Premier Giorgia Meloni said her government intends to cut taxes for the middle class further and ruled out a wealth tax as she addressed the annual assembly of retailers association Confcommercio in Rome on Wednesday.

“We don’t intend to stop; we want to do more to reduce the tax burden on the middle class,” said Meloni, whose government cut to the second band of the IRPEF income tax for earnings of between 28,000 and 50,000 euros from 35% to 33% in the 2026 budget law.

“Others talk about taxing wealth, but we’re working to ensure that Italians can aspire to (have) wealth after decades of sacrifice”.

The premier also spoke about the measures the government has put in place to clamp down on so-called ‘Apri e Chiudi’ (open and close) businesses, enterprises that open, issue invoices, often for non-existent transactions, and then quickly closing to avoid tax audits and other payments.

“This is not a banana republic, here the rules are respected,” she said.

“There is no market without rules”.

Meloni linked the problem of Italy’s declining birth rate and ageing population to the need to offer better prospects to young people.

“We have an emergency called the young generations, the ability to offer greater and further opportunities to the best energies we have, and, on the other hand, the need to reverse the demographic emergency, one of our greatest economic problems,” she said.

The premier also hailed the role of the nation’s shopkeepers.

“Your businesses are the fabric that keeps our regions, our villages, our cities and towns, even the smallest ones, alive,” she said.

“Every raised shutter is a light, a reference point, a certainty, but also a sign of energy, of know-how; it is a guarantee of safety, of sociality, of community—it is something that no online platform can ever replace,” Meloni said.