Italy's chronic unemployment problem has been thrown into sharp relief after 85,000 people applied for 30 jobs at a bank – nearly 3,000 candidates for each post.

With youth unemployment nudging close to 40 per cent and the overall level at 11 per cent, steady jobs are in great demand.

But even the managers at the Bank of Italy were astounded by the huge number of people who contacted them.

In an editorial, a national newspaper characterised the job-hunters as “shipwrecked castaways” desperately in search of a “life raft”.

Up for grabs were 30 deputy assistant jobs in the state bank, a junior position with a modest annual salary of just 28,000 euros.

Nor will the work be very glamorous – one of the duties will be feeding cash into machines that can distinguish bank notes that are either counterfeit or so worn out that they should no longer be in circulation.