Kafka reloaded

Kafka reloaded 

My son, fresh out of the University, has had an early introduction to what working in Italy entails. Fresh out of the University, he landed a job offer (yes, miracles happen).

He was sent a list of documents he has to provide. First on the list is a copy of the Identity Card. In Italy, this document lists your full name and surname, date and place of birth, place of residence at issuance, the Italian equivalent of the social security number, Citizenship, and the identifier of the birth certificate.

After that, in quick succession, he was asked by this company to provide:

  1. ID card image

  2. Scan of the social security number ;

  3. Signed declaration of date and place of birth;

  4. government issued certificate of citizenship, (with stamp duty);

  5. government issued birth certificate (with stamp duty);

  6. government issued composition of the family unit (with stamp duty);

  7. Signed declaration of graduation (which is available to third party on the University site);

  8. Signed declaration that he has a clean criminal record.

Clear so far?

Just so you know, 2,3,4,5, are data already present on the ID card. 6 is useless unless he asks for fiscal purposes to get some of the attendant benefits coming from supporting a benefit, a thing that has just recently sunk the Rutte government for contesting valid claims. 7 and 8 are also documents you ask the state , to provide them to your employer, which in turn sends them to the state. In the process, you lose a couple of days.

So, when I see an Italian Minister, Mr Provenzano, extolling the beauty of “Next Generation EU” in terms, amongst other things, of “digitalization”, you should understand the wry smile on my face. By all means, digitalization did happen: instead of going to a public office to queue up asking for documents relative to nonsensical requests, most of the documents were available though ATM like terminals in a mall. Because we are in a city where these things are available, and not in the boondocks. So, to summarize this small piece:

EU governments and the Italian one in particular think that they will be able to organize and direct productivity enhancing investments. Meanwhile, they not only engage in things that are absolutely useless, but force citizens to lose time and money in doing so, with the dread of making mistakes, or sending one less document than requested, and generally training into people an acquiescence to government idiocy.

Bear in mind that nominally there is a law on the books saying that it is forbidden to government to ask for data already in its possession, which speaks volumes about the sense of state of all the controlling apparatus. No one complains, because mostly that instills fear of reprisals, and it's anyway pointless: the time cost of complaining is higher than going with the flow, and no one would pay anyway. But keep this piece in mind when high minded claims about “investment” are uttered: this is the level of economic and business knowledge you have to deal with. It probably is different elsewhere in the EU, but it's not FORBIDDEN or sanctioned by the EU when it happens.

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