8 ms·

EU must become a 'genuine federation' to avoid deindustrialisation and decline

79 points by saubeidl 9mo ago

deleted 9mo ago
[deleted]
epolanski 9mo ago
We definitely need more focus on creating a true single market. It is difficult to scale across Europe. Most countries will gladly fall back to "we do how we please in our country, Europe won't tell us what to do!" which is the usual nationalistic rally to which many fall prey not realizing how good it would be to start making small but steady steps into common regulations. We really need a strong internal market.
- general1465 9mo ago
  > "we do how we please in our country, Europe won't tell us what to do!" This is like people who will be pointing on weak, indecisive Europe. But when somebody suggests that we should get rid of unanimous voting so one country can't sabotage everybody else, suddenly those people love weak and indecisive Europe and won't give their veto right. Wanting their cake and eating it too...
  - lucasRW 9mo ago
    By that standards, an EU army would have gone to war in Irak in 2003, dragging french soldiers and the french aircraft carrier despite them being right from the very start.
    - myrmidon 9mo ago
      Sure, but how many "correct" decisions are not made or drag on forever because of vetos? Allowing veto power to single participants is often crippling for institutions in practice, because you allow every political adversary (internal and external) to freely pick the weakest link whenever he wants to sabotage or paralyze decisionmaking. This already happens in practice with the EU, and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth is a textbook example of how such a mechanism essentially doomed the whole thing.
- chongli 9mo ago
  We definitely need more focus on creating a true single market. It’s going to be difficult to achieve this without the establishment of a single official language. That’s where the US gets most of its advantage: a large population of English speakers means a large single market for products in English. Sure, lots of products (like food) don’t care about language but software and media (literature, music, video games, movies, TV) definitely do. It’s no coincidence that the US dominates the global market for those cultural and technology products.
  - epolanski 9mo ago
    I have a decade of experience working with european companies, digital and not. Language is not a barrier at all. Laws and regulations are.
  - ekaryotic 9mo ago
    software is a bad example since all the coding is done in english. the translation tools are inexpensive nowadays. bilingual persons have lower rates of dementia so it's not even sure that standardising on one language would be a net benefit. also it's universally accepted that english is one of the more difficult languages to learn. If there was a revival of the movement for a single language then english wouldn't be picked by non native english speakers.
    - ethbr1 9mo ago
      Esperanto for all! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto
      - mothballed 9mo ago
        How much easier is it to learn Esperanto than some broken form of simplified English that gets the message across and then also enables you to speak the native language of 26% of the world GDP?
        direwolf20 9mo ago
- tistoon 9mo ago
  This will never happen, or at most, it will be a half-baked clunky "federation" like today. Why? Because you will always say first: "I am Italian" and not "I am European" when introducing yourself. All the dreamy one powerful Europe will never happen because of this. Which makes sense because Europe, by definition, is multiple countries, identities and cultures!
  - Tom1380 9mo ago
    And I am Ligurian, before Italian. If I can be both, I can be all three
  - OKRainbowKid 9mo ago
    By that logic, Germany would have never formed.
    - croon 9mo ago
      I'll add Italy, the UK, Spain, Switzerland, Greece.
    - tistoon 9mo ago
      By this logic, we'll never get rid of nations and become one federated people of Earth... See? I can switch eras and make an irrelevant comment too! :)
      - OKRainbowKid 9mo ago
        By what logic? The one in your comment I replied to? Yeah I don't subscribe to that logic. I don't see how my comment was irrelevant or why you mention "switching eras", when in your comment you used the quite absolute "never". I honestly don't get your point.
  - epolanski 9mo ago
    I'm not sure where are you from, but we Europeans do also feel Europeans. This isn't about countries losing sovereignty over night, but about creating common frameworks and regulations step by step. This is already a reality in some sectors, e.g. agriculture. Agriculture sits under exclusive or near-exclusive EU control in the whole EU and the model works (albeit it's not perfect, like no model is). EU promotes countries to produce what they are good at. Thus, it doesn't incentivize Italy to produce cereals much, because Italy does not have the right land to grow cereals and that would not make much sense in economic terms. Instead Italy is incentivized to grow cheese, meat, grapes, olives, etc, things that Italy is good at and sells well. There's other things on which all countries delegate to EU: trade (tariffs and custom rules), goods standards, aviation safety rules, competition and state aid regulations, etc, etc. So I would say that EU has been very successful on multiple fronts in harmonizing and taking responsibility for multiple things. But I'm gonna give you of a simple blocker at EU level: why gdpr or dma/dsa are very EU centralized, ultimately digital and data regulations are still not really delegated and national law takes precedence: this is a very heavy blocker to scale any company that requires any kind of business involving data. As soon as you cross a border you need to know the ins and outs of every single country. So it's not that trivial to build a software service company and have it scale painlessly across Europe. Examples include: contract law, consumer protection, liability rules, and all courts remain national. Terms of service, refund rules, dispute handling is always country-specific. Expanding beyond your own borders is very expensive. Then you have tax complexity, payment and banking, labor law, data protection (as mentioned)..
mathverse 9mo ago
Doubt this. Europeans are "euroracist", protectionist and unable to see the bigger picture. As a european I have exited the continent, sold all my properties and will never return to this place ever again.
- deleted 9mo ago
  [deleted]
- jpoesen 9mo ago
  [flagged]
- MrGilbert 9mo ago
  > As a european I have exited the continent, sold all my properties and will never return to this place ever again. Where did you move to?
  - drawfloat 9mo ago
    100% guarantee either Thailand or Singapore. Always the case with these types of posts.
    - mathverse 9mo ago
      Of course. Where else?
    - mothballed 9mo ago
      Well Singapore has higher economic freedom index than most (all) places in Europe, except maybe Lichtenstein which is sometimes not ranked.
      - snowpid 9mo ago
        Singapore is a very racist place and has an authoritarian regime.
        9mo ago
seydor 9mo ago
You re more likely to see the creation of the Spanish federation than the political union of disparate european interests currently held together via monetary injections
nickslaughter02 9mo ago
> the European Union risks subordination, division and deindustrialision all at once Whose fault is that? Who is constantly forcing regulations which hurt EU industries? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Green_Deal#Job_losses_and_inflation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Green_Deal#Job_losses... https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2025/12/16/eu-carmakers-to-comply-with-90-emissions-reduction-by-2035-as-full-combustion-engine-ban-s https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2025/12/16/eu-carmakers-t... Instead of fixing the problems they have created they are now placing taxes on imported heavy goods. https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2026/01/01/eus-carbon-border-tax-on-heavy-industry-goods-goes-into-effect-risking-trade-escalation https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2026/01/01/eus-carbon-bor...
