Why does it need to be? Would freedom of permanent movement still be something Europeans would vote for today? Will the EU really hold hard on this line with Switzerland? (And does it make political sense to?)
My guess is yes.
It's one of the best things that the EU brings.
… which is exactly why the EU would terminate agreements with Switzerland if we start first. And why it would make political sense. They made that quite clear with the UK.
I believe you. But hard numbers?
> No current political party except for fringe parties in any EU state advocates for exiting the EU or ending the four freedoms
Eh, there seems to be massive demand for modifying either freedom of movement or the context around it.
> They made that quite clear with the UK
The UK invoked Article 50. That wouldn’t happen here.
What IS a topic, is preventing non-EU migration, and that has broad support and slowly all parties are moving in that direction.
And we are NOT EU. But for now, they basically go „yes yes, but we think of you as EU because we are so tightly connected“.
So what do you expect to happen if we push the point and make them treat us as non-EU?
Again, based on what polling?
> what do you expect to happen if we push the point and make them treat us as non-EU?
I frankly don't expect the EU to be unreasonably spiteful. (And for the record, I don’t think the EU was spiteful with the UK.)
Do you have evidence/polling to suggest otherwise?
Freedom of movement for labor is absolutely critical to counterbalance the freedom of movement that capital has, otherwise it leads to mass exploitation of labor and rising levels of inequality, which leads to, well, the French approach to the bourgeois problem.