French president tells fellow European leaders the bloc is falling behind the US and China because of over-regulation and under-investment
The EU “could die” unless it makes itself more competitive with the US and China, Emmanuel Macron has warned.
The French president said the bloc was over-regulating and under-investing at the Berlin Global Dialogue event.
Washington and Beijing both outstripped the EU in economic output and investment, he said, before calling on the bloc to complete its banking union package of financial rules.
Member states also needed to press for global trade rules to be kept fair, he added, according to Bloomberg.
While I’m generally sympathetic to the idea that the EU should strive to be more economically-competitive, I’m also skeptical that economic competitiveness represents an existential threat for the EU.
I’d also point out that the devil is in the details of what specific changes one plans to make. France has a lot of EU regulation and economic restrictions that they like. I suspect that a lot of people might point to the Common Agricultural Policy as something to reduce in size, though it’s generally benefitted France at the expense of some other members.