The wealth divide between Italy's prosperous northern regions and the impoverished south is widening, a new survey showed on Monday.
According to a report on tax returns in the financial daily Il Sole 24 Ore, average earnings for 2007 in all northern regions stood above 17,000 euros, while in the south they remained below 13,000.
While the southern region of Calabria clocked average earnings of just 10,200 a year (a 14% drop between 1999 and 2007), in the northern region of Valle d'Aosta earnings were up 11% in eight years to an average of 18,490 euros a head.
The two regions are home to the poorest and richest towns in Italy respectively.
Ayas in Valle d'Aosta came in first in the rankings with residents earning an average of 66,000 euros a year.
The small mountain town has less than 1,500 residents but earnings were boosted because it is also the home of Silvio Scaglia, founder of telecommunications giant Fastweb.
At the other end of Italy, residents in the small Calabrian town of Plati' earned an average of 4,000 euros each last year.
The sole exception to the north-south divide is the town of Val Rezzo in northern Lombardy.
Earnings dropped by 31% between 1999 and 2007 to an average of 4,330 euros, making Val Rezzo the second lowest earner in Italy after Plati'.
