French president tells fellow European leaders the bloc is falling behind the US and China because of over-regulation and under-investment

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.

  • Naich@lemmings.worldEnglish
    1142·
    2 months ago

    Call me a mad old communist stooge but I count quality of life rather than economic output as a marker of success.

    • NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io
      273·
      2 months ago

      True to an extent but you need economic output to give you weight in the international stage. Otherwise you start getting pushed around by other superpowers.

      • grue@lemmy.worldEnglish
        14·
        2 months ago

        Also you need at least a reasonable amount of economic output to have good quality of life. I’m not saying good quality of life should be defined as full-blown sigma grindset consumerism, but I don’t think most people would define it as cottagecore subsistence farming, either.

        • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
          51·
          2 months ago

          You know, if you look at actual subsistence farmers, I never get a cottagecore vibe. They can and do use modern bits and pieces to make their work a little less back-breaking, as they can scavenge or occasionally buy them. A pole lathe is less aesthetic when it’s powered by a cut-off bungie cord.

        • kent_ehEnglish
          31·
          2 months ago

          a reasonable amount of economic output

          There’s a vast difference between "reasonable " and “max_profits nothing else matters”.

      • drspod@lemmy.mlEnglish
        141·
        2 months ago

        Otherwise you start getting pushed around by other superpowers

        This is more a coincidence of the status quo rather than a consequence of an inherent correlation between economic output and geopolitical power.

      • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
        31·
        2 months ago

        And also just buy things that are nice for ordinary people. In the West we don’t feel it, but in a place like Africa the inability to produce anything high-tech themselves hurts.

        • Saleh@feddit.orgEnglish
          3·
          2 months ago

          It would hurt much less, if the countries wouldn’t get fucked in trade “agreements” for their agricultural products and resources.

          This aspect is kind of where the whole “free market, everyone specializes, everyone wins” theory fails, as the “less developed” economies get pushed around diplomatically and militarily, rather than being allowed to participate in a fair market.

          • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
            1·
            2 months ago

            Corrupt wealth extraction from Africa is real, and significant on their end (but not ours, we do it for cents off each dollar).

            A lot of African economies are managing to grow explosively anyway, though, as anyone who pays attention to the continent can tell you.