Consumers' behaviour facing economic crisis

The article contains the results of a comparative research, carried out on two groups of consumers, one Italian and one Romanian, concerning their behaviour facing the economic crisis in order to identify measures and policies to overcome it. The research was conducted jointly by Laboratorio Athena (Terni, Italy) and “Gheorghe Zane” Institute of the Romanian Academy (Iaşi, Romania) during August 2012 and September 2012. The comparative research on consumption finds its motivation in the fact that the crisis has had a global character (that is why the comparison between the two countries), has been systemic (propagated from private to public debt and from subprime mortgages to the whole financial sector) and structural (no separation between financial and real aspect of the crisis in causes and effects, being the consumption at the same time the main cause and the principal target of the crisis). The majority of Italian consumers interviewed, though they have suffered a lot the crisis, do not slip, if not for a small quota, below the threshold of the minimum needed to live. They have experimented a reduction in income and an impoverishment specially of the middle class (employees and entrepreneurs in addition to farmers). Young people, women, large families and singles were also the most vulnerable to economic crisis. The impact of the crisis on Italian consumers has been contained by some basic conditions (to be occupied, to be employed mostly in the position of employee, to own home, to rely on the protection of Welfare State and of family). Decrease in income has also produced a reduction in consumption, less strong for “safe havens” goods, recreation goods, durable goods (not traditional, but those characterized by high information content).The crisis has also implied in Italian consumers a weakening of the capability of repayment of the debts already contracted and of the willingness to incur a bank loan for consumption and a new attitude in working harder among active population. The Liberistic recipes (cut in public expenditure and cut in taxes) are the most preferred by Italian consumers for economic growth and for raising of consumption. Most Romanian consumers seem paradoxically not to have been highly affected by the effects of the crisis. This is due to some subjective factors (like consumers’ expectations that are different, some referring to high standards of living, while others oriented towards basic needs) and to some objective factors (to be occupied, to be employed mostly in the position of employee, to live in a house of own’s one property, to work in informal activities, to work in the shadow economy, to work in other EU member countries). A little less than half of Romanian consumers claims that his income has decreased, while a slightly lower percentage argues that his income has not changed. However, almost three quarters of Romanian consumers are able, with their income, to deal with their basic needs. The reduction in income, where occurred, was accompanied in Romania to a reduction in consumption, but unlike the Italians, Romanians save more on culture, holidays and clothing (not on food and health), while consumption of durable and safe havens holds in both countries. In both cases, the crisis has resulted in a difficulty, almost similar, to repay debts, even if the reluctance to issue additional debt by the bank is lower in Romania than in Italy. An other points of differentiation lies in the fact that the crisis has hit in Romania men more than women due to the concentration of male employment in those industrial sectors which have been more affected by the crisis in the reorganization of labour. Romanian farmers and entrepreneurs, unlike what happens in Italy, do not fall below the bare essential line. Half of the Romanian farmers surveyed even improve their condition. Romanians free professions are in conditions worse than their Italian colleagues only managing to meet basic needs. Romanians consumers, who are already employed, have more conviction in comparison with Italians to work harder to regain the lost purchasing power and Romanian workers, who are not employed, are less discouraged compared with Italians in searching work, despite the crisis. Consumption is seen as a driver of growth by the majority of Romanian respondents as well as by the majority of Italians, but in Romania there is a greater proportion of dissent among consumers that, unlike Italians, are well aware of the role of consumption in generating the crisis. With regard to policies to overcome the crisis, Romanians consumers, as Italians, prefer the liberistic formula (cutting public spending, tax cuts) than the Keynesian recipe, but this last one is supported in Romania by a greater share of consent. The policy indications suggested in this article consists on the contrary in an equilibrate mix between Liberistic and Neo-Keynesian recipes (more public spending on productive investment not in traditional infrastructure, but in quality of life and environment, in human capital, in innovation, more distributive justice, more regulation) and in a qualitative conversion of consumption in a more ecological, immaterial, relational direction.