- sigmoid10 9mo ago
  The regulations mentioned there are not necessarily wrong though. Decarbonisation and renewables are no longer purely environmental concerns, they are key objectives for the European security strategy to remove dependence on foreign tyrants and dictators. These jobs would have disappeared sooner or later anyways. But lots of new ones will be created in these new industries. The EU is merely getting dragged down by the established traditional fossil industry that wants to delay the transition as long as possible to squeeze every cent out of the market while they can. But this is bad for literally everyone involved in the long term. The only thing that is benefiting are next-quarter based exec bonuses. If Europe actually allowed for a disruptive startup environment (which unfortunately has its own set of safety issues), these companies would have been handed their lunch by now.
  - lynx97 9mo ago
    > remove dependence on foreign tyrants Ahh, thats why the EU is moving to LNG, now I get it!
    - embedding-shape 9mo ago
      > why the EU is moving to LNG Is it? News for this resident of the EU. What exactly are you referencing? Most states in the EU are focusing on renewables one way or another, are you talking about a specific country here or?
rapsey 9mo ago
[flagged]
- tedggh 9mo ago
  The population of Africa is estimated to be 5-6 times the population of Europe by 2060. For context, in 1990 Africa had slightly less people than Europe. Today more than double.
  - churchill 9mo ago
    [dead]
  - tonyedgecombe 9mo ago
    I wonder how that can happen once climate change starts affecting their ability to grow food. It might make the current immigration problems look quite minor once you have 500 million people knocking on the door and wanting to come in.
- okokwhatever 9mo ago
  Oh man... you're so right. We all know this is happening and none of us feels the freedom to combat this truths in EU anymore.
  - direwolf20 9mo ago
    Sarcasm? Thanks to the EU, it's now legal to have a public wifi hotspot in Germany.
- tonyedgecombe 9mo ago
  >Mass importation of third worlders That's not a policy of the EU, it's controlled by individual countries.
voy707 9mo ago
it's too late.
- beardyw 9mo ago
  Too late in what context? There have been diverse societies in Europe for thousands of years. To have got so far as a union is not a step backward.
  - beardyw 9mo ago
    Though to correct myself Hitler also had a shot at it in a different way.
  - voy707 9mo ago
    Too late to change the fact that EU is no longer competitive despite historically strong core competencies and no shortage of talented people. Manufacturing? Energy is way too expensive. Tech? Admirable attempts using relatively little financial resources to keep up with the US and China haven't worked out. An issue of scale, not talent. The complex regulatory body and risk-averse politics slows everything down (except the process of creating new regulations) Germany is a prime example of all of the above. Oh, and let's also make our energy supplies dependent on an adversary after shutting down perfectly fine nuclear power plants while fantasizing about a green hydrogen future while operating coal plants into the 2040s. (Also Germany)
inglor_cz 9mo ago
How does Poland manage to be industrially active and growing? Despite having only 10 per cent of the total EU population and not being in a federalist relation with Malta, Cyprus and Portugal? Partly by not importing Germano-French bureaucratic dysfunction (Papiere, Papiere über alles). Which would only grow more prominent with further integration. Brute force does not matter nearly as much as quality of governance does. Qing China was a big, helpless monster eaten alive by smaller, more agile competitors.
- hardlianotion 9mo ago
  I don't know, but would a significant component of Poland's growth stem from the fact that it is still a significant net recipient of EU funding?
  - inglor_cz 9mo ago
    So are sluggish economies like Hungary. Again, it is not the amount of money you receive as whether you can use them in a productive way. Poland invested heavily into infrastructure and was able to reduce the NIMBY problem that is so prominent in Czechia or Germany and leads to decade-long paper wars over every railway, road and housing project. Of course they now reap the benefits. As a neighbour, I am a bit frustrated by the difference that is becoming ever more visible. CZ is stuck in a bad vetocracy, hopefully the new government, populist as it may be, will change it a bit. (One reason for my hope is that the Mayor party is in opposition. They were the biggest fans of the vetocracy, because it gave power to regional politicians.) In general, if you can learn from somebody, adapt the good things and not the bad ones. If you are allowed to choose, of course. But that requires some degree of freedom.
    - hardlianotion 9mo ago
      For sure net funding isn't everything, but I am inclined to think it is something significant.
      - inglor_cz 9mo ago
mono442 9mo ago
Deindustrialisation is mostly a consequence of high energy costs which is due to carbon taxes. They are fighting a problem which they have caused .
- direwolf20 9mo ago
  Solar is the cheapest form of energy averaged over the whole year. 2025 was the first year where more total electricity was produced by renewables than not. It has the obvious problem that it doesn't work at night and in winter. That's a big problem. I don't know how to fix that.
  - mono442 9mo ago
    These savings don't trickle to the end customers. It's only making middlemen richer.
    - direwolf20 9mo ago
      Well then why aren't there competitive middlemen?
      - deleted 9mo ago
        [deleted]
    - aktenlage 9mo ago
      Companies can (and do) install solar for their own consumption. No middleman involved.
  - general1465 9mo ago
    Yeah that's a theory. Practically you have something called electricity exchange in Leipzig where price bottom is set by the most expensive power source.
    - direwolf20 9mo ago
lnsru 9mo ago
There are many nice pragmatic ideas. But which king will give away the throne for greater good? For example Germany is federation with 16 states and 16 administrations. The country could shrink to two administration areas like South and North and become 8 times more efficient. Never gonna happen! To have this on continental level is even more never gonna happen probability.
- alansaber 9mo ago
  Agreed, there needs to be an immediate existential threat for European countries to give up their autonomy
- TitaRusell 9mo ago
  Every country in the EU was created through warfare. Germany only unified because Prussia had the guns. And the compromise was the Federation of Germany.
  - marcusverus 9mo ago
