There were over 4 million 800 thousand entrepreneurs operating in Italy in 2021.
Of these approximately 1 million 460 thousand were women (30%).
Istat underlines this in a Report on women and business, explaining that compared to 2015 there was a slight growth in the female presence of around 65 thousand units (+0.9 percentage points).
The vast majority (64.8%) of women entrepreneurs do not have employees, a rate that is higher than that of their male colleagues (62.4%).
Female entrepreneurs have a lower average age (49 years) than their male colleagues (52 years), thanks to a larger under-35 component.
In the class of 50 years and over, women represent 26.5% of all entrepreneurs.
The imbalance is reduced slightly in the middle age group (33%) and more consistently among the youngest, where the female share reaches 37.1%.
The vast majority of female entrepreneurs operate in the Services sector (90.7% compared to 74.9% of entrepreneurs), in which women represent just over a third (34.2%) of all entrepreneurs in the sector.
Istat reports that 34.5% of female entrepreneurs have obtained a tertiary qualification compared to 23.4% of men.
In the presence of a high educational qualification, the gender gap is reduced.
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