There are those who wait for months for an answer, those who lose a job opportunity, those who give up. In Italy, obtaining a visa to work is an obstacle course that only a few manage to complete. The numbers are illustrated by the new report on the Flows Decree 2026 by Ero Straniero, the campaign born in 2017 to impose a reform on regular immigration in Italy into the public debate. According to the association, only 8 people out of 100 as of December 2025 have managed to complete the entire procedure to be able to work regularly within our borders. A figure that tells of the bureaucratic and regulatory difficulties that have dragged on since the early 2000s, since that system regularized by the Consolidated Immigration Act of 1998 and then by the Bossi Fini of 2002.
Only 8 out of 100 get a work visa: the immigration system in Italy
The objective of these two laws was to link the arrival in Italy of a foreign person – and consequently grant a visa – to an employment contract. But in our country, full of small and medium-sized businesses, entrepreneurs need skills and to know the person they are hiring. An alternative system has therefore been created whereby people enter Italy with a tourist visa and then remain irregular for a long time until the entrepreneur is able – if he has the intention to do so – to participate in the click day which lasts a few days and regularize the worker through a long procedure.
Until the 1980s, Italy was a country of emigration, therefore, there was no law that regularized the opposite phenomenon. The first was the Foschi Law (1986), which mainly intervened on the work of foreigners already present, introducing protections against exploitation and an initial regularisation.
In 1990 the Martelli Law arrived (L. 39/1990), the first real attempt at systematisation: it introduced entry quotas, regulated the right to asylum (overcoming the “geographical reserve”, the right to asylum was extended to anyone), regulated expulsions and residence permits and provided for major regularisation. However, management remains fragmented and poorly coordinated.
From the Turco-Napolitano model to the Bossi-Fini squeeze: how regular entry changes
In the 1990s, the increase in migratory flows, including from the Balkans and Eastern Europe, made the need for a more complete law clear. This leads to the Consolidated Law on Immigration of 1998 (Turco-Napolitano), which reorganizes all the matter into a single body of legislation, introduces the annual programming of flows and structures the system of permits, controls and integration more clearly. The 1998 system sought a balance between entry control and inclusion policies, also providing temporary detention centers for those in an irregular position and administrative expulsion procedures.
With Law 189/2002 (Bossi-Fini) the approach has become more restrictive. Entry for work was more strictly subordinated to the prior existence of a contract (residence contract) and to the employer’s name calling. The link between residence permit and employment contract has been strengthened, the margins for subsequent regularization have been reduced and the rules on expulsion and detention have been tightened. In essence, a model has been consolidated in which regular entry is possible almost exclusively through scheduled quotas and with a job already guaranteed from abroad. This law was also the result of those times, of an immigration that was mainly economic and different from the emergency immigration of the last 15 years, linked to climate change and wars.
Click Day and flow decree 2026: how regular entry for work in Italy works today
Today, the entry of non-EU citizens for work occurs mainly through the annual flow decree, which establishes a maximum number of workers admitted (subordinate, seasonal, self-employed) in specific sectors. Applications are submitted online by employers on established days and times: the so-called “click day”. The requests are examined in chronological order within the limits of the quotas established by the decree. If the application falls within the scheduled numbers, the One Stop Shop for immigration issues the work permit and transmits it to the Italian diplomatic representation in the country of origin, which in turn evaluates the issuing of the visa. Once the visa has been obtained, the worker can enter Italy and, within 15 days, must sign the residence contract at the prefecture; only at that point can he request a residence permit for work, a title that allows him to live and work regularly in the country.
In recent years, quotas have been increased to respond to labor shortages in sectors such as construction, agriculture, tourism and family care, but the click day mechanism remains criticized because it favors those who are quickest in the IT procedure rather than a real selection based on actual needs. In fact, the current system continues to move within the Bossi-Fini plant.
Because seasonal work works more than subordinate work in the flow system
As we have already said, this system intensifies irregular arrivals and participation in the click day for individuals who have already been in Italy for some time: in the Ero Straniero 2026 report, the residence contracts actually signed are compared with the quotas available in the three envisaged channels – seasonal work, non-seasonal work and domestic and social-healthcare work – and a now structural fact emerges: the seasonal worker works better than the “classic” subordinate one.
Over time, seasonal work has become the most effective channel because it is based on already existing relationships: the employer knows the person, often calls them back year after year, and the administrative procedure becomes the formalization of a relationship that is in fact already well-established. The dynamic changes radically when it comes to hiring someone you’ve never met before from abroad. In that case the flow mechanism does not facilitate a meeting, but tries to organize it ex ante, and the uncertainty translates into a lower success rate.
The link between direct knowledge and success of the procedure is even more evident in the personal care sector. Here the completion rate is significantly higher than in other types of work, because entrusting the care of a family member is not a choice based only on formal requirements, but on a personal relationship. It is no coincidence that many families use the flows to stabilize an already existing situation: to regularize workers with whom they had started an informal relationship, often made such by the absence of a residence permit or the impossibility of regularizing those who are already in the area in an irregular condition or with a temporary permit.
Flows Decree 2025: strengthened controls on Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Morocco
This year compared to previous years there was an important innovation in the flow decree, namely the monitoring for the issuing of authorizations by the Police Headquarters and Labor Inspectorate for some countries considered at risk – Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and, later, Morocco. According to the legislator, these countries are “characterized by a high risk of submitting applications accompanied by counterfeit documentation or without the requirements established by law”. This had two consequences, one related to the other: many applications expired due to delays and as a result thousands of jobs were cut.
Let us remember that these nationalities are the protagonists of immigration flows in our country. In 2024, together, these four countries accounted for nearly 73% of incoming applications, and nearly one in two applications was submitted for labor from Bangladesh.
The proposals to overcome click day and reform regular immigration
The Ero Straniero report proposes to overcome the rigidity of the flow system through an organic reform based on more flexible channels that adhere to the reality of the labor market, with the aim of promoting an effective meeting between supply and demand and reducing the risk of irregularities. The main solutions indicated are:
- Direct hiring “on call” extra quotas: possibility for the employer to hire from abroad without limits on annual quotas and without time windows, based on the concrete needs of the company or family.
- Permit to search for work with sponsors: entry for one year of selected workers in the countries of origin through guarantors (agencies, associations, universities, unions), to facilitate entry into the market.
- Permit to search for work on individual initiative: direct request for a visa to search for work in Italy for a limited period, with economic guarantees and the possibility of conversion into a work permit.
- Regularization on an individual basis: permanent channel for those who are already in Italy without documents but have an employment contract.
- Permit for social rooting: renewable two-year qualification for permanently integrated people, on the model of the Spanish “arraigo social”.
The basic idea is to overcome the emergency and bureaucratic logic to a stable, programmable immigration structure that is more consistent with the real dynamics of work and the needs of companies.