    Basically all centralization of political power in human history has been accomplished by force. See Rome, Persia, Germany, USSR, etc. etc. etc. Even the USA's transition from a union of united States to The United States occurred under force of arms. Sadly, this centralization of political power has been a disaster for mankind IMO. Even as we've transitioned from monarchies to democracies over the last few centuries, the trend has largely resulted in the replacement of actual, determinative choices with merely having a millionth of a share of a choice. Not a determinative choice, but a say. Consider the holy roman empire, for example. [0] Under this scheme of decentralization, people had an actual choice of their government. Say you were a merchant in Mühlhausen circa 1700, and you found yourself in opposition to your local government. You could simply move a short distance to a different area and be beholdened to an entirely different government. You'd have 50 choices within 100 miles! While it's true that the HRE was all under the administration of one government, but it was extremely weak. It lacked, for example, the ability to levy direct taxes. After unification in 1870, the same merchant would've had to move much further to escape his government, and his options had been diminished by 95%. After European unification, he would have to travel to another continent! While democracy has given us control of our governments in theory, in practice the "choice" it offers is much less empowering than the determinative choice afforded by decentralization. The larger our political entities grow, the more diluted our "say" and the fewer full choices are available to us. In the United States, we have less than 1/100,000,000th of a share of the choice in our chief executive! While democracy is obviously preferable to Aristocracy/Monarchy/Tyranny, on it's own it is still only a marginal improvement. At worst, you can still end up with 49.9% of people living under a government they oppose. Decentralization solves this lingering problem, because it allows people to self-sort in and out of countries they don't like, allowing for people who truly despise their governments to choose themselves a new government. In the absence of such a safety valve, people are forced into a zero-sum struggle for power. It is rule or be ruled. Dominate or be dominated. We're seeing this in the United States right now. We're not at each other's throats because we hate each other. Not even because we hate each other's politics in the abstract. We're at each other's throats because neither side is content to be ruled by the other. The same reason that centralized entities only arise by force is the same reason they fall apart in the end. People don't want them. They don't want to be dominated. Centralization of political power forces people into an inescapable struggle for power. It is the enemy of peace and tranquility, and a blight on humanity. [0] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Droysens-26.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Droysens-26.jpg
cm277 9mo ago
As an entrepreneur with businesses in both the US and EU, a federation is probably several steps too far from political will. Instead: - Let banks operate and merge across borders, especially neobanks/fintechs. European banks are easily 10+ yrs ahead of the US in terms of tech and customer service but they lack scale and capital, especially in the credit side of things. - Credit, again: we need the equivalent of D&B/Fico for Europe: a single credit bureau that can judge creditworthiness of people and organizations. Even the US has solved this through private companies, why can't Europe? Fellow Euros are shocked when I tell them that a 0-day LLC in the US can get $20k in credit card limits almost immediately. The rest are easy, especially for web/internet companies. But if we have to raise credit/money based on the rules of the biggest (and slowest!) economies, then the EU is fucked.
- direwolf20 9mo ago
  What stops you spending $20k and declaring bankruptcy for your LLC? Credit scores are probably illegal in the EU due to the laws against mass surveillance.
  - cm277 9mo ago
    You got it, FICO/Equifax/Transunion stop it. The $20k is basically raised on the founders' credit, not the LLCs; richer founders can get a lot more credit right up front. And yes, FICO is probably infeasible in the EU with current laws, that's the point. Fix that first, these businesses are just as critical as actual banks.
    - direwolf20 9mo ago
      Mass surveillance laws don't prevent a bank from doing due diligence on a loan when you ask for a loan, or from suing you if you lied. In Germany it's hard to get a liability shield and there's no compassion for idiots — if you borrowed $20k by lying to the bank about your other loans, your wages will be garnished for life until you pay it back including punitive interest. They could rely on that instead of mass surveillance. I have a feeling FICO would be more destructive than beneficial for Europe. Look what it's done to America. Borrowing $20k for a startup is not worth that.
exceptione 9mo ago
Absolutely. One should just talk with people in the military about procurement. Europe wastes a lot of money and opportunity by having so much duplicated efforts. The innovation and manufacturing power in the EU is absolutely not the problem. But the lack of coordination means that countries inevitably favor local industry, resulting in overly expensive and incompatible systems, with gaps everywhere. There needs to be a central authority that is able to lead a defense program. Just one example: I am hearing far too often that France is overly protecting their own interests and as such can't reach important deals with Germany about sharing burdens and profits. So it results in duplicated, incompatible systems. Germany is generally more open to share benefits and intel with other countries. Such deal-making can drag on for decades, to only fall out. For industries to scale, they need long term planning and a guaranteed pipeline of orders. I am talking about ships, planes, MBT's, air defence, missile tech--not riffles. It is a shame, because both countries are powerhouses in engineering. Also, this costs EU taxpayers billions of dollars, and perhaps their safety even.
- Eddy_Viscosity2 9mo ago
  > resulting in overly expensive and incompatible systems This can occur even with a more integrated market. The problem is that military suppliers deliberately make as many things 'sole source' as possible so they can be the only supplier and hence charge even higher rates. I'm don't mean the big items like tanks and planes, but the little consumable stuff like lubrication oils, fasteners, gears, etc. that are made to be non-compatible with other systems on purpose. Harder to fix because of the usual corporation-military-lobbying feedback loops and because it requires standards which can be technically intensive to develop.
  - general1465 9mo ago
    And this is where standardization and regulation should show up. It can start from details like only standardized bolts and screws with standardized heads are allowed to be used all the way to jet engine must have exactly these dimensions and these inputs and outputs in these positions so it is possible to use same jet engine in Rafale, Eurofighter or Gripen.
petesergeant 9mo ago
Not going to happen without an agreed single working language, which can't realistically be anything other than English, and that'll be unacceptable, so the idea is (very sadly) dead on arrival.
- wat1771 9mo ago
  De facto it's English currently even if they don't want to admit it
  - maxldn 9mo ago
    I kind of assumed brexit would make people give up pretending, but that doesn’t seem to have happened
    - direwolf20 9mo ago
      English is the most widely spoken language. It is the language you are most likely to have in common with a random European citizen — in the same way Chinese is the language you are most likely to have in common with a random Earthling. This doesn't mean if you do something in English (Chinese) the whole continent (planet) will understand it. It is very useful to know. Especially if you talk to someone who travels internationally a lot, some rich businessman or non–local politician, they surely speak English too.
      - Anonyneko 9mo ago
        >in the same way Chinese is the language you are most likely to have in common with a random Earthling It's still going to be English, although not by a huge margin if you include non-Mandarin Chinese.
- direwolf20 9mo ago
  The EU itself (not the countries) does every communication in every EU country language. I think it's the second largest employer of translators in the world, behind only the UN. For a business, the language is whatever you agree with your customers. You are free to choose. If you communicate with the EU itself, any EU country language is accepted. Language diversity is just a fact of life in Europe and not going away soon, that's like asking the US to give up the idea of states and become a single country.
lloydatkinson 9mo ago
