When companies charge too much, EU fines them for monopoly abuse, when they charge too low, EU fines them for dumping prices, when they charge the same, EU fines them for price fixing. It's almost as if laws were designed to fill EU's pockets.
Specifically, EU fines represent about 3% of EU revenue. The funds from the fines may not be used until the fine has passed all chances of being overturned by courts, which can take up to 8 years.
Finally: the fines reduce EU funding from member countries by the same amount. Even if the member nations decided to subsequently give more money back to the EU, there is a cap on how much money the EU can take.
Of course fines are a revenue source, the EU operates on multiyear fixed budged which they supplement with fines and tariffs.
The bulk of that wealth transfer is reliant on the coffers of US companies.
> Please don't use Hacker News primarily for political or ideological battle. This destroys intellectual curiosity, so we ban accounts that do it.
Also I balance it with the variety in my submissions.
Please share your sources.
And, just assuming you are right, those coffers are full of untaxed revenue from EU markets.
Are you suggesting that it's legitimate to fine US companies on antitrust grounds to supplement tax revenue?
wow. Really?
You make that sounds like its insignificant, but it really isn't.
Fines that go in to the 'consolidated budget' for a country or region doesn't seem right; it's blatantly in their own interest to lay out fines, regardless of if the behaviour warranted it or not.
This seems very familiar to the US property seizure laws; the line between 'justice' and 'flat out corrupt' is fine, and there's significant financial gain to walking the corrupt side of the line.
I don't think this is anything to be proud of.
Over 4.5 years, from 2013 to 2017, EU fines totaled nearly $10b. That's $2b a year, or just over 1% of the EU's total revenue.
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/06/27/the-largest-fines-dished-out...
But anyway, fines going into the general budget is a very usual situation which poses no problem in a stable administration.