[microtonal]

They all talk about the importance of European digital sovereignty and then continue to do the exact opposite behind the scenes.

To be honest and I say this as a Dutch person, this is typical Dutch (government). Basically two rules in Dutch politics: (1) always choose the option that pleases the US the most; (2) always postpone solving issues to the latest possible moment (US dependence, nitrogen deposition, childcare benefits scandal, gas-induced earthquakes).

France, Germany, etc. are much better examples when it comes to sovereignty.

As an aside the parliament wants to stop the Solvinity acquisition or stop renewing the contract with Solvinity. But the VVD (one of the parties in government) is always going to choose what is best for big business (the party is one big revolving door) or the US.

[miohtama]

It's not only Dutch. Instead of building sovereignity, the EU thought they could regulate their way and force everyone to bend the knee because of their share as a trading partner. This started 20 years ago. However what has happened is that the EU's soft power is crumbling, but the politicians have hard to grasp with the reality they could somehow dictate things globally. AI will only further accelerate this.

Only way to have control is to have domestic actors you can push around.

[graemep]

Europeans (and not just the EU) think they still have the influence on the world they had in the 1980s when their economies were a much larger proportion of the global economy. Europeans have no idea what the world looks like from Asia which contains most of the world's population and generates a third of global GDP.

[ffaccount2]

Americans (and not just the US) think they still have the influence on the world they had in the 1980s when their economies were a much larger proportion of the global economy. Americans have no idea what the world looks like from Asia which contains most of the world's population and generates a third of global GDP.

[graemep]

It is a general western problem to some extent, but the US has a a faster growing economy than any of the big European economies. It is still a super-power.

[vanviegen]

The "faster growing economy" is basically 100% AI speculation now. If that gamble pays of the US is still in trouble (as is the rest of the world), as there doesn't appear to be even a hint of a plan of what a post-AI society looks like for anybody but the top 0.1%.

[trollbridge]

I don't think the top 0.1% has a plan, either. From my personal interactions with them, they are mostly just excited they can talk to a chatbot on their phone all day, and then make questionable decisions from that - to use a recent example, deciding to be their own general contractor and make a house remodel cost an extra million and take an extra year to do.

[joe_mamba]

>The "faster growing economy" is basically 100% AI speculation now.

True, however, the US does more export manufacturing than the EU and at higher profit margins to boot. So even without the AI industry, the US is still in a far stronger place economically than EU.

The EU's massiv offshoring efforts, lack of innovation investments, red tape, environmentalism and high energy prices have left its domestic industry weaker and more vulnerable to foreign competitors and malicious foreign dependencies it can't control since it doesn't have any hard power to use as leverage to protect its industry.

Sure, the EU started to remilitarize and move away from fossil fuels to renewables, but this titanic effort is gonna pay back and maybe restore balance in 5-15 years time, and it remains to be seen if by then its economy will have just fallen further behind, since investors and the world aren't standing still waiting for the EU to catch up with them, but are instead exploiting the EU's current weakness to pull further ahead.

Like Germany's exports are now back to 2006 levels, and its domestic giants like BASF is further downsizing operations in Germany and building a massive 10 billion $ factory in China which is totally not gonna make Germany's policies tied to the whims of the CCP the same way they were tied to Russia's gas. BOSCH just announced 20k more job cuts in Germany and moving abroad till 2030. etc

Remains to be seen if this damage can be undone in the future, as things are currently patched up by massive government spending to cover up the private industry lack of spending, which isn't sustainable and eventually the cracks will get bigger.

[graemep]

its been true for decades:

https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.CD?end=2024...

https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.PCAP.CD?end=2024...

> if that gamble pays of the US is still in trouble (as is the rest of the world)

Which will probably strengthen the relative position of the US.

[cess11]

I would consider bonds and treasuries a stronger signal than any lack of "post-AI" political vision.

