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I find many people are extremely negative about Brexit. I didn't recommend Brexit but when I hear people describe it like an unavoidable catastrophe I think it

I find many people are extremely negative about Brexit. I didn't recommend Brexit but when I hear people describe it like an unavoidable catastrophe I think it might be good to remind you that this is just what Norwegian politicians told the public before the 1994 EU referendum. Turns out they were wrong: Norwegians are very happy outside EU.

DominikR 10y ago
So are the Swiss. Turns out that they are so successful outside the EU that even Swiss garbage men earn more than most citizens of EU member states could ever dream of.
- Pamar 10y ago
  Is this adjusted with the cost of living in Switzerland ?
  - temp 10y ago
    No, they're talking in nominal terms. Your salary will be twice as high in Zurich as it would be in say Munich, but you will also pay about twice as much for most things, be it groceries or rent.
    - Pamar 10y ago
      My point exactly.
      - DominikR 10y ago
        Well of course the cost of living will be higher when the incomes are double or in most cases even triple the incomes of other EU member states. How does that invalidate what I wrote? Are you proposing that the Swiss would be better off with a Somali income and cost of living?
        Pamar 10y ago
        Try rewriting this as "garbagemen in country X, after taxes and all expenses including rent etc, have 10% of their income left, while white collars from country Z barely manage to save 1% of their earnings over the same period". Is this still true when X=Switzerland and Z another random country in UE?
        DominikR 10y ago
        I just don't get what point you are trying to make here. Statistics and Polls consistently show again and again that Switzerland is one of the safest, richest, most democratic and yes - even happy countries in the world. And maybe you can't see it, but stuff that the Swiss import is for them very cheap in comparison to all others. Just imagine how less it'd hurt you financially to pay for an iPhone when you have an income that is much higher than in every surrounding country. Or how about going on vacations. That's very cheap for Swiss too, because for them basically every country they could go to is insanely cheap. Edit: And the funny thing is, they are not in the EU, every male has a automatic assault rifle at home, they have free speech, regular referenda on important matters and the majority there is against any kind of Socialism.
- BjoernKW 10y ago
  In either case there are very specific reasons for their respective success: Oil and foreign money, respectively. None of that is down to them not being part of the EU The UK isn't even remotely comparable to either of those countries. Besides, both Switzerland and Norway have trade agreements with the EU. If the UK wants similar agreements it'll have to accept similar conditions including freedom of movement, which in turn will make this whole Brexit affair rather pointless: The UK will effectively have to accept the same conditions it has right now without any ability to influence or veto EU regulations anymore.
RBerenguel 10y ago
Every time I hear the "Norway" issue I just point out one crucial fact: oil. Norway is a huge oil exporter.
- DominikR 10y ago
  Please take a look at how the Swiss are doing outside the EU. They have no oil, just their financial industry. Actually that's quite similar to the UK, just that the UK is much stronger in many other areas too. I suspect that the UK will do really well outside the EU. Edit: Has anyone here even considered that it might be the EU that will break up long before the UK? As I see it the next time Turkeys dictator Erdogan decides to unleash millions of refugees (as he has threatened before) the EU will most definitely be finished. In my country (Austria) the guy that a few weeks ago lost the presidential election (with 49% of the votes) said that he would support a referendum for exiting the EU. So did Le Pen from France and Wilders from the Netherlands. Recent polls show that in Italy and France an absolute majority wants to have a referendum about exiting the EU. And you believe that the EU can actually punish someone for misbehaving? Every article written that suggests that the UK should ignore democratic decisions or that all who have voted for Brexit are stupid racist will fasten the process of a collapsing EU. So please continue!
  - temp 10y ago
    >I suspect that the UK will do really well outside the EU. Can you give me some specific insight into how Northern Ireland, Wales or Cornwall are going to benefit from being outside the EU? Will UK's farmers, for whom it is estimated that 55% of all income comes directly from EU subsidies, also benefit from an exit?
    - narag 10y ago
      I wonder if we should be happy with an organization that pays 55% of UK farmers' income.
  - RBerenguel 10y ago
    Switzerland has ~10% GDP coming from banking, roughly the same as the UK. Also, Switzerland is part of the single market. The thing is, most of the "big banking" in the UK is already planning for its own leave to Frankfurt and Paris. And the EU seems pretty clear into not having the UK in the single market.
jc80 10y ago
The UK would have to agree on free movement like Norway and Switzerland to get the same deal, and that's the main thing they voted against. They never really had it anyways, getting into the UK has always felt more like the US border crossing. Good riddance.
- reitanqild 10y ago
  > The UK would have to agree on free movement like Norway and Switzerland to get the same deal, and that's the main thing they voted against. I don't think that's the main thing they voted against rather than a percieved opaque, wasteful and possibly corrupt system. (I'm not sure but I'm afraid media cherry picked a bit to present the image of dumb xenophobic Leave supporters.)
  - gjulianm 10y ago
    Still, they will end up subject to the same system if they want to maintain free trade and a certain freedom of movement. However, out of the EU they won't have representation and won't have a say in what laws and measures are passed.
  - jc80 10y ago
    My point is mainly that if the UK is even able to get, and agrees to a deal like Norway, they're in the exact same position they were before the brexit, only worse. Norway has to pay the EU, has accepted free travel and has to adhere to EU regulations. I don't see how this could be a "win" situation for the UK; it's just a downgrade of their status with the union.
squidi 10y ago
The catastrophe that people are mostly worried about is the impact of Britain leaving on the EU, not just to Britain. It is a key member of the EU and it's exit could be very destabilising for trade and investment throughout the region. On the global scale, not too many people will benefit in the next 5-10 years, maybe Britain will though (who knows for sure).
- Bromskloss 10y ago
  Why do we have to stop trading with Great Britain because they leave the EU?
tigershark 10y ago
The FTSE lost 3.15% in a single day while it triggered a massive destruction of European stock markets. The pound arrived to 1.33$, it was never at that level since 1985. 2000 people are being relocated from Morgan Stankey to Dublin or Frankfurt. Pretty much all the other banks are following the same plans. The financial services sector contributes for around 11% of the whole government tax income. Car industry is heading in the same direction. Even worse the uk won't secure any trade deal with Europe because they will want to discourage other nations to follow the same path. The damage to the uk and global economy will be huge, comparable to the 2008 crisis if not even worse. And finally UK has nothing to do with Norway, a country extremely small (only London has double of Norway population) that exports oil. And it has free access to the European market. Uk, as I said before, very likely won't have it.
- simonswords82 10y ago
  > The damage to the UK and global economy will be huge I agree - the short term damage to the UK and global economy has been significant. That's confidence being shot down overnight, and the markets reacting accordingly. > Even worse the uk won't secure any trade deal with Europe because they will want to discourage other nations to follow the same path. Really? Come on now. You're telling me that European countries will stop selling to the UK? Nobody really knows how this is going to unfold but it's not going to be doom any more than it's going to be a huge success. In the meantime please stop spreading hyperbole about how the sky is falling.
  - tigershark 10y ago
    There will be no free market is different from stop selling. China is not part of the EU market but there are huge trades between EU and China.

