11 ms·

It feels a little like there should be a simple, rational argument from politics and economics for retaining the EU as a single unit. "The world markets are do

It feels a little like there should be a simple, rational argument from politics and economics for retaining the EU as a single unit. "The world markets are dominated by a few forces. One is a country with the bulk of the world's population; its population is about sixteen times the population of the most populous European country. Another is a single country with territory approximately fifteen times the square mileage of the largest single European nation. Unifying the voices of all people in Europe under one political entity doesn't zero out the playing field, but it may very well decrease the absurd order-of-magnitude scales of difference between political entities as these two juggernauts stomp inexorably towards their desired world order while the individual nations of Europe debate their own individual selfish interests." But people aren't often rational about national ties.

tomp 10y ago
> Unifying the voices of all people in Europe under one political entity doesn't zero out the playing field, but it may very well decrease the absurd order-of-magnitude scales of difference between political entities as these two juggernauts stomp inexorably towards their desired world order while the individual nations of Europe debate their own individual selfish interests. The fallacy is with "unifying the voices". EU definitely doesn't feel that way. E.g. in the handling of the Greek crisis, it's mainly the German voice that's heard, and the voice of IMF (not even part of the EU!) echoes softly in the background. Sure, you might argue that Germany is so much bigger/more prosperous/more powerful/better than Greece, for the EU to stick together, it must be beneficial to every single nation within it. It's easy to champion "solidarity" when it's mainly their solidarity for you, but not the other way around.
- mpweiher 10y ago
  Of course you have bickering, because you have different interests, just as with any group where number of members > 1. So if it doesn't feel that way, yes, because (a) you're looking at it from the inside and (b) we're not particularly integrated, yet.
  - tomp 10y ago
    But the main question comes from (b) - will we ever be integrated? Ignoring Britain and the rest of non-Euro countries, Germany and their unwillingness to even consider a fiscal union seems to be the main stumbling block. Can you imagine the US government introducing capital controls only in Alabama?!
    - mpweiher 10y ago
      Huh? I am fairly certain that fiscal union was always the plan, not achievable politically, so left for later introduction when it became obviously necessary. Anyway, I don't buy that it's Germany that's blocking. Of course, fiscal union means giving up a good chunk of sovereignty, which is where many of the member states balk. Fiscal union is OK if it means we get money, not so OK if we are no longer allowed to spend any way we want.
- PaulHoule 10y ago
  This has a lot to do with it. The EU has mismanaged the Greek "Crisis" by not actually having a true crisis but rather having a crisis every six months. In a world where threats are coming from Russia, Syria, etc. it would be in in the interest of Europe to have Greece be stable and they really should have made everybody feel some pain, write off part of the debt, and take the punch bowl away.
  - jacquesm 10y ago
    The biggest threats to the EU are not external, but internal. In a nutshell: - not enough buy-in of the population - too much corruption - too many languages - too many EU politicians getting 'money for nothing' (further reducing buy-in) - too many countries that slip their own protectionist measures in under the radar and get away with it - no unified tax system - way too many horses pulling in different directions at once And we don't have a slavery problem to get rid of so there most likely will not be a unification by force happening any time soon.
    - kennell 10y ago
      + massive bureaucracy How anyone can write a 4 page essay on the EU without mentioning the absurd bureaucracy and regulatory hell it has introduced to small businesses is beyond me. People outside of Europe may not be aware of how bad it really is, so just let me point you to the perhaps most prominent example, the "Commission Regulation (EEC) No 1677/88 of 15 June 1988 laying down quality standards for cucumber" [1]. Let me pull some money quotes from the text: - "Slightly crooked cucumbers may have a maximum height of the arc of 20 mm per 10 cm of length of the cucumber." - "Cucumbers grown in the open must weigh 180 g or more. Cucumbers grown under protection must weigh 250 g or more. Moreover, 'Extra' Class and Class I cucumbers grown under protection weighing: 500 g or more must be not less than 30 cm long, between 250 and 500 g must be not less than 25 cm long." [1] http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:31988R1677&from=DE http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELE...
      - chrisseaton 10y ago
- k__ 10y ago
  The question is, what is good for the others? Germany has the biggest population and the most wealth. The smallest countries seem to do well, too.
  - tomp 10y ago
