Discriminazioni dirette e indirette a carico dei cittadini non-italiani nell’accesso al reddito e alla pensione di cittadinanza

In the establishment of the so-called ‘citizenship income’, the Italian legislator decided to limit the personal scope of application only to families where the applicant member is an Italian national, or an EU national (or family member) who is a beneficiary of the right of residence or permanent residence, or a third-country national who has obtained the long- term resident status; every applicant must reside in Italy for at least ten years (the last two of which must be consecutive); moreover, several third-country nationals have the obligation to submit appropriate certification issued by their country of origin in order to demonstrate that the economic requirements are fulfilled. This paper seeks to demonstrate that such higher criteria not only have direct or indirect (or both) discriminatory effects vis-à-vis International and EU law, especially in view of the relevant ECJ, ECtHR and Italian Constitutional Court case-law, but are also disproportionate in order to get an income as basic as the one at issue.