It certainly starts to feel like they view both of those as actual goals, not stated goals of course.
metalman 9mo ago
The EU will become another empire, which means that somebody gets to be Minnisota, and then exporting there worst contradictions, will need a Gaza.
cpursley 9mo ago
No matter the structure there, without affordable gas from a certain neighbor - Europe simply no longer has the capability to be an industrialized block. You can't smelt aluminum with solar nor make fertilizer, chemicals - can run AI data centers with it - sorry. Energy is EVERYTHING. Without it, Europe becomes a tourist Disney Land for the worlds rich.
- direwolf20 9mo ago
  Why can't you do those things on solar? Actually, I'd think they're ideal matches. Aluminium smelters use so much electricity that even ones that are connected to non-renewable grids have contracts to ramp production up or down at a moment's notice, to absorb supply and demand swings in the rest of the grid. However much electricity you think they use, they use twenty times that. These are places wired with 100 kiloamp busbars. The point is they're well used to variable electricity supply. Cloud comes past? No problem, the furnaces run slower for a moment. I think they need a certain base load to keep them hot as they can't restart them if the aluminium solidifies inside. Aluminium smelting is an electrochemical process. Running electricity through the ore turns it into the metal and that's why they need so much. It's not just electric heating. They use direct current, so that's a good match for solar panels too. Two and a half volts per cell. Fertilizer is something similar, as far as I know. They use electrochemical arc reactors to make nitrogen compounds from air. These can also scale up and down instantly. AI training is pretty good too. If a cloud comes past you can pause the training run for a moment or underclock. The firmware for that might not be there yet, but the laws of physics quite like the idea. Why do you think these particular things require natural gas?
  - PlkMarudny 9mo ago
    It’s the exact same reason you wouldn’t want the lights failing in an operating theater, nor a lift not going to the 30th floor just because the power became unavailable.
    - direwolf20 9mo ago
      Show us on a Hall–Héroult cell where the operating theatre elevator shaft is
PlatoIsADisease 9mo ago
When I visited Europe, or talk to a European in the US, the first question you always get asked: "Where are you from?" This makes me quite uncomfortable, because I'm immediately getting stereotyped based on my parents DNA. (In the US, the question is often "What do you do for work? What do you do for fun?") I have strong doubts that Europe can actually become a single nation of states. If France doesn't screw it up by demanding to be first among equals, Germany or Poland will probably side with the US who will be against this from happening.
- direwolf20 9mo ago
  Your parent's DNA? Really? Not the experiences in your childhood that formed you?
cbeach 9mo ago
The stagnation in Europe (compared to the US) is due to EU over-regulation and industrial suicide caused by net zero policy. > [chemicals sector] investments fell from 1.9 megatonnes of capacity in 2024 to 0.3 megatonnes last year, as the sector struggled with high energy prices, suffocating bureaucracy and an expansion of Chinese imports https://www.ft.com/content/6d7dee96-4d6f-431c-a229-b78f9298f1ef https://www.ft.com/content/6d7dee96-4d6f-431c-a229-b78f9298f... From 2019 to 2023, the EU recorded over 853,000 manufacturing job losses, with the largest losses in automotive sectors in Poland, Czech Republic, Romania, and Germany. The European Green Deal was forecast to put up to 11 million jobs “at risk” in various sectors if adjustments weren’t made: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Green_Deal#Job_losses_and_inflation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Green_Deal#Job_losses... We seem to think that if we destroy our own industry, ship emissions abroad, and marginally reduce global CO2 emissions, we will inspire the rest of the world (i.e. China and India) to follow suit. That's self-evidently ridiculous. EU national leaders need to stop peacocking in Davos and Brussels, and start listening to their own people, and their own businesses, who are crying out for sensible energy costs, and for red tape and bureaucracy to get out the way of business.
TitaRusell 9mo ago
In WW2 the Germans wanted to incorporate the Netherlands into the Third Reich. Even the Dutch Nazi party split over it.
carlosjobim 9mo ago
I think supporters of this idea take the citizens' loyalty for granted. Much like the nations within Europe do. It would be super easy for the EU to charm the European populations into EU loyalty instead of national loyalty. All it would take is to offer good deals to the individual person. To start, a minimum €10 000 per month salary for any citizen taking up military duty. Home ownership to young people who contribute to the federation. And such things, the possibilities are endless. But we all know that the disdain that the EU leaders and national European leaders have against their own population is bottomless, and that they would rather do anything except building loyalty among their population.
- direwolf20 9mo ago
  I think and hope EU leaders are wary of the idea of becoming a federation, and would only do that if it had clear widespread support among both the population and country leaders.
- jopsen 9mo ago
  > It would be super easy for the EU to charm the European populations into EU loyalty instead of national loyalty. All it would take is... Lol, I suggest you start forming an EU soccer team :)
  - carlosjobim 9mo ago
    I think you just presented good evidence for my suggestion. All the greatest soccer teams are successful because they are willing to spend big money on getting loyal players, from anywhere.
    - jopsen 8mo ago
      An EU soccer team funded by the EU to win against all other European teams. Wow, I fear people would hate that with a burning passion. Creating national unity is hard. It doesn't happen overnight -- maybe if you are attacked by an external force.
lucasRW 9mo ago
Yeah of course, Europe has already been destroyed by the EU bureaucracy, but lets give them even more powers to implement their dumb ideas even faster, such as... "oh, how about we stopped producing cars by 2030?", or again... "oh, war is bad, guns kills, how about we pass CSR laws that dissuade banks from funding military companies".
kmfrk 9mo ago
The number of times I've read articles about the upcoming "Silicon Valley in Europe" warrants an article running through the last twenty years of the EU getting its act together "any day now".
linhns 9mo ago
I may be skimming but isn't this what the EU currently is?
flowerthoughts 9mo ago
Just as the US is proving that giving power to federations will make states powerless, Draghi finds it the perfect time to suggest a federation. We all knew this would eventually be the proposed path. The EU politicians and staffers obviously have a vested interest in saying yes. It means the EU will stop having to fight for ratification. It also means centralized planning and less fine-grained adjustments for local needs. As always. This is not more power to the people or "we're stronger together." This is a simple attempt at an opportunistic power grab. Please don't let it happen here too.
tsoukase 9mo ago
EU is a rare coalition in history, carefully implemented but still an expirement. There are three types of members: low (south/east), middle (north/west) and Germany. Basically money is flowing in producing Germany and then back to the consuming lows. The middles are neutral to money flow. This vital rotation is expected to continue in the future albeit with slower speed. The recent collaborations with South America and India aim to help this flow go on. The current US policy is making a great favor to Europe as they cause a uniting instinct against a common danger. There is no need for same language and same most common surname 'Smith' to span 5000km.