DominikR 10y ago

So are the Swiss. Turns out that they are so successful outside the EU that even Swiss garbage men earn more than most citizens of EU member states could ever dream of.

Pamar 10y ago
Is this adjusted with the cost of living in Switzerland ?
- temp 10y ago
  No, they're talking in nominal terms. Your salary will be twice as high in Zurich as it would be in say Munich, but you will also pay about twice as much for most things, be it groceries or rent.
  - Pamar 10y ago
    My point exactly.
    - DominikR 10y ago
      Well of course the cost of living will be higher when the incomes are double or in most cases even triple the incomes of other EU member states. How does that invalidate what I wrote? Are you proposing that the Swiss would be better off with a Somali income and cost of living?
      - Pamar 10y ago
        Try rewriting this as "garbagemen in country X, after taxes and all expenses including rent etc, have 10% of their income left, while white collars from country Z barely manage to save 1% of their earnings over the same period". Is this still true when X=Switzerland and Z another random country in UE?
        DominikR 10y ago
        I just don't get what point you are trying to make here. Statistics and Polls consistently show again and again that Switzerland is one of the safest, richest, most democratic and yes - even happy countries in the world. And maybe you can't see it, but stuff that the Swiss import is for them very cheap in comparison to all others. Just imagine how less it'd hurt you financially to pay for an iPhone when you have an income that is much higher than in every surrounding country. Or how about going on vacations. That's very cheap for Swiss too, because for them basically every country they could go to is insanely cheap. Edit: And the funny thing is, they are not in the EU, every male has a automatic assault rifle at home, they have free speech, regular referenda on important matters and the majority there is against any kind of Socialism.
BjoernKW 10y ago
In either case there are very specific reasons for their respective success: Oil and foreign money, respectively. None of that is down to them not being part of the EU The UK isn't even remotely comparable to either of those countries. Besides, both Switzerland and Norway have trade agreements with the EU. If the UK wants similar agreements it'll have to accept similar conditions including freedom of movement, which in turn will make this whole Brexit affair rather pointless: The UK will effectively have to accept the same conditions it has right now without any ability to influence or veto EU regulations anymore.

