can anyone explain why the EU is viewed as some sort of kind, progressive organisation, when in reality acts like a bitter, protectionist bully?
There are things that I don't like about the EU. Especially:
* Bureaucracy
* They spent 40% of their budget for agriculture subsidies.
* Now we have open boarders for immigrants from very violent and tribal societies. (You can downvote me for this if you like).
But here are many positive things. Freedom of movement. You can work, retire or open a business in any EU country that you want. Open skies - very cheap airfares (which will hurt the UK a lot).
What happens just this year is mind blowing.
* Free trade agreement with Japan
* Potential free trade agreement with Mercosur countries
* No roaming charges for cell phones anymore
* PSD2 for Fintech (Banks have to grant access to bank accounts for fintechs)
* Money Wires are very cheap or free within the EU. They can still take a day or two. Starting November Banks must offer "instant EU money wires". I think the time is less than a minute. Less than a bitcoin transaction takes to process.
* Military Headquarter in the EU, beginning of an EU army
Don't write the EU off. Nobody knows the future but for me the Brexit seems like madness.
But since you mentioned Greece. What about Puerto Rico? Illinois?
Otherwise how do you replace, for example, 28 different national systems for classifying bananas with a single classification without a certain amount of bureaucracy? You either hive massive multilateral discussions among 28 national bureaucracies or you get rid of the individual national burocrats and delegate this function to Brussels.
I love the bananna thing btw - it's a long time favourite of EU haters as an example of EU overreach. Europhobic UK newspapers have milked it for years - out-of-control bureaucrats making up useles regulations and creating red-tape. But they never mention that it replaced was 28 individual national banana classifcations.
The result is that the content of the regulation have become the de-facto standard in the industry that everyone is following voluntarily.
It was even the other way round. Lobbyists of merchants wanted cheaper transport costs and solved it on a EU level.
And the UK is going to learn about it the hard way (if it goes ahead with Brexit, less likely by the day). The Euratom debacle is already showing that.
The UK decided to leave the EU which means leaving the single market. I'm guessing you do not appreciate the vast difference between being part of a single market and having a trade deal.
Regardless of the existence of NAFTA for example, a company based in Mexico city will not have all the same rights and access to the US market as one based in the US.
However being a member of the EU means, for example a Danish company can load up a van with its produce, drive to London and deliver them to a customer without any paperwork or customs checks along the way. It has all the rights of a company based in another UK city.
This can only work if there are shared standards across the EU and if there is an authority (ultimately the European Court of Justice) to ensure these rights are available to all. It also requires common standards for goods and services.
The UK simply cannot expect to maintain this level of access to the EU market unless it is willing to accept the ECJ and all the EU laws and regulations.
Btw, only someone with no historical perspective whatsoever would question the progressive credentials of the EU (given the recent history of some of its members: communist rule, military and fascist dictatorship, sectarian division) or accuse it of being protectionist (given that 17 of the 20 most globalised countries in the world in terms of trade are members).
I would challenge you to explain how the Common External Tariff combined with the Common Agricultural Policy are not protectionist (tariffs average 18%)!
outside of the CAP: there are plenty of other examples of heavy protectionism in the CET. sugar and coffee are two easy examples.
sugar has a heavy import tariff: to give the domestic EU sugar beet industry an huge advantage over the cane sugar business in the developing world
coffee is more insidious: processed coffee has a heavy import tariff, whilst unprocessed coffee has no tariff at all, this prevents producers in developing countries from developing the profitable part of the industry, forcing them to sell the raw produce at low prices to the EU
there are plenty of other examples, the net effect of being that if you are a developing nation: the EU is not an easy destination for your goods
CAP is a product of its time (sixties and seventies) but has been and continues to be reformed beyond recognition. All the export subsidies, quotas, price floors and other market distortions are gone or are in the process of being phased out.
As for sugar tariffs, it has been used as a tool for development policy with developing countries having zero-tariff access to EU markets. The processed Coffee tariff is not "heavy" - certainly less than 10% from what I recall.
yes, the CAP was a product of its time, but it's still there, it still makes up a huge 39% of the budget[1] (down from 79%, true), and the external tariffs on agriculture average out to a whopping 18%
if this isn't protectionism, what is?
[1]: https://ec.europa.eu/agriculture/sites/agriculture/files/cap...
The tricky aspect of free trade agreements is the non-tariff barriers [2]; those relate mostly to regulations, including labor protection, health, the environment, money laundering, and such.
They are very difficult to negotiate, because a lot of them are not about economics, but about things that people genuinely care about. For example, one of the major sticking points with TTIP was food quality (the chlorinated chicken debate). As a result, trade agreements that want to reduce regulatory barriers take years to negotiate.
Within the EU, this problem is addressed by having an actual, full-blown bicameral legislature and a court of justice to protect the interests of the member states and their citizens. But the UK doesn't even like the ECJ, so this is not going to be easy.
As far as the negotiations go, the British government has nobody but itself to blame. It doesn't even seem to be prepared for negotiations (and one has to wonder what it wasted the past year on); it has consistently and aggressively talked trash about the EU (in order to appeal to UKIP voters?), has issued threats (such as turning the UK into a European Singapore), and so forth. It should not be surprising that the reaction hasn't exactly been amicable.
[1] http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/TM.TAX.MRCH.WM.AR.ZS?vie...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-tariff_barriers_to_trade
If tomorrow the UK says: "Fuck, we screwed up, let's stay in the EU" then the EU will put all their resources behind making that happen. No barriers at all: 4 freedoms and hopefully Schengen, too.
Where do you get the idea that is the EU the one leaving the UK for racist reasons, thus wanting to erect barriers against workers from other countries?
It's not like these consequences weren't mentioned before. And I won't bother repeating the arguments about Britain's existing financial obligations which you chose to pretend to be ignorant of.
>threatening to institute trade barriers against the UK (unless it pays vast sums of money, and then it's only to begin talking about a free trade agreement
Like the kind of money that other EEA members are paying to access to common market?
the UK Government wants to keep barriers to trade as low as possible, it is seeking a free trade agreement
the EU is currently ratifying the Canadian FTA, and last week announced agreement with Japan had been reached that would reduce barriers by 99%[1]... whilst simultaneously threatening the UK with increased barriers to trade
[1]: https://www.ft.com/content/c874d02a-60ba-11e7-91a7-502f7ee26...
> the UK Government wants to keep barriers to trade as low as possible, it is seeking a free trade agreement
UK electorate cannot have both
And what the UK wants is not a free trade agreement, they want the same acces that they have now.
the UK wants an "ambitious free trade agreement", not membership of the single market, if you don't believe me see https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/the-governments-negot...
So we do not seek membership of the single market. Instead we seek the greatest possible access to it through a new, comprehensive, bold and ambitious free trade agreement."there way of punishing the UK" Look, If you are going to have a divorce and tell your wife: "Look, we are going to have a divorce but I don't want to pay alimony and we are going to stay fuck buddies and the cottage in Italy that you inherited from your parents, I am still going to use this."
Then all this sounds like an excellent idea but if your wife says "I pass" this does not mean that your wife is going to "punish you". She is just passing on the deal.
I gotta ask the opposite, why does the UK want such an FTA so much?
Could it be, gasp, that they realized they're actually fucked without one?
The one leaving the EU is Uk. And you cannot have the cake and eat it.
Uk position until now is ditching all the obligations and keep the the benefits.
UE is not threateting to institute economic barriers, they are saying that if UK is not an EU member they should be treated like so