    My answer: all or nothing, not something in-between like now. Either disintegrate the currency union, possibly Schengen as well, and let each country govern itself as it sees fit (seemed to work quite well 20 or so years ago) - simply by the virtue of common European heritage and values (at least compared to the rest of the world - China, US, Muslim countries), we'll end up collaborating quite well. Or establish a United States of Europe, where the federal government takes care of the budget (no more "Greece defaulting" and "Cypriot capital controlls"), military (no more "UK intervention in Syria") and probably a few other things. Of course, to implement this, we need to agree on a common set of values from the beginning, which IMO we should model on Germany/Switzerland/Denmark (i.e. direct democracy, strong military but non-interventionism abroad, publicly-funded schools and healthcare but allow private services as well, strong consumer and environmental protections, flexible employment but with a strong social net). Personally, I'd add freedom of speech and the right to self-determination (secession) as well, but most of Europe seems quite opposed to that...
- prof_hobart 10y ago
  The UK doesn't feel that way either. The country is largely run by, and for, a small sliver of our society and does little to help vast swathes of it.
lintiness 10y ago
small, isolated, selfish interests have long been the drivers of global progress.
Grue3 10y ago
Poor Switzerland. It's small, has relatively low population, and not in a union with any other country. Moreover, everyone has guns. And yet, it's one of the most (if not the most) prosperous countries in Europe.
- jacquesm 10y ago
  Switzerland is a very interesting country, but it only exists by virtue of the mountains surrounding it and historically, if those mountains had not been there Switzerland as we know it today would not exist. What works in Switzerland my not necessarily work elsewhere. On another note, the Swiss neutrality has caused them to end up on the wrong side of history in more than one occasion.
  - Thimothy 10y ago
    No that I know much of Swiss history, but according to that argument, Poland would be by now a footnote in European history, and thy seem to manage...
    - jacquesm 10y ago
      > Poland would be by now a footnote in European history, and thy seem to manage... As much as I love Poland I would not consider them a candidate for the 'most prosperous' country in Europe, and I think that you'd agree with me given your choice of words.
- MagnumOpus 10y ago
  > not in a union with any other country They contribute EU funds, they are in the Schengen borderless zone, they implement EU directives and regulations (without being able to veto them like members can), and they are part of the European free trade zone. Sure, de jure they are not in the union. De facto that is just a nice fiction to satisfy the ultranationalists from the Swiss People's Party.
- Faaak 10y ago
  Switzerland takes _great_ advantage of the other countries. People living near the border go to other countries to buy their stuff (france, germany, italy). Switzerland also has economy incentives for companies which work if small countries implement-it, but not all. Switzerland is a exception, not the rule.
JumpCrisscross 10y ago
> It feels a little like there should be a simple, rational argument from politics and economics for retaining the EU as a single unit According to Ronald Coase, people begin to organise their production in firms when the transaction cost of coordinating production through the market exchange, given imperfect information, is greater than within the firm [1]. One could extend this concept to subsidiarisation. People should elevate decisions to a higher level of government only when transacting/negotiating with other effected parties at the same level of subsidiarisation becomes costlier (e.g. the New York Area's MTA and Port Authority in comparison with the Bay Area's lack thereof). Note that a conclusion around "always coalesce" or "always devolve" doesn't appear across all parameters. If Britain's and her trading partners' institutions were more efficient than the EU's, it would be rational to leave. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_the_firm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_the_firm
rayiner 10y ago
It's not so simple. Take the U.S. for example. If the Northeast were its own country, it'd have universal health care, abortion rights would be secure, etc. So how do people in New York feel about being lumped into the same polity with people from Florida, and having to make the compromises they have to make to do that? You don't have to follow American politics all that closely to know they're not always happy about it. Throughout history, there has been a strong tendency for groups with shared values and culture wanting to form their own sovereign countries. It's intellectually lazy to hand-wave this away as mere irrationality. In reality, when aggregating people into larger groups works best (in fact, works at all) if those people share the same values. Otherwise, instead of "unifying the voices of all people" you end up in a situation where peoples' voices are canceled out by conflicting values. That makes people feel powerless, it destroys faith in public institutions, and it aggregates power in bureaucrats because the voices of people are too diluted to keep them in check.
yarrel 10y ago
Europe cannot compete with Russia and China. And the NHS will be dismantled thanks to TTIP whether the UK leaves the EU or not. Brexit is therefore a choice between political elites. A remote, unseen, neoliberal, corrupt political elite or a closer, familiar, neoliberal, corrupt political elite. Presenting this as a choice of economic self-interest is irrational.
- Chyzwar 10y ago
  Russia is on verge of bankruptcy. Average Greek has much better life that average Russian. China have even bigger structural problems: corruption, aging population, empty cities, lack of own technology, weak retirement system, bad education etc. This choice about Brexit will impact mostly economic situation. If UK vote for Brexit people will start losing jobs.

