[toyg]

> It also implies a booming, healthy economy where more people want.money to start businesses

Lol, have you ever been to Italy...? Banks will not lend to you unless you're quite rich already. Catholicism says debit bad, and the country is pretty conservative as a whole.

Italian banks making money implies two things: them screwing consumers (famously called literally "available cattle", il parco buoi, in local finance circles) and rich people getting richer.

[nunobrito]

Kind of surprised to read someone talking wrongly with that much certainty.

Catholicism isn't about "debit bad", it is about "interest bad" and this only applies to catholics owning banks. Historically this has left jews in Italy running banks and abusing its citizens (that cattle, or more accurately "goy" in native language of those bank owners) just fine since centuries.

Please remember that the Vatican created its own bank (financial group) to escape the jewish monopoly on banks. Within the catholic circles you'd hear them now promoting Santander as catholic-friendly option in Europe for normal citizens to escape that monopoly. Money lending isn't an issue within European catholic groups as long as it avoids going overboard with interests.

[emanuele232]

??? have YOU ever been to italy? from my experience banks are totally going to lend you money for you mortgage if you have a non-temporary contract that covers 80% of your house cost.

you just need to have roughly 30% of the house cost cash and a stable job that pays enough, but with a 1.3k net salary (median income) and 30k you can totally buy a 110k home

talking about the north, if you live in the south just move already xd

[toyg]

Mortgages are not business banking. Mortgages are fine, because if you don't pay the bank takes your house - possibly the most valuable asset category in the country.

[wolfhumble]

> Catholicism says debit bad, and the country is pretty conservative as a whole.

From Wikipedia: "The present era of banking can be traced to medieval and early Renaissance Italy, to the rich cities in the centre and north like Florence, Lucca, Siena, Venice and Genoa. The Bardi and Peruzzi families dominated banking in 14th-century Florence, establishing branches in many other parts of Europe."

. . .

"The word bank was taken into Middle English from Middle French banque, from Old Italian banco, meaning "table", from Old High German banc, bank "bench, counter". Benches were used as makeshift desks or exchange counters during the Renaissance by Florentine bankers, who used to make their transactions atop desks covered by green tablecloths."

[ffhhttt]

What does that have do with Religion? Most banks everywhere behave the same way..

[bryanrasmussen]

highly religious countries trend more conservative.

Italy is a highly conservative country.

Not sure if that explains their financial problems, probably not.

on edit: An Italian coworker just pointed out he wouldn't say Italy was very conservative, which I guess in a lot of ways is true - especially when compared to U.S and some other countries.

Maybe actually the 'Conservative' - 'Liberal' labeling doesn't work well in this case, for example Italians believe in free health care and in my experience do a better job at it than Denmark. In the U.S free health care is "anti-conservative"

[ffhhttt]

I wouldn’t define Italy as highly conservative especially the north where most of economic activity is concentrated. If we did that we’d have to say that some Eastern European countries are “ultra” conservative.

> Not sure if that explains their financial problems, probably not.

I would say Switzerland is pretty conservative as well (if not more in some aspects but less in others)

[bryanrasmussen]

yeah also there is a strong divide on this kind of thing between North and South, my experience is mainly Naples on down.

[toyg]

To expand a bit: Italy is economically conservative. People don't like to invest, banks don't like to lend to businesses, and when businesses fail (which is just part of the capitalism game) everyone cries for the State to make them whole. Most people favour long-term assets like real estate, and as soon as any profit is generated it is typically "privatized" rather than reinvested.

Obviously I'm painting with a very broad brush. There are virtuous businesses, like anywhere; and it's still a G8 country with a massive economy. But it's not a country that, as a whole, values economic risk-taking. Somewhat ironically, I think we were more daring when the overall system was less free-market-oriented (the Italian State used to own a lot of large "strategic" businesses directly, up until the '90s), maybe because rich folks had to show they were better than the State at running things.

On social issues, it's a different (and very complex) story.

[ffhhttt]

> To expand a bit: Italy is economically conservative. People don't like to invest, banks don't like to lend to businesses, and when businesses fail

That’s true. A lot (most?) of Europe seems to be like that, though

[ir123]

Islam forbids interest, so religion kinda has something to do with banks. But capitalism uh.. finds a way

[ffhhttt]

Yeah, I’m talking about Italy specifically here. You know.. the birthplace of modern banking.

[2Gkashmiri]

it does not. there is absolutely no basis for "islam forbits interest".

the way "islamic banking" was envisioned, they created a problem then suggested an alternative which is the same thing, just with arabic names.

there is something called "shariah compliant banking" but "islamic banking" on its own is a misnomer and doesn't exist.

don't believe me, here is a video of Dr. Mohammad Shahrour on the subject.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEk_8-jaSUs

its really short but brings home the idea.

your next question might be "so...whats islamic banking then". the answer is simple. when you can't fight in a free market so what you do is change the market so that customers automatically opt for your "superior" product as opposed to the competition.

You can read up on this by finding "why need for islamic banking" arose. the problem didn't exist till then so someone just literally invented it and then sold a solution

[ir123]

your answer really doesn't make sense to me, can you explain it a bit more?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riba

> While Muslims agree that riba is prohibited, not all agree on what precisely it is.[2][3] It is often used as an Islamic term for interest charged on loans,[Note 1] and the belief this is based on — that there is a consensus among Muslims that all loan/bank interest is riba — forms the basis of a $2 trillion Islamic banking industry

This is enough to negate what you said here:

>it does not. there is absolutely no basis for "islam forbits interest".

Could you explain what you mean here?

>the problem didn't exist till then so someone just literally invented it and then sold a solution

What problem didn't exist and what was invented and what was the solution?

[thefz]

Hey, as an Italian, this is a superficial, cliché-ridden opinion from someone who does not know the country much.

[toyg]

Sorry - I was just born there, spent a few decades, and still go back once or twice a year. Obviously mine was a bit of a throwaway comment, but you can't deny that the banking sector in Italy is vergognoso, and one of the reasons the country continues to stutter economically since the '90s. To be fair, they are not the only one - the Italian elite is, as a whole, pretty bad.