79 points by saubeidl 9mo ago

deleted 9mo ago

[deleted]

We definitely need more focus on creating a true single market. It is difficult to scale across Europe. Most countries will gladly fall back to "we do how we please in our country, Europe won't tell us what to do!" which is the usual nationalistic rally to which many fall prey not realizing how good it would be to start making small but steady steps into common regulations. We really need a strong internal market.

general1465 9mo ago
> "we do how we please in our country, Europe won't tell us what to do!" This is like people who will be pointing on weak, indecisive Europe. But when somebody suggests that we should get rid of unanimous voting so one country can't sabotage everybody else, suddenly those people love weak and indecisive Europe and won't give their veto right. Wanting their cake and eating it too...
- lucasRW 9mo ago
  By that standards, an EU army would have gone to war in Irak in 2003, dragging french soldiers and the french aircraft carrier despite them being right from the very start.
  - myrmidon 9mo ago
    Sure, but how many "correct" decisions are not made or drag on forever because of vetos? Allowing veto power to single participants is often crippling for institutions in practice, because you allow every political adversary (internal and external) to freely pick the weakest link whenever he wants to sabotage or paralyze decisionmaking. This already happens in practice with the EU, and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth is a textbook example of how such a mechanism essentially doomed the whole thing.
chongli 9mo ago
We definitely need more focus on creating a true single market. It’s going to be difficult to achieve this without the establishment of a single official language. That’s where the US gets most of its advantage: a large population of English speakers means a large single market for products in English. Sure, lots of products (like food) don’t care about language but software and media (literature, music, video games, movies, TV) definitely do. It’s no coincidence that the US dominates the global market for those cultural and technology products.
- epolanski 9mo ago
  I have a decade of experience working with european companies, digital and not. Language is not a barrier at all. Laws and regulations are.
- ekaryotic 9mo ago
  software is a bad example since all the coding is done in english. the translation tools are inexpensive nowadays. bilingual persons have lower rates of dementia so it's not even sure that standardising on one language would be a net benefit. also it's universally accepted that english is one of the more difficult languages to learn. If there was a revival of the movement for a single language then english wouldn't be picked by non native english speakers.
  - ethbr1 9mo ago
    Esperanto for all! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto
    - mothballed 9mo ago
      How much easier is it to learn Esperanto than some broken form of simplified English that gets the message across and then also enables you to speak the native language of 26% of the world GDP?
      - direwolf20 9mo ago
tistoon 9mo ago
This will never happen, or at most, it will be a half-baked clunky "federation" like today. Why? Because you will always say first: "I am Italian" and not "I am European" when introducing yourself. All the dreamy one powerful Europe will never happen because of this. Which makes sense because Europe, by definition, is multiple countries, identities and cultures!
- Tom1380 9mo ago
  And I am Ligurian, before Italian. If I can be both, I can be all three
- OKRainbowKid 9mo ago
  By that logic, Germany would have never formed.
  - croon 9mo ago
    I'll add Italy, the UK, Spain, Switzerland, Greece.
  - tistoon 9mo ago
    By this logic, we'll never get rid of nations and become one federated people of Earth... See? I can switch eras and make an irrelevant comment too! :)
    - OKRainbowKid 9mo ago
      By what logic? The one in your comment I replied to? Yeah I don't subscribe to that logic. I don't see how my comment was irrelevant or why you mention "switching eras", when in your comment you used the quite absolute "never". I honestly don't get your point.
- epolanski 9mo ago
  I'm not sure where are you from, but we Europeans do also feel Europeans. This isn't about countries losing sovereignty over night, but about creating common frameworks and regulations step by step. This is already a reality in some sectors, e.g. agriculture. Agriculture sits under exclusive or near-exclusive EU control in the whole EU and the model works (albeit it's not perfect, like no model is). EU promotes countries to produce what they are good at. Thus, it doesn't incentivize Italy to produce cereals much, because Italy does not have the right land to grow cereals and that would not make much sense in economic terms. Instead Italy is incentivized to grow cheese, meat, grapes, olives, etc, things that Italy is good at and sells well. There's other things on which all countries delegate to EU: trade (tariffs and custom rules), goods standards, aviation safety rules, competition and state aid regulations, etc, etc. So I would say that EU has been very successful on multiple fronts in harmonizing and taking responsibility for multiple things. But I'm gonna give you of a simple blocker at EU level: why gdpr or dma/dsa are very EU centralized, ultimately digital and data regulations are still not really delegated and national law takes precedence: this is a very heavy blocker to scale any company that requires any kind of business involving data. As soon as you cross a border you need to know the ins and outs of every single country. So it's not that trivial to build a software service company and have it scale painlessly across Europe. Examples include: contract law, consumer protection, liability rules, and all courts remain national. Terms of service, refund rules, dispute handling is always country-specific. Expanding beyond your own borders is very expensive. Then you have tax complexity, payment and banking, labor law, data protection (as mentioned)..

mathverse 9mo ago

Doubt this. Europeans are "euroracist", protectionist and unable to see the bigger picture. As a european I have exited the continent, sold all my properties and will never return to this place ever again.

deleted 9mo ago
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jpoesen 9mo ago
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MrGilbert 9mo ago
> As a european I have exited the continent, sold all my properties and will never return to this place ever again. Where did you move to?
- drawfloat 9mo ago
  100% guarantee either Thailand or Singapore. Always the case with these types of posts.
  - mathverse 9mo ago
    Of course. Where else?
  - mothballed 9mo ago
    Well Singapore has higher economic freedom index than most (all) places in Europe, except maybe Lichtenstein which is sometimes not ranked.
    - snowpid 9mo ago
      Singapore is a very racist place and has an authoritarian regime.
      - 9mo ago

seydor 9mo ago

You re more likely to see the creation of the Spanish federation than the political union of disparate european interests currently held together via monetary injections

nickslaughter02 9mo ago

> the European Union risks subordination, division and deindustrialision all at once Whose fault is that? Who is constantly forcing regulations which hurt EU industries? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Green_Deal#Job_losses_and_inflation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Green_Deal#Job_losses... https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2025/12/16/eu-carmakers-to-comply-with-90-emissions-reduction-by-2035-as-full-combustion-engine-ban-s https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2025/12/16/eu-carmakers-t... Instead of fixing the problems they have created they are now placing taxes on imported heavy goods. https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2026/01/01/eus-carbon-border-tax-on-heavy-industry-goods-goes-into-effect-risking-trade-escalation https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2026/01/01/eus-carbon-bor...

