This is the price of the crisis. The cost borne by the Region and the Government to support a totally unfulfilled industrial recovery in Sardinia: four billion spent over twenty years with no economic multiplier effect. Both in the regions and for families. Fifteen years of failures that have led to the destruction of the employment base.

That monstrous sum written in the public finance documents is being drawn on multiple fronts: resolutions, ministerial interventions, financial maneuvers. It's a historical and political memory of yesterday and today, with the Cagliari-Rome axis closely connected and equally responsible. Equally transversal. A black line that runs the length and breadth of Sardinia, starting with the Sulcis-Iglesiente area, pumped full of money to become the hub of aluminum, zinc, lead, and coal.

The other major Sardinian industrial hub was supposed to be Porto Torres, with its petrochemical plant and fossil-fuel power plant. Even the greater Cagliari area, with Macchiareddu, thought it would compete on equal terms for heavy-sector payrolls, but the region, in alternating currents, never stopped dancing a waltz of uncertainty between firebricks, fluorite, and steel. In Ottana, the revival of textile production never materialized.

But what caused the cost of public support for industrial policies that never truly delivered to rise to four billion euros? The value of social safety nets is certainly undisputed, without which work would lose its dignity. But faced with a substantial expenditure, potentially exceeding a billion euros, politicians have chosen to finance agony rather than employment.

The full article by Alessandra Carta and further details are available in the newspaper on newsstands and on the Unione Digital app.

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