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Brits now poorer than Italians

It was a hammer blow to British pride so devastating that some have credited the so-called sorpasso — overtaking — with starting the slide that led to Thatcher’s removal from power three years later. In 1987 the Italians, perceived stereotypically as chaotic and corrupt, announced proudly they were more prosperous than the British despite eights years of painful, divisive reform imposed by the Tories. And now guess what? They’ve done it again. Just as most of us thought the economic crisis could get no worse, La Stampa on Thursday declared: “Italy beats England [sic] with the euro.”

Such has been the depreciation of the pound, the paper said, that Britain’s gross domestic product was now worth less than Italy’s. Applying Wednesday’s exchange rate to the two countries’ output last year, La Stampa calculated that Italy’s was 0.7 per cent higher.

And not only that. “For some weeks we have been individually richer on average,” the paper said. The standard measure of prosperity is GDP per head, and on that count Italians were also in front, by almost €900 (£855) a year. However sobering for Britons, the latest arithmetic should have the bittersweet taste of revenge for Italy, a country whose sorpasso was quickly reversed and which, three years ago, was branded “the real sick man of Europe” by the Economist.

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