Milan is a city for young people, but it will only remain so if there is housing available

The evolution of a city is measured not only by its total population, but also by the people who pass through it. In the case of Milan, this can be assessed using census data from the last 20 years; registration and deregistration records; and, for recent years, data from the City Council on neighbourhoods, age, citizenship, households, incomes and the property market.

Over the past two decades, Milan has not changed all that much in terms of size. It had 1.256 million residents in 2001 and only slightly more in 2023. But this snapshot tells us little: the key phenomenon is population turnover. Over the last ten years, around a third of the resident population has been replaced by new residents, net of births and deaths. Gross of these, more than half. A turnover rate typical of an American city.

To see what sort of city produces this turnover, let’s divide residents into two groups: those under 45 and those aged 45 and over. In 2001, there were 628,882 people under 45, accounting for practically 50 per cent of the population, and even in 2023 the two groups were essentially equal in size. Between 2004 and 2013, there were approximately 380,000 registrations of people under 45, compared with 278,000 deregistrations: a net increase of over 100,000. Among those aged 45 and over, registrations totalled around 80,000 and deregistrations 113,000, resulting in a net decrease of over 30,000. This trend continued into the following decade with similar figures.

Milan is a city people come to in order to study, take up their first job or launch a career; a large proportion of those who arrive leave after ten years, making way for a new generation. This remains the driving force behind the Milanese model: attracting young talent. The average age has remained stable over the past twenty years, whilst in Italy as a whole it has risen by as much as five years. Over the past two decades, the number of foreign residents has tripled: there were around 88,000 in 2001, 176,000 in 2011 and almost 270,000 in 2023. They account for a fifth of the population and tend to settle in outlying neighbourhoods, partly due to housing prices. Single-person households are on the rise, while disparities in income and property values are widening. Young people are concentrated in semi-central areas near the universities.

Can this growth model continue?

As in other major, successful cities, property values have risen dramatically. There were almost 25,000 property transactions a year in the mid-2000s; this figure fell below 15,000 in the years following the 2008 crisis, before rising again to reach almost 29,000 in 2022. But the very process that makes a city wealthier can also jeopardise the driving force that generated that wealth.

Until now, Milan has worked because a young person could move there, find a job and then decide whether to stay. If the cost of housing rises much faster than wages, this option becomes increasingly difficult. A city can become ever richer, but also more selective. It can attract capital and property investment whilst at the same time driving out students and civil servants. Housing policy does not allow for easy shortcuts.

Are high house prices the fault of Airbnb? I don’t think so: these days, it is often more cost-effective for landlords to let on a long-term basis, although we certainly need to prevent entire blocks of flats from being used for short-term lets. Is it the fault of the ultra-wealthy foreigners who have arrived in the city as a result of tax incentives? I don’t think so: in Milan, there are fewer than 2,000 of them, barely 1 per cent of the foreign population.

There is a need for more affordable housing for students and young workers, as well as additional accommodation for those employed in essential public services. This is a challenge faced by all major international cities, but Milan has an advantage: unlike other cities that have ground to a halt, it has built and continues to build new homes. The focus, however, unlike in the past, must be on the quota of social housing at controlled prices, which must actually be built and not sold off. Much will depend on how the government’s first calls for tenders under the National Housing Plan are handled, as well as those by the Milan City Council on affordable housing and student accommodation, and those by the Lombardy Region – funded by European resources – on affordable housing.

However, it is also necessary to address the other side of the equation: young people’s wages. All successful cities have seen a surge in property prices, but none have wages as low as those in Milan. Here, it will be businesses that must come to terms with the dwindling number of young people and whether or not they wish to remain in the city.