RBerenguel 10y ago

Every time I hear the "Norway" issue I just point out one crucial fact: oil. Norway is a huge oil exporter.

DominikR 10y ago
Please take a look at how the Swiss are doing outside the EU. They have no oil, just their financial industry. Actually that's quite similar to the UK, just that the UK is much stronger in many other areas too. I suspect that the UK will do really well outside the EU. Edit: Has anyone here even considered that it might be the EU that will break up long before the UK? As I see it the next time Turkeys dictator Erdogan decides to unleash millions of refugees (as he has threatened before) the EU will most definitely be finished. In my country (Austria) the guy that a few weeks ago lost the presidential election (with 49% of the votes) said that he would support a referendum for exiting the EU. So did Le Pen from France and Wilders from the Netherlands. Recent polls show that in Italy and France an absolute majority wants to have a referendum about exiting the EU. And you believe that the EU can actually punish someone for misbehaving? Every article written that suggests that the UK should ignore democratic decisions or that all who have voted for Brexit are stupid racist will fasten the process of a collapsing EU. So please continue!
- temp 10y ago
  >I suspect that the UK will do really well outside the EU. Can you give me some specific insight into how Northern Ireland, Wales or Cornwall are going to benefit from being outside the EU? Will UK's farmers, for whom it is estimated that 55% of all income comes directly from EU subsidies, also benefit from an exit?
  - narag 10y ago
    I wonder if we should be happy with an organization that pays 55% of UK farmers' income.
- RBerenguel 10y ago
  Switzerland has ~10% GDP coming from banking, roughly the same as the UK. Also, Switzerland is part of the single market. The thing is, most of the "big banking" in the UK is already planning for its own leave to Frankfurt and Paris. And the EU seems pretty clear into not having the UK in the single market.

jc80 10y ago

The UK would have to agree on free movement like Norway and Switzerland to get the same deal, and that's the main thing they voted against. They never really had it anyways, getting into the UK has always felt more like the US border crossing. Good riddance.

reitanqild 10y ago
> The UK would have to agree on free movement like Norway and Switzerland to get the same deal, and that's the main thing they voted against. I don't think that's the main thing they voted against rather than a percieved opaque, wasteful and possibly corrupt system. (I'm not sure but I'm afraid media cherry picked a bit to present the image of dumb xenophobic Leave supporters.)
- gjulianm 10y ago
  Still, they will end up subject to the same system if they want to maintain free trade and a certain freedom of movement. However, out of the EU they won't have representation and won't have a say in what laws and measures are passed.
- jc80 10y ago
  My point is mainly that if the UK is even able to get, and agrees to a deal like Norway, they're in the exact same position they were before the brexit, only worse. Norway has to pay the EU, has accepted free travel and has to adhere to EU regulations. I don't see how this could be a "win" situation for the UK; it's just a downgrade of their status with the union.

squidi 10y ago

The catastrophe that people are mostly worried about is the impact of Britain leaving on the EU, not just to Britain. It is a key member of the EU and it's exit could be very destabilising for trade and investment throughout the region. On the global scale, not too many people will benefit in the next 5-10 years, maybe Britain will though (who knows for sure).

Bromskloss 10y ago
Why do we have to stop trading with Great Britain because they leave the EU?

tigershark 10y ago

The FTSE lost 3.15% in a single day while it triggered a massive destruction of European stock markets. The pound arrived to 1.33$, it was never at that level since 1985. 2000 people are being relocated from Morgan Stankey to Dublin or Frankfurt. Pretty much all the other banks are following the same plans. The financial services sector contributes for around 11% of the whole government tax income. Car industry is heading in the same direction. Even worse the uk won't secure any trade deal with Europe because they will want to discourage other nations to follow the same path. The damage to the uk and global economy will be huge, comparable to the 2008 crisis if not even worse. And finally UK has nothing to do with Norway, a country extremely small (only London has double of Norway population) that exports oil. And it has free access to the European market. Uk, as I said before, very likely won't have it.

simonswords82 10y ago
> The damage to the UK and global economy will be huge I agree - the short term damage to the UK and global economy has been significant. That's confidence being shot down overnight, and the markets reacting accordingly. > Even worse the uk won't secure any trade deal with Europe because they will want to discourage other nations to follow the same path. Really? Come on now. You're telling me that European countries will stop selling to the UK? Nobody really knows how this is going to unfold but it's not going to be doom any more than it's going to be a huge success. In the meantime please stop spreading hyperbole about how the sky is falling.
- tigershark 10y ago
  There will be no free market is different from stop selling. China is not part of the EU market but there are huge trades between EU and China.