The structural context of family welfare in the regions of Italy

A factor analysis of household-level attributes of welfare reveals three dimensions across the 20 regions of Italy: affluence, nuclear family oriented style of life, and basic consumption. Because the data on which these empirical patterns is based is normatively oriented, these dimensions conform to the definition of social indicators. The three dimensions of regional social structure that resulted from a separate factor analysis of variables selected from the point of view of structural theory were not so interpreted. These three structural dimensions — industrial-urban differentiation, agrarian rigidity, and central government subsidies — predict affluence, family oriented style of life and basic consumption respectively. This unexpectedly symmetrical result can be interpreted in causal or definitional terms.