Renato Brunetta

Brunetta was born in Venice in 1950, the youngest of three brothers. He grew up in a poor family, his father was a peddler.[1] He attended the classical lyceum Foscarini. Brunetta once said, that as a boy he often studied classics on his own, to reduce the social gap between him and his fellow students.[2]

On 2 July 1973, he graduated in political and economic sciences at the University of Padua. He began his academic career at the same university holding various positions: from 1973 to 1974 he was assistant professor theory and development policy and applied economics. In the academic year 1977–78, he became professor of economics and labour policy. From 1982 to 1990, he was associate professor of fundamentals of economics at the Department of Economic and Social Analysis of the Territory at the Iuav University of Venice. From 1991 to 1999, he was associate professor of labor economics at University of Rome Tor Vergata, where he also held the position of professor of political economy until 2009.[3]

Since 1976, Brunetta has been enrolled as a freelance journalist in the Order of Journalists of Veneto. He is a columnist of Il Sole 24 Ore and Il Giornale. Moreover, he is founder and editor of the magazine Labur – Reviews of labor economics and industrial relations, published by Wiley-Blackwell for the Center for Economic and International Studies (CEIS) of the Tor Vergata University. Together with Vittorio Feltri, he wrote a series of Manuals of Political Conversation published by Libero. In June 2020, he briefly became a columnist of Il Riformista, a centrist and liberal newspaper directed by Piero Sansonetti, which he left in October 2020.[4]

He is a former member of the Italian Socialist Party, Member of the European Parliament for the North-East from 2004 to 2009 with the Forza Italia, part of the European People's Party, and vice-chair of the European Parliament's Committee on Industry, Research and Energy.

• Formerly a professor of Labour Economics at the University of Rome Tor Vergata.
• In the 1980s and 1990s he was an economics adviser to the governments of Bettino Craxi, Giuliano Amato, and Carlo Azeglio Ciampi.
• From 1985 to 1989, vice-chairman of the Labour and Social Affairs Committee of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (in Paris).
• From 1983 to 1987 he was an official of the Ministry of Labour with overall responsibility for employment strategy and incomes policy.
• In 1989 he founded the European Association of Labour Economists, of which he is the first chairman.
• From 1999 to 2008 he was Member of the European Parliament.
• Founder and editor of the journal Labour - Review of labour economics and industrial relations, he has also written for the newspapers Il Sole 24 Ore, Il Giornale, and Avanti!.

• 1988 - Saint Vincent Prize - Journalism[5]
• 1992 - Ezio Tarantelli prize - Best work of labor economics[6]
• 1994 - Scanno Prize - Best work of industrial relations[7]
• 2002 - Rudolph Valentino International Prize - Economy, finance and communication[8]

• 2004 European Parliament election in Italy

• Personal profile of Renato Brunetta in the European Parliament's database of members
• Declaration (PDF) of financial interests (in Italian)