tomp 10y ago

> Unifying the voices of all people in Europe under one political entity doesn't zero out the playing field, but it may very well decrease the absurd order-of-magnitude scales of difference between political entities as these two juggernauts stomp inexorably towards their desired world order while the individual nations of Europe debate their own individual selfish interests. The fallacy is with "unifying the voices". EU definitely doesn't feel that way. E.g. in the handling of the Greek crisis, it's mainly the German voice that's heard, and the voice of IMF (not even part of the EU!) echoes softly in the background. Sure, you might argue that Germany is so much bigger/more prosperous/more powerful/better than Greece, for the EU to stick together, it must be beneficial to every single nation within it. It's easy to champion "solidarity" when it's mainly their solidarity for you, but not the other way around.

mpweiher 10y ago
Of course you have bickering, because you have different interests, just as with any group where number of members > 1. So if it doesn't feel that way, yes, because (a) you're looking at it from the inside and (b) we're not particularly integrated, yet.
- tomp 10y ago
  But the main question comes from (b) - will we ever be integrated? Ignoring Britain and the rest of non-Euro countries, Germany and their unwillingness to even consider a fiscal union seems to be the main stumbling block. Can you imagine the US government introducing capital controls only in Alabama?!
  - mpweiher 10y ago
    Huh? I am fairly certain that fiscal union was always the plan, not achievable politically, so left for later introduction when it became obviously necessary. Anyway, I don't buy that it's Germany that's blocking. Of course, fiscal union means giving up a good chunk of sovereignty, which is where many of the member states balk. Fiscal union is OK if it means we get money, not so OK if we are no longer allowed to spend any way we want.
PaulHoule 10y ago
This has a lot to do with it. The EU has mismanaged the Greek "Crisis" by not actually having a true crisis but rather having a crisis every six months. In a world where threats are coming from Russia, Syria, etc. it would be in in the interest of Europe to have Greece be stable and they really should have made everybody feel some pain, write off part of the debt, and take the punch bowl away.
- jacquesm 10y ago
  The biggest threats to the EU are not external, but internal. In a nutshell: - not enough buy-in of the population - too much corruption - too many languages - too many EU politicians getting 'money for nothing' (further reducing buy-in) - too many countries that slip their own protectionist measures in under the radar and get away with it - no unified tax system - way too many horses pulling in different directions at once And we don't have a slavery problem to get rid of so there most likely will not be a unification by force happening any time soon.
  - kennell 10y ago
    + massive bureaucracy How anyone can write a 4 page essay on the EU without mentioning the absurd bureaucracy and regulatory hell it has introduced to small businesses is beyond me. People outside of Europe may not be aware of how bad it really is, so just let me point you to the perhaps most prominent example, the "Commission Regulation (EEC) No 1677/88 of 15 June 1988 laying down quality standards for cucumber" [1]. Let me pull some money quotes from the text: - "Slightly crooked cucumbers may have a maximum height of the arc of 20 mm per 10 cm of length of the cucumber." - "Cucumbers grown in the open must weigh 180 g or more. Cucumbers grown under protection must weigh 250 g or more. Moreover, 'Extra' Class and Class I cucumbers grown under protection weighing: 500 g or more must be not less than 30 cm long, between 250 and 500 g must be not less than 25 cm long." [1] http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:31988R1677&from=DE http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELE...
    - chrisseaton 10y ago
k__ 10y ago
The question is, what is good for the others? Germany has the biggest population and the most wealth. The smallest countries seem to do well, too.
- tomp 10y ago
  My answer: all or nothing, not something in-between like now. Either disintegrate the currency union, possibly Schengen as well, and let each country govern itself as it sees fit (seemed to work quite well 20 or so years ago) - simply by the virtue of common European heritage and values (at least compared to the rest of the world - China, US, Muslim countries), we'll end up collaborating quite well. Or establish a United States of Europe, where the federal government takes care of the budget (no more "Greece defaulting" and "Cypriot capital controlls"), military (no more "UK intervention in Syria") and probably a few other things. Of course, to implement this, we need to agree on a common set of values from the beginning, which IMO we should model on Germany/Switzerland/Denmark (i.e. direct democracy, strong military but non-interventionism abroad, publicly-funded schools and healthcare but allow private services as well, strong consumer and environmental protections, flexible employment but with a strong social net). Personally, I'd add freedom of speech and the right to self-determination (secession) as well, but most of Europe seems quite opposed to that...
prof_hobart 10y ago
The UK doesn't feel that way either. The country is largely run by, and for, a small sliver of our society and does little to help vast swathes of it.