sigmoid10 9mo ago
The regulations mentioned there are not necessarily wrong though. Decarbonisation and renewables are no longer purely environmental concerns, they are key objectives for the European security strategy to remove dependence on foreign tyrants and dictators. These jobs would have disappeared sooner or later anyways. But lots of new ones will be created in these new industries. The EU is merely getting dragged down by the established traditional fossil industry that wants to delay the transition as long as possible to squeeze every cent out of the market while they can. But this is bad for literally everyone involved in the long term. The only thing that is benefiting are next-quarter based exec bonuses. If Europe actually allowed for a disruptive startup environment (which unfortunately has its own set of safety issues), these companies would have been handed their lunch by now.
- lynx97 9mo ago
  > remove dependence on foreign tyrants Ahh, thats why the EU is moving to LNG, now I get it!
  - embedding-shape 9mo ago
    > why the EU is moving to LNG Is it? News for this resident of the EU. What exactly are you referencing? Most states in the EU are focusing on renewables one way or another, are you talking about a specific country here or?

rapsey 9mo ago

[flagged]

tedggh 9mo ago
The population of Africa is estimated to be 5-6 times the population of Europe by 2060. For context, in 1990 Africa had slightly less people than Europe. Today more than double.
- churchill 9mo ago
  [dead]
- tonyedgecombe 9mo ago
  I wonder how that can happen once climate change starts affecting their ability to grow food. It might make the current immigration problems look quite minor once you have 500 million people knocking on the door and wanting to come in.
okokwhatever 9mo ago
Oh man... you're so right. We all know this is happening and none of us feels the freedom to combat this truths in EU anymore.
- direwolf20 9mo ago
  Sarcasm? Thanks to the EU, it's now legal to have a public wifi hotspot in Germany.
tonyedgecombe 9mo ago
>Mass importation of third worlders That's not a policy of the EU, it's controlled by individual countries.

voy707 9mo ago

it's too late.

beardyw 9mo ago
Too late in what context? There have been diverse societies in Europe for thousands of years. To have got so far as a union is not a step backward.
- beardyw 9mo ago
  Though to correct myself Hitler also had a shot at it in a different way.
- voy707 9mo ago
  Too late to change the fact that EU is no longer competitive despite historically strong core competencies and no shortage of talented people. Manufacturing? Energy is way too expensive. Tech? Admirable attempts using relatively little financial resources to keep up with the US and China haven't worked out. An issue of scale, not talent. The complex regulatory body and risk-averse politics slows everything down (except the process of creating new regulations) Germany is a prime example of all of the above. Oh, and let's also make our energy supplies dependent on an adversary after shutting down perfectly fine nuclear power plants while fantasizing about a green hydrogen future while operating coal plants into the 2040s. (Also Germany)

inglor_cz 9mo ago

How does Poland manage to be industrially active and growing? Despite having only 10 per cent of the total EU population and not being in a federalist relation with Malta, Cyprus and Portugal? Partly by not importing Germano-French bureaucratic dysfunction (Papiere, Papiere über alles). Which would only grow more prominent with further integration. Brute force does not matter nearly as much as quality of governance does. Qing China was a big, helpless monster eaten alive by smaller, more agile competitors.

hardlianotion 9mo ago
I don't know, but would a significant component of Poland's growth stem from the fact that it is still a significant net recipient of EU funding?
- inglor_cz 9mo ago
  So are sluggish economies like Hungary. Again, it is not the amount of money you receive as whether you can use them in a productive way. Poland invested heavily into infrastructure and was able to reduce the NIMBY problem that is so prominent in Czechia or Germany and leads to decade-long paper wars over every railway, road and housing project. Of course they now reap the benefits. As a neighbour, I am a bit frustrated by the difference that is becoming ever more visible. CZ is stuck in a bad vetocracy, hopefully the new government, populist as it may be, will change it a bit. (One reason for my hope is that the Mayor party is in opposition. They were the biggest fans of the vetocracy, because it gave power to regional politicians.) In general, if you can learn from somebody, adapt the good things and not the bad ones. If you are allowed to choose, of course. But that requires some degree of freedom.
  - hardlianotion 9mo ago
    For sure net funding isn't everything, but I am inclined to think it is something significant.
    - inglor_cz 9mo ago

mono442 9mo ago

Deindustrialisation is mostly a consequence of high energy costs which is due to carbon taxes. They are fighting a problem which they have caused .

direwolf20 9mo ago
Solar is the cheapest form of energy averaged over the whole year. 2025 was the first year where more total electricity was produced by renewables than not. It has the obvious problem that it doesn't work at night and in winter. That's a big problem. I don't know how to fix that.
- mono442 9mo ago
  These savings don't trickle to the end customers. It's only making middlemen richer.
  - direwolf20 9mo ago
    Well then why aren't there competitive middlemen?
    - deleted 9mo ago
      [deleted]
  - aktenlage 9mo ago
    Companies can (and do) install solar for their own consumption. No middleman involved.
- general1465 9mo ago
  Yeah that's a theory. Practically you have something called electricity exchange in Leipzig where price bottom is set by the most expensive power source.
  - direwolf20 9mo ago

lnsru 9mo ago

There are many nice pragmatic ideas. But which king will give away the throne for greater good? For example Germany is federation with 16 states and 16 administrations. The country could shrink to two administration areas like South and North and become 8 times more efficient. Never gonna happen! To have this on continental level is even more never gonna happen probability.

