ROME — Like most people these days, the pasta maker gets bombarded by the media heralds of doom.
He hears frantic updates from broadcasters, pompous platitudes from politicians, shifty corporate-speak from executives, impenetrable jargon from economists.
But Enrico Benigni doesn't need that noise to tell him how bad the crisis is. Out here in the real world, in the pasta shop he opened 31 years ago on the quiet, picturesque Via del Boschetto near the Colosseum, he has concrete evidence.
His customers buy a lot less pasta.
"People used to come every day, and each day they bought different kinds of pasta: on Thursday gnocchi, another day ravioli or tortellini, and tagliatelle the next," said Benigni, a bespectacled 56-year-old. "Now, they come once or maybe twice a week only. We have had about a 20% drop in sales."
The psychology of crisis has taken hold in the streets, workplaces and homes of Europe, unnerving a people accustomed to a robust welfare state that protects jobs and companies alike.
Italy, Spain, Britain and their neighbors had spent the last year afflicted by declining growth, rising unemployment, and sputtering industrial and real estate sectors. But Europeans tend to feel safer than Americans. They have been shielded from suffering the same plight as American workers: It's more difficult for the boss to fire employees.
Nevertheless, the speed and savagery of the upheaval have shaken that sense of comfort. There is only so much the government can do when globalization sends turmoil churning throughout the marketplace.
In interviews in recent days, Europeans expressed a generalized fear. They worried about their immediate livelihood, but especially for their families, their countries and the future.
"I am not worried about me or my wife; for us the little money we earn will be enough," Benigni said. "But I am worried about the future of my children. There was a point where they considered taking over our family business in which my wife and I worked with pride for so many years. But they saw that it was not worth it and chose to go different ways because this kind of shop, where we still make pasta with our hands, is destined to disappear."
Benigni's wife, Carmela Grasso, said, "People feel poorer and poorer. What is surprising is the fact that our shop is not situated on the outskirts of Rome but in a good area. People try to save wherever they can."
