Yea Italians are a pain in the ass about dressing; people here are stuck in the 80s still when it comes to work so it only makes sense it works that way.
Italian here. I don't know what your experience is, but I have to call bullshit.
Such generic comments applying to an entire population should be best avoided.
I have worked in Italian, British, American and Spanish engineering companies and I have not noticed any significant differences in dressing code, with the UK probably being the more formal environment (we had "Casual Fridays", which meant that the rest of the week we had to wear shirts). In the rest I could get by with a polo shirt and jeans.
Of course people with more contact with the outside tend to dress more formally, but this has been true for every company I have been.
My experience is being born and raised in Rome, working with people from different cities (Pi Campus here in Rome, H-Farm in Veneto, etc) and now working in Santa Monica. Not much to call bullshit on, if you don't see any difference between Cali and Italy I don't know what to tell you.