alansaber 9mo ago
Agreed, there needs to be an immediate existential threat for European countries to give up their autonomy
TitaRusell 9mo ago
Every country in the EU was created through warfare. Germany only unified because Prussia had the guns. And the compromise was the Federation of Germany.
- marcusverus 9mo ago
  Basically all centralization of political power in human history has been accomplished by force. See Rome, Persia, Germany, USSR, etc. etc. etc. Even the USA's transition from a union of united States to The United States occurred under force of arms. Sadly, this centralization of political power has been a disaster for mankind IMO. Even as we've transitioned from monarchies to democracies over the last few centuries, the trend has largely resulted in the replacement of actual, determinative choices with merely having a millionth of a share of a choice. Not a determinative choice, but a say. Consider the holy roman empire, for example. [0] Under this scheme of decentralization, people had an actual choice of their government. Say you were a merchant in Mühlhausen circa 1700, and you found yourself in opposition to your local government. You could simply move a short distance to a different area and be beholdened to an entirely different government. You'd have 50 choices within 100 miles! While it's true that the HRE was all under the administration of one government, but it was extremely weak. It lacked, for example, the ability to levy direct taxes. After unification in 1870, the same merchant would've had to move much further to escape his government, and his options had been diminished by 95%. After European unification, he would have to travel to another continent! While democracy has given us control of our governments in theory, in practice the "choice" it offers is much less empowering than the determinative choice afforded by decentralization. The larger our political entities grow, the more diluted our "say" and the fewer full choices are available to us. In the United States, we have less than 1/100,000,000th of a share of the choice in our chief executive! While democracy is obviously preferable to Aristocracy/Monarchy/Tyranny, on it's own it is still only a marginal improvement. At worst, you can still end up with 49.9% of people living under a government they oppose. Decentralization solves this lingering problem, because it allows people to self-sort in and out of countries they don't like, allowing for people who truly despise their governments to choose themselves a new government. In the absence of such a safety valve, people are forced into a zero-sum struggle for power. It is rule or be ruled. Dominate or be dominated. We're seeing this in the United States right now. We're not at each other's throats because we hate each other. Not even because we hate each other's politics in the abstract. We're at each other's throats because neither side is content to be ruled by the other. The same reason that centralized entities only arise by force is the same reason they fall apart in the end. People don't want them. They don't want to be dominated. Centralization of political power forces people into an inescapable struggle for power. It is the enemy of peace and tranquility, and a blight on humanity. [0] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Droysens-26.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Droysens-26.jpg

cm277 9mo ago

As an entrepreneur with businesses in both the US and EU, a federation is probably several steps too far from political will. Instead: - Let banks operate and merge across borders, especially neobanks/fintechs. European banks are easily 10+ yrs ahead of the US in terms of tech and customer service but they lack scale and capital, especially in the credit side of things. - Credit, again: we need the equivalent of D&B/Fico for Europe: a single credit bureau that can judge creditworthiness of people and organizations. Even the US has solved this through private companies, why can't Europe? Fellow Euros are shocked when I tell them that a 0-day LLC in the US can get $20k in credit card limits almost immediately. The rest are easy, especially for web/internet companies. But if we have to raise credit/money based on the rules of the biggest (and slowest!) economies, then the EU is fucked.

direwolf20 9mo ago
What stops you spending $20k and declaring bankruptcy for your LLC? Credit scores are probably illegal in the EU due to the laws against mass surveillance.
- cm277 9mo ago
  You got it, FICO/Equifax/Transunion stop it. The $20k is basically raised on the founders' credit, not the LLCs; richer founders can get a lot more credit right up front. And yes, FICO is probably infeasible in the EU with current laws, that's the point. Fix that first, these businesses are just as critical as actual banks.
  - direwolf20 9mo ago
    Mass surveillance laws don't prevent a bank from doing due diligence on a loan when you ask for a loan, or from suing you if you lied. In Germany it's hard to get a liability shield and there's no compassion for idiots — if you borrowed $20k by lying to the bank about your other loans, your wages will be garnished for life until you pay it back including punitive interest. They could rely on that instead of mass surveillance. I have a feeling FICO would be more destructive than beneficial for Europe. Look what it's done to America. Borrowing $20k for a startup is not worth that.

exceptione 9mo ago

Absolutely. One should just talk with people in the military about procurement. Europe wastes a lot of money and opportunity by having so much duplicated efforts. The innovation and manufacturing power in the EU is absolutely not the problem. But the lack of coordination means that countries inevitably favor local industry, resulting in overly expensive and incompatible systems, with gaps everywhere. There needs to be a central authority that is able to lead a defense program. Just one example: I am hearing far too often that France is overly protecting their own interests and as such can't reach important deals with Germany about sharing burdens and profits. So it results in duplicated, incompatible systems. Germany is generally more open to share benefits and intel with other countries. Such deal-making can drag on for decades, to only fall out. For industries to scale, they need long term planning and a guaranteed pipeline of orders. I am talking about ships, planes, MBT's, air defence, missile tech--not riffles. It is a shame, because both countries are powerhouses in engineering. Also, this costs EU taxpayers billions of dollars, and perhaps their safety even.

Eddy_Viscosity2 9mo ago
> resulting in overly expensive and incompatible systems This can occur even with a more integrated market. The problem is that military suppliers deliberately make as many things 'sole source' as possible so they can be the only supplier and hence charge even higher rates. I'm don't mean the big items like tanks and planes, but the little consumable stuff like lubrication oils, fasteners, gears, etc. that are made to be non-compatible with other systems on purpose. Harder to fix because of the usual corporation-military-lobbying feedback loops and because it requires standards which can be technically intensive to develop.
- general1465 9mo ago
  And this is where standardization and regulation should show up. It can start from details like only standardized bolts and screws with standardized heads are allowed to be used all the way to jet engine must have exactly these dimensions and these inputs and outputs in these positions so it is possible to use same jet engine in Rafale, Eurofighter or Gripen.

petesergeant 9mo ago

Not going to happen without an agreed single working language, which can't realistically be anything other than English, and that'll be unacceptable, so the idea is (very sadly) dead on arrival.

wat1771 9mo ago
De facto it's English currently even if they don't want to admit it
- maxldn 9mo ago
  I kind of assumed brexit would make people give up pretending, but that doesn’t seem to have happened
  - direwolf20 9mo ago
    English is the most widely spoken language. It is the language you are most likely to have in common with a random European citizen — in the same way Chinese is the language you are most likely to have in common with a random Earthling. This doesn't mean if you do something in English (Chinese) the whole continent (planet) will understand it. It is very useful to know. Especially if you talk to someone who travels internationally a lot, some rich businessman or non–local politician, they surely speak English too.
    - Anonyneko 9mo ago
      >in the same way Chinese is the language you are most likely to have in common with a random Earthling It's still going to be English, although not by a huge margin if you include non-Mandarin Chinese.
direwolf20 9mo ago
The EU itself (not the countries) does every communication in every EU country language. I think it's the second largest employer of translators in the world, behind only the UN. For a business, the language is whatever you agree with your customers. You are free to choose. If you communicate with the EU itself, any EU country language is accepted. Language diversity is just a fact of life in Europe and not going away soon, that's like asking the US to give up the idea of states and become a single country.

lloydatkinson 9mo ago

It certainly starts to feel like they view both of those as actual goals, not stated goals of course.

metalman 9mo ago

The EU will become another empire, which means that somebody gets to be Minnisota, and then exporting there worst contradictions, will need a Gaza.

