations on this product. This flat-rolled alloy steel product has stirred much question with the Department of Congress. “The Department” has concluded that the “dumping” accusations to this steel product are very complicated. As a result, “the Department” is extending the time to decide upon this case until June 28, 2000. Despite certain problems with the economy, the rates of importation and exportation are such that they create a trade balance, which is quite favorable for Italy.