lintiness 10y ago

small, isolated, selfish interests have long been the drivers of global progress.

Grue3 10y ago

Poor Switzerland. It's small, has relatively low population, and not in a union with any other country. Moreover, everyone has guns. And yet, it's one of the most (if not the most) prosperous countries in Europe.

jacquesm 10y ago
Switzerland is a very interesting country, but it only exists by virtue of the mountains surrounding it and historically, if those mountains had not been there Switzerland as we know it today would not exist. What works in Switzerland my not necessarily work elsewhere. On another note, the Swiss neutrality has caused them to end up on the wrong side of history in more than one occasion.
- Thimothy 10y ago
  No that I know much of Swiss history, but according to that argument, Poland would be by now a footnote in European history, and thy seem to manage...
  - jacquesm 10y ago
    > Poland would be by now a footnote in European history, and thy seem to manage... As much as I love Poland I would not consider them a candidate for the 'most prosperous' country in Europe, and I think that you'd agree with me given your choice of words.
MagnumOpus 10y ago
> not in a union with any other country They contribute EU funds, they are in the Schengen borderless zone, they implement EU directives and regulations (without being able to veto them like members can), and they are part of the European free trade zone. Sure, de jure they are not in the union. De facto that is just a nice fiction to satisfy the ultranationalists from the Swiss People's Party.
Faaak 10y ago
Switzerland takes _great_ advantage of the other countries. People living near the border go to other countries to buy their stuff (france, germany, italy). Switzerland also has economy incentives for companies which work if small countries implement-it, but not all. Switzerland is a exception, not the rule.

JumpCrisscross 10y ago

> It feels a little like there should be a simple, rational argument from politics and economics for retaining the EU as a single unit According to Ronald Coase, people begin to organise their production in firms when the transaction cost of coordinating production through the market exchange, given imperfect information, is greater than within the firm [1]. One could extend this concept to subsidiarisation. People should elevate decisions to a higher level of government only when transacting/negotiating with other effected parties at the same level of subsidiarisation becomes costlier (e.g. the New York Area's MTA and Port Authority in comparison with the Bay Area's lack thereof). Note that a conclusion around "always coalesce" or "always devolve" doesn't appear across all parameters. If Britain's and her trading partners' institutions were more efficient than the EU's, it would be rational to leave. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_the_firm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_the_firm

rayiner 10y ago

It's not so simple. Take the U.S. for example. If the Northeast were its own country, it'd have universal health care, abortion rights would be secure, etc. So how do people in New York feel about being lumped into the same polity with people from Florida, and having to make the compromises they have to make to do that? You don't have to follow American politics all that closely to know they're not always happy about it. Throughout history, there has been a strong tendency for groups with shared values and culture wanting to form their own sovereign countries. It's intellectually lazy to hand-wave this away as mere irrationality. In reality, when aggregating people into larger groups works best (in fact, works at all) if those people share the same values. Otherwise, instead of "unifying the voices of all people" you end up in a situation where peoples' voices are canceled out by conflicting values. That makes people feel powerless, it destroys faith in public institutions, and it aggregates power in bureaucrats because the voices of people are too diluted to keep them in check.

yarrel 10y ago

Europe cannot compete with Russia and China. And the NHS will be dismantled thanks to TTIP whether the UK leaves the EU or not. Brexit is therefore a choice between political elites. A remote, unseen, neoliberal, corrupt political elite or a closer, familiar, neoliberal, corrupt political elite. Presenting this as a choice of economic self-interest is irrational.

Chyzwar 10y ago
Russia is on verge of bankruptcy. Average Greek has much better life that average Russian. China have even bigger structural problems: corruption, aging population, empty cities, lack of own technology, weak retirement system, bad education etc. This choice about Brexit will impact mostly economic situation. If UK vote for Brexit people will start losing jobs.