cpursley 9mo ago

No matter the structure there, without affordable gas from a certain neighbor - Europe simply no longer has the capability to be an industrialized block. You can't smelt aluminum with solar nor make fertilizer, chemicals - can run AI data centers with it - sorry. Energy is EVERYTHING. Without it, Europe becomes a tourist Disney Land for the worlds rich.

direwolf20 9mo ago
Why can't you do those things on solar? Actually, I'd think they're ideal matches. Aluminium smelters use so much electricity that even ones that are connected to non-renewable grids have contracts to ramp production up or down at a moment's notice, to absorb supply and demand swings in the rest of the grid. However much electricity you think they use, they use twenty times that. These are places wired with 100 kiloamp busbars. The point is they're well used to variable electricity supply. Cloud comes past? No problem, the furnaces run slower for a moment. I think they need a certain base load to keep them hot as they can't restart them if the aluminium solidifies inside. Aluminium smelting is an electrochemical process. Running electricity through the ore turns it into the metal and that's why they need so much. It's not just electric heating. They use direct current, so that's a good match for solar panels too. Two and a half volts per cell. Fertilizer is something similar, as far as I know. They use electrochemical arc reactors to make nitrogen compounds from air. These can also scale up and down instantly. AI training is pretty good too. If a cloud comes past you can pause the training run for a moment or underclock. The firmware for that might not be there yet, but the laws of physics quite like the idea. Why do you think these particular things require natural gas?
- PlkMarudny 9mo ago
  It’s the exact same reason you wouldn’t want the lights failing in an operating theater, nor a lift not going to the 30th floor just because the power became unavailable.
  - direwolf20 9mo ago
    Show us on a Hall–Héroult cell where the operating theatre elevator shaft is

PlatoIsADisease 9mo ago

When I visited Europe, or talk to a European in the US, the first question you always get asked: "Where are you from?" This makes me quite uncomfortable, because I'm immediately getting stereotyped based on my parents DNA. (In the US, the question is often "What do you do for work? What do you do for fun?") I have strong doubts that Europe can actually become a single nation of states. If France doesn't screw it up by demanding to be first among equals, Germany or Poland will probably side with the US who will be against this from happening.

direwolf20 9mo ago
Your parent's DNA? Really? Not the experiences in your childhood that formed you?

cbeach 9mo ago

The stagnation in Europe (compared to the US) is due to EU over-regulation and industrial suicide caused by net zero policy. > [chemicals sector] investments fell from 1.9 megatonnes of capacity in 2024 to 0.3 megatonnes last year, as the sector struggled with high energy prices, suffocating bureaucracy and an expansion of Chinese imports https://www.ft.com/content/6d7dee96-4d6f-431c-a229-b78f9298f1ef https://www.ft.com/content/6d7dee96-4d6f-431c-a229-b78f9298f... From 2019 to 2023, the EU recorded over 853,000 manufacturing job losses, with the largest losses in automotive sectors in Poland, Czech Republic, Romania, and Germany. The European Green Deal was forecast to put up to 11 million jobs “at risk” in various sectors if adjustments weren’t made: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Green_Deal#Job_losses_and_inflation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Green_Deal#Job_losses... We seem to think that if we destroy our own industry, ship emissions abroad, and marginally reduce global CO2 emissions, we will inspire the rest of the world (i.e. China and India) to follow suit. That's self-evidently ridiculous. EU national leaders need to stop peacocking in Davos and Brussels, and start listening to their own people, and their own businesses, who are crying out for sensible energy costs, and for red tape and bureaucracy to get out the way of business.

TitaRusell 9mo ago

In WW2 the Germans wanted to incorporate the Netherlands into the Third Reich. Even the Dutch Nazi party split over it.

carlosjobim 9mo ago

I think supporters of this idea take the citizens' loyalty for granted. Much like the nations within Europe do. It would be super easy for the EU to charm the European populations into EU loyalty instead of national loyalty. All it would take is to offer good deals to the individual person. To start, a minimum €10 000 per month salary for any citizen taking up military duty. Home ownership to young people who contribute to the federation. And such things, the possibilities are endless. But we all know that the disdain that the EU leaders and national European leaders have against their own population is bottomless, and that they would rather do anything except building loyalty among their population.

direwolf20 9mo ago
I think and hope EU leaders are wary of the idea of becoming a federation, and would only do that if it had clear widespread support among both the population and country leaders.
jopsen 9mo ago
> It would be super easy for the EU to charm the European populations into EU loyalty instead of national loyalty. All it would take is... Lol, I suggest you start forming an EU soccer team :)
- carlosjobim 9mo ago
  I think you just presented good evidence for my suggestion. All the greatest soccer teams are successful because they are willing to spend big money on getting loyal players, from anywhere.
  - jopsen 8mo ago
    An EU soccer team funded by the EU to win against all other European teams. Wow, I fear people would hate that with a burning passion. Creating national unity is hard. It doesn't happen overnight -- maybe if you are attacked by an external force.

lucasRW 9mo ago

Yeah of course, Europe has already been destroyed by the EU bureaucracy, but lets give them even more powers to implement their dumb ideas even faster, such as... "oh, how about we stopped producing cars by 2030?", or again... "oh, war is bad, guns kills, how about we pass CSR laws that dissuade banks from funding military companies".

kmfrk 9mo ago

The number of times I've read articles about the upcoming "Silicon Valley in Europe" warrants an article running through the last twenty years of the EU getting its act together "any day now".

linhns 9mo ago

I may be skimming but isn't this what the EU currently is?

flowerthoughts 9mo ago

Just as the US is proving that giving power to federations will make states powerless, Draghi finds it the perfect time to suggest a federation. We all knew this would eventually be the proposed path. The EU politicians and staffers obviously have a vested interest in saying yes. It means the EU will stop having to fight for ratification. It also means centralized planning and less fine-grained adjustments for local needs. As always. This is not more power to the people or "we're stronger together." This is a simple attempt at an opportunistic power grab. Please don't let it happen here too.

tsoukase 9mo ago

EU is a rare coalition in history, carefully implemented but still an expirement. There are three types of members: low (south/east), middle (north/west) and Germany. Basically money is flowing in producing Germany and then back to the consuming lows. The middles are neutral to money flow. This vital rotation is expected to continue in the future albeit with slower speed. The recent collaborations with South America and India aim to help this flow go on. The current US policy is making a great favor to Europe as they cause a uniting instinct against a common danger. There is no need for same language and same most common surname 'Smith' to span 5000km.