"with all the overregulation, bureaucracy" What most people do not understand, most of the regulation in the EU is to make trade easier. That is the main focus

"with all the overregulation, bureaucracy" What most people do not understand, most of the regulation in the EU is to make trade easier. That is the main focus of the EU commission (not the parliament though, which brings in pro-people regulation like food regulations or GDPR). There is often the joke about the EU regulating bananas. People don't ask why this is regulated, they think it's "the idiots in the EU". The reason is easier trade. Because this way some dealer in Poland can buy a quality level of banana from someone in Spain and knows what they can expect to get. It's for easier trade. It's like having a standard API and language (e.g. SQL) instead of everyone doing their own. It's like lanugages generating LLVM IR (the IR is "regulated") so they don't have to write their own backend. Think of EU regulation more like OAuth.