China's security establishment has gone public with the view that their purpose is no longer to find answers to the question 'how do we survive the US?', but instead to something like 'how do we manage the US?'.

In the coming years US power projection is not going to look anything like the stuff we grew up with, that social and military influence just does not exist anymore. Right now, things are pretty good, compared to what they'll be in a year or two. It's likely we'll get a brutal el Niño, fertilizer and lubricant shortages, gnarly energy prices and more, all at the same time. The US is closing down food production at a rate that would keep me up at night if I lived there.

[rob74]

Well, Musk for one is promising not universal basic income, but universal high income. In a country where a lot of people don't even have health insurance. Let's see how that will work out, I'll believe it when I see it...

[intended]

As much as people complain about the EU, its the last western polity that is functioning to some degree of normal.

To put it politely, America is just not, at this moment in time, with a predictable actor with rational self interest.

If things continue to fail, then its simple to assume we return to the spheres of interest stage of things, at which point the EU still functions as a bloc which everyone trades with.

Plus, American GDP figures are matched with a K shaped economy, and a population with a deep sense of unease and unhappiness.

[Muromec]

The EU is curiously a block that countrirs want to join

[dgellow]

It’s fine, you don’t have to be the fastest growing economy in the world to be a meaningful global power and a good place where to live, get education, work. You need some level of growth, but it’s ok to no be at the top of the charts. The US has been the capitalist leader in the world for a long time and isn't going well at all, the country benefits its population very little. It’s not like only the actor with the top economic growth wins and all the other countries are losing.

The EU has some issues, the economy isn’t the most dynamic, but the quality of life is great and has been improving. It is a large global market and has cultural influence. Our democratic institutions have survived ok so far. I think we are doing quite ok. We will see if we can deal well with issues caused by our aging population, that’s pretty challenging but I think we are in a reasonable position (and actually a more than great position if we compare worldwide)

[graemep]

It agree that global power and the wellbeing of most people are not correlated. I think the common people of the UK were better off without and empire than with one. Many small countries with no global power have high standards of living.

However, the comments I replied to above were about digital sovereignty and soft power.

I am not convinced the future of the EU (or Europe in general) is as assured as you think it, but that is another discussion.

Americans do have a high standard of living in general and a very high median income: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_the_United_...

They have two big flaws in their system, both failures to provide security for the poor and for people who suffer misfortunes: wealth distribution and the lack of universal healthcare.

[cess11]

The other year the US was beaten by a starved little country on the edge of the Arabian Peninsula, and recently by a somewhat large country by the Persian Gulf. Currently their only real ally is getting beaten by FPV drones handled by a guerilla force.

The US has very little influence today compared to a decade or more ago. To the extent that the world at large cares about the US it's because they are committing genocide and destroying global trade logistics. All of their former allies are trying to substitute them out, or at least hedge with other international relations.

As far as I can tell, outside certain parts of the Occident, no one cares about new US movies or television series anymore. The Oscars gather some interest because some people want to know if any entertainment industry people will go against the regime and say something negative about mass murder of children, but that's about it. Future generations will be shaped more by chinese and indian movies than usian ones.

When apartheid South Africa was about to crumble it also initiated nasty military campaigns and faked political and military supremacy for a while, as did Idi Amin's Uganda. I'd bet something similar is going on in the US.

Some people are still stuck in the late Cold War, notably EU politicians like von der Leyen and Kaja Kallas, as well as most swedish top politicians. They cannot imagine a world where the US is not calling the shots and will drag Europe further into global irrelevancy by idiotically paying tribute and kneeling for the US. Pretty much the rest of the world is disgusted and horrified by the bumbling nastiness of contemporary US empire.

[vitally3643]

If both of these views are true (and they appear to be becoming more true every day): what happens?

I find it a little hard to believe that Russia or China or whoever in the East or South is quietly puppeting all the bullshittery happening now. Maybe a little less hard to believe that the West has just collectively decided to huff lead gas fumes and lose our collective minds for a generation.

