Approximately half of Italy's domestic workers are employed without legal status, according to reporting by InfoMigrants.

The figure — 50% — describes Italy's household-services sector, a workforce that includes private caregivers for elderly and dependent adults, home cleaners, and childminders. Workers outside the registered system lose access to the protections that registered status confers: social contributions, paid leave, severance, and access to Italian labour tribunals for wage disputes.

What does the headline figure describe?

Domestic work in Italy falls under a dedicated legal framework separate from standard salaried employment. Registered household employees work under collective-bargaining agreements that set hourly minimum wages, weekly rest periods, holiday entitlements, and notice periods. Household employers must enrol registered staff with the National Social Security Institute (INPS), withhold contributions each month, and observe those terms throughout the relationship.

The 50% reported by InfoMigrants refers to workers who operate outside that registration. They hold no formal contract with a household employer. That single absence changes the calculation of every protection the registered system provides.

Who sits in the unregistered share?

The domestic-workforce population in Italy draws workers from migration corridors into the European Union. Italy's elderly-care segment has become a recognised employment pathway for migrant women in particular. Workers who enter the unregistered share include:

• those whose residence permits have expired
• those holding permits tied to unrelated sectors
• those who entered Italy through irregular channels

Workers who remain in irregular employment cannot use the position to apply for or renew a residence permit through the Italian Ministry of the Interior. The procedural channels require documentation that an irregular worker typically cannot produce from inside the role, including proof of employment that the unregistered arrangement does not generate.

What does the figure leave unclear?

InfoMigrants' headline figure carries no methodology statement in the title itself. Readers who require the underlying basis of the 50% share should expect to find in the full reporting:

• the data period the figure covers
• the underlying source (tax records, INPS filings, or survey data)
• the total headcount of Italy's domestic workforce
• a comparison with prior years' estimates

What does this mean for workers and employers?

For migrant workers in or considering domestic roles: the figure underlines how much of the sector still operates outside Italy's contributory system. A permit holder should anchor any next step to official Ministry of the Interior channels and to the terms of the existing permit, not to private intermediaries or off-ledger cash arrangements.

For household employers: registration with INPS and observance of the applicable collective agreement remain the compliance baseline. Households that skip those steps face back-payment of contributions for every undeclared month worked, and the administrative fines that the relevant collective agreement quantifies.

Bottom line

Half of Italy's domestic workers operate without legal status — the central estimate in the report — and that share defines the scale of the country's undeclared household-employment economy.