Il lavoro costituisce il primo capitolo del volume Il diritto alla retribuzione adeguata. Tutele costituzionali e crisi economica, Giappichelli, Torino, 2012.

The right to a fair wage (art. 36, section 1, Italian Constitution) is a pillar of the “constitutional” theory, assuming an axiological and prescriptive function into the section of fundamental social rights. Moreover, lacking a minimum wage legislation, it has played, in Italy, an historical role in protecting those workers not directly covered from national collective agreement. 
The essay analysis how the right to a fair wage assumed, in a favourable economic context, an “independent variable” meaning, then changing in a “dependent” one in presence of deep crisis’ trends. 
In Italy, the phenomenon has had a judicial validation in Eighties and Nineties: according to Constitutional Court, a law which reduces wage standard, in a context of economic and financial crisis, is in keeping with art. 36, section 1, if the measure is adequate, proportionate and limited.  Nowadays, these relevant juridical issues returns to be of topical interest in a context of severe crisis’ trend. In fact, the labour reforms, approved in many European States and reducing wages’ levels, is destined for stimulating a new important “season” of judicial activism.