The peak in the center, but the northern area dominates, the southern suburbs struggle. Here is the income map in the city and there is certainly no shortage of surprises.
The analysis of the data released by the Department of Finance on the per capita income of Italians has given us a Messina which is the first of the three large Sicilian cities, but with Catania and Palermo, it closes the national ranking of centers with more than 120,000 taxpayers. The data refers to 2023 Irpef declarations and therefore linked to 2022 income.
The city of the Strait has a per capita income (per taxpayer it would be better to say) of 20,982 euros which, not only is the highest of the three metropolitan cities on the island (Catania 19,843, Palermo 20,828) but also the highest among the 108 municipalities of the Peloritana province. The total overall income declared by all Italians amounts to over 970.2 billion euros (58 billion more than the previous year, +6.3%) and the average value of 23,650 euros. That is, almost 2,700 euros more than what was declared in Messina in 2022.
By peeking into the folds of the open data made available by the Ministry of Finance for large cities, it is also possible to go into even more detail about incomes. In fact, the Department “unpacks” the overall citizen data based on the various postal codes, thus helping to create a cross-section of how wealth is distributed in the Messina area. Cross-referencing the economic data and the postal codes, the ranking by district emerges.
Let's start from the two extremes, the best and the worst. The portion of the city with the highest Irpef income per capita is the most central one. The one to be clear with the postal code 98123 which has as its geographical indication the area of via Santa Cecilia, but which includes the entire area straddling viale San Martino. The average income of the 7,611 taxpayers is 28,211 euros, therefore over 7,000 euros above the city average.
