[pmb]

> The EU single market is largely a myth from the perspective of wanting to start a successful company that can compete internationally. It's not any easier now than it was before the EU existed.

[citation needed] because I think this is extremely false.

It is easy to underestimate the pain caused by having all the pre-euro currencies and pre-EU tax laws (yes there was the Schengen zone and EEC, but the EU uniformity helps a lot) and pre-EU borders.

Source: me, who is a middle-aged American founding a tech startup in the EU and visited Europe many times before the EU existed.

[mfld]

I think it is getting better year after year, in small steps. For example, B2B taxation within the EU (by use of the reverse-charge mechanism) has become quite easy in recent years. Of course, depending on the product, diverse local rules may apply.

[senko]

I think you're both correct.

EU Single market is a massive improvement, but it's not yet really single market like in the States (although there can be a bit of legislation/tax barriers between states there as well, depending on your location and line of work).

Also, it's hard to understate just how open the US is. For me, an European living in the EU, it's as easy, or easier (larger wallets, single language) to sell (digital/online products/services) to Americans. For digital goods, might as well skip the EU.

[vishnugupta]

> [citation needed]

Of the top of my head.

Uber, has to do all sorts of gymnastics to make rides work across different EU countries. And still they are routinely asked to stop serving in a country for some reason or another.

Amazon. It took them years to launch across EU, they went country by country and didn’t launch across EU at once.

[oblio]

They're most likely talking about digital.

Look at Netflix, a different catalog in every country.

[pmb]

They said it was currently worse than it used to be before the EU. That is not true.

Netflix engaging in complicated IP rights negotiations does not mean the existence of the European Union is pointless.

[mrweasel]

The current EU laws (especially tax laws) aren't helpful for businesses. If you want to do business in every EU country you basically have to register a business in each of them.

Sure, you can sell goods for €10.000 - €20.000 to another EU country without much trouble, beyond that you need to setup a business in each country, sometimes you even need employees or at least an office in a country to be able to do so. I worked for a company that shipped to a number of EU countries, from an EU country. It has taken them 15 years to expand from shipping to three countries to nine. Every time they want to enter a "new market" it is years of planning and insane fees or doing business in a supposed "single market".

The current situation is better than before the EU, but it's by no means good. Certainly no where as good as a Nebraska company wanting to sell their product in New Mexico. EU business will never grow to the size of American companies if they cannot bootstrap themself in a true single EU market. An American business immediately have a potential customer base of 350 million consumer, an EU business have at most 80 million if they start in Germany and will have to add an insane bureaucracy if they want to expand.

EDIT: My information is out of date: In 2021 a solution was introduced where you can pay your VAT locally, and the tax authority in your own country will handle the transfer of VAT to the other EU countries.

There are still some taxes (e.g. taxes on tobacco or alcohol) you may need to handle for each country, and to do some you may need to be a registered business.

[Etheryte]

This is just straight up not true. You need a legal body in a country if you want to hire someone on payroll there, you most definitely do not need one just to sell your goods and services, that's the entire point of the single market. It sounds like you've misunderstood a second hand recollection of someone else's struggles?

[dsign]

> You need a legal body in a country if you want to hire someone on payroll there

Even this is not strictly true. One can often just register a foreign company with the local tax agency for a direct hire. The most frequent scenario is that a foreign hire comes through their own legal entity, as a hired contractor. Now, the sad part of that statement is that often a hire comes as a hired contractor not because of cross-border taxation, but because of tax management reasons. In some EU countries, high value employees cost three euros in taxes for every two euros paid after taxes. A lot of people prefer to set up a corporation that allows them to better manage that majority of their income that goes to the tax office.

[maccard]

That's not employing someone in a different country though, that's contracting. And it's the same arrangement you can use to hire someone in the US from the EU.

[Zanfa]

> One can often just register a foreign company with the local tax agency for a direct hire.

This is the non-contracting employment part of GPs comment. I don’t think it’s frequently used, but it is possible.

[cbg0]

> If you want to do business in every EU country you basically have to register a business in each of them.

This is false. Some types of business that are more heavily regulated do require you to set up a local branch.

[mfld]

Really? Most companies I know have just a single representative or billing endpoint in the EU.