Kaiserschmarrn wrote:I wouldn't go as far. Regarding protectionism with respect to the rest of the world, leaving the food security policy (which includes the CAP) aside, the EU is not all that bad. As far as I know, tariffs are comparatively low and it is constantly looking out for free trade agreements. Since it represents a rather large economic block it has a more powerful position vis-a-vis other large economies than any individual European country could have.
The UK had to give up all it's other free trade agreements globally,
such as it's free trade agreements with New Zealand for example, in order to join the EU.
We would like free trade agreements, not just with EU members but with many other countries too.
Equally there are some countries in the EU that we do not want free trade agreements with at all. Germany for example. Those that can outproduce us in our doemstic industries, such as car manufacturing or beef production, Steel etc.
The problem with being part of a larger block is that our national intrest gets outvoted by the national intrests of other members of the EU.
While we have a "a say" in the protectionism the EU signs us up for, we do not have the ability to make that decision for ourselves. We have a voice, but not the authoirty to make our own decisions.
It's often billed to us as a trade off.
Either we can have free trade in the EU, or we can have free trade with the rest of world.
Either, or is the deal the EU currently offers us. or at least that's what we are told.
Or... apparently... we can be like Norway who can have free trade agreements with every nation. EU or non EU alike, as best suits them at any particular moment of their choosing.
Only we aren't Norway so we can't. If we had a control of a critical resource that the EU needs like Norway does, we could, but we don't. What we have on offer is direct competition for their industries, not an abundance of cheap fuel. The deal that is on offer to them is not the same as any deal that will be on offer to us.
I don't honestly think we can get a free trade with the EU if we leave.
It's not in their intrests to be in competition with a country that refuses to cripple it's own economy.
Example, working time directive.
A country like Japan, with no significant natural resources can achieve a higher standard of wealth for it's people by allowing them to work as many hours as they wish.
All countries may achieve a higher standard of wealth if their citisens undertake more labour.
People like me want this. I like to work very long hours to get more money. Under EU rules however this is illegal. I simply cannot legally work the number of hours required to get businesses like I have started in the past, up and running any more.
Why? Because the French and others have decided that nationally they wish to make a compromise. To all work less and raise the price of imported goods so that domestic (lazy) industries can still compete on price. To protect their way of life.
Now this is a perfectly reasonable aspiration and for a country such as France with so many of the natural resources and infrastructures that it needs little from abroad anyway, this makes much sense.
But the UK is not France. It's closer to Japan. We need foreign trade. We need to compete internationally to feed ourselves. Not "want". Need.
And currently we are failing to do so and have been for a very long time. The longer this goes on the greater and greater the need to address this becomes. Urgency increases over time and without intervention will become a crisis. A crisis in which people will starve.
The last time we were starving, the great people of New Zealand sent us food aid. What incentive do they have to do this for us next time, now that we are no longer mutually dependant trade partners?
I predict that if we leave the EU there will be punative repercussions.
The first and easiest being to deny us the only thing we ever wanted from the EU anyway,
a free trade agreement.
There is no divorce without bad feeling.
You see Free Trade is the only thing the EU has to offer us
that we want from it.
It is it's single and only bargaining chip.
If it wants something from us, taxes or reduced competition for it's industries for excample, Free Trade is the only carrot it has. It could try building an army of course, using the stick hand, but then we would just wipe the whole of them out in under an hour.
So either we respond to their carrot, or we are beyond their ability to control.
So the only thing it has to control us with is a free trade agreement. If we don't do as they say, they will take it away from us.Financially. Should they do so, certain people will gain from this and certain people will lose from this.
Broadly speaking some multi-national companies will move their headquarters to other EU nations because Free trade and more importantly tax exploitation means that they want to headquarter their EU operations in the lowest tax areas in the EU. (Which is part of the reason why many choose Britain).
So we will lose such people. The highly mobile parts of multi-nationals. The headquarters. We won't lose them all, but
we will lose
some of them.The winners of course are not the big multi-nationals, they are the private citisens, those who pay tribute to the EU in the form of taxation but make no finacial return from the relationship on an individual level. At least... we would hope these people would be the winners, but frankly I do not expect any tax surplus to ever be returned to the tax payer anyway. So the actual winners are more likely to be the areas of government spending that our EU taxes will be diverted to in it's stead.
Free trade with the EU is not in itself anything we fear losing, however. Once the EU uses protectionism against us, we will reply in kind. As a net importer, we have nothing to fear from this at all. It actually advantages us at this time. We are then also free to make whatever deals with the rest of the world we prefer. And we do the bulk of our international business
outside of the EU.
All the rest of the world trades successfully in the EU without being a member of it, so can we.