If they won't go of their own accord, bribe them. That at least would appear to be the philosophy of Italian finance minister Tommaso Padoa Schioppa who has proposed a tax incentive to five million, home-living young Italians to encourage them to leave home and mamma's cooking.
According to research institute Eurispes, 59 per cent of Italians between the ages of 18 and 34 still live at home. That figure compares badly with other EU countries - 10 per cent in Spain, 12 per cent in Finland, 12.5 per cent in Denmark, 16.5 per cent in Germany, 19.5 per cent in Austria, 23 per cent in France and a respectable 20.5 per cent in Ireland.
Young people who fail to leave the nest, claims Mr Padoa-Schioppa, also fail to get married and develop independent lives for themselves.
Given that, in Italy as in Ireland, the standard excuse for not leaving home has always been high rental costs, the minister has proposed a measure in this year's budget which would allow young people between the ages of 20 and 30 to claim up to €999 in income tax allowance if they are paying rent (and if they earn less than €15,493.71 per annum).
During a senate hearing this week, the minister described those at the centre of this proposed legislation as "bamboccioni", which might loosely be translated as big fat mamma's boys. Not everyone was amused by the minister's turn of phrase. Franco Caruso of extreme left party Rifondazione Comunista, theoretically a government ally, was outraged. He argued that young Italians continue to live at home with their parents, not because of the cost of housing but because a majority of them find work only on a short term contract basis which makes it impossible for them to get a mortgage.
For some, though, the minister has touched a raw nerve. Renato Brunetta, economist and parliamentarian for Silvio Berlusconi's centre-right opposition party Forza Italia said:
"These young people are the living symbols of a social system in which there is no movement, not even India with its caste system is so paralysed. The poor quality of the supply and demand of work and the relative inefficiency of the productive system mean that [ mamma's boys] show little propensity for professional, social or geographic movement and little willingness to take risks."