Deregolamentazione del mercato del credito ipotecario: rischi e benefici per i compratori di prima casa. Newcastle upon-tyne e Genova, due città a confronto

The thesis analyses how the financial resources define the first time buyers housing access in England and Italy. A picture of the two countries’ credit systems is made, and the local system data about an English city, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and an Italian one, Genova will be taken into consideration. The choice of the case studies is linked to the Esping-Andersen's and Allen's typology of the welfare state and to the international trends. Even if Esping-Andersen had classified England as a liberal country, the role of the state in housing policies has been strong. In fact England has had an high rate of public houses up until 1980. On the other hand Italy is classified as a "familiaristic" country by Allen, Castells and Mingione, and even in the North, where the “corporativistic” welfare state is stronger, the role of the family is dominant. Taking into account the two international trends of the dismantling of the welfare state and the crisis of the family it is interesting to analyse how the third "actor" of the welfare system, the market, is working. From this point of view is interesting to compare England and Italy because the former had the most developed European credit system and the latter the least developed up to the "subprime" crisis. In this analysis the differences and the element of convergence of the last years between the two countries are stressed, explaining the differences in first-time-buyers access to the housing system.