Maybe this is just how corrupt capitalistic societies die and the East is happy to sit back and watch us burn ourselves to the ground.

[tedggh]

They also came to realize building, operating and maintaining a military force is extremely expensive. Free healthcare, 7 weeks of vacation, 36 hr work weeks, unemployment benefits, subsidized housing, etc etc is all great when you don’t have the financial burden of protecting your home.

[victorbjorklund]

USA has said they will not support Europe in a military conflict so now you can slash your military and fire all those soldiers and have free health care etc. No? Sounds like ”protecting” Europe wasn’t what stood in the way of free healthcare, vacation, etc.

[trollbridge]

Nearly half (about 47%) of healthcare in the U.S. is government-paid, although via a variety of different programs. The USA also has quite lavish benefits in a variety of other ways.

Of course, that is mostly paid for via massive amounts of debt, not from savings of military spending. But government spending on healthcare is more than twice (2.5 to 3 times) that of military spending. So slashing military spending to zero would just mean the amount of government-provided healthcare spending could go from 47% to 56% or so. (Not taking into account that a lot of "military spending" is actually healthcare spending!)

[tanaros]

Total EU defense spending is around $450M USD. The US defense budget, prior to 2027, is about $950M USD. Are you saying the US could have all those social policies for $500M USD?

[avidiax]

The US could have those benefits for free.

Single payer would be drastically cheaper than the current system.

The other benefits are just policies that slightly reduce GDP per capita based on a first order analysis.

We are able to afford so many other subsidies, so unclear why housing would be different.

[rescbr]

The US could simply give away $1 M per resident, removing the need for social policies and it would still come out cheaper.

[ImJamal]

The US has around 340 million people. Giving a million dollars to each one would be 340 trillion dollars.

[sokoloff]

Where does this ~$350 trillion dollars come from?!

[kasey_junk]

You aren’t counting the VA in your spending. That’s another 450 billion.

[jorvi]

> However what has happened is that the EU's soft power is crumbling

Uh, no. The US soft power is turning to dust whilst the EU is out there building the new free [trade] world, with itself as the biggest lynchpin.

What has happened the past ±30 years is that most EU countries cut spending on their militaries to the bone, because big brother USA would take care of it anyway. Now that we are returning to a multi-polar world, suddenly the EU is left scrambling for hard power that it doesn't have. That's why they can't play hardball when the US does a new ridiculous thing, because they simply lack the hard power to back up Ukraine.

The US is sorely going to regret their antics though. Long term, the EU is going to switch to their own stacks, both for military but also things like cloud and other tech. It's trillions of $ the US economy will be missing out on. And voting in a Democratic president, senate and house is not gonna change a thing about it, because the US has proven itself to be a fundamentally unreliable, if not outright hostile partner.

[rafram]

The US alone spends 1.5x as much on consumer goods (yes, adjusted for PPP) and nearly 2x as much on R&D as the entire EU. It’s very sweet that the EU is trying to decouple itself from the US economy, but I highly doubt its ability to become “leader of the free trade world” when it has so little money to throw around.

[ejpir]

Yeah, we'll just up our EU debt to about 40 trillion USD, make up some money and continue. Sounds a lot like US right? Living in perpetual debt as a nation.

[ben_w]

> The US alone spends 1.5x as much on consumer goods (yes, adjusted for PPP) and nearly 2x as much on R&D as the entire EU.

Given that by PPP the EU and the US are about the same, that necessarily means the EU spends more on other things.

[inglor_cz]

"the EU is out there building the new free [trade] world, with itself as the biggest lynchpin"

At its usual pace ... do you know when the negotiations with Mercosur started? Year 2000. Only now we have an agreement. Still, better than not doing anything at all. But I wonder how many of the original negotiators are still alive.

It also yet remains to be seen what happens if China puts a real pressure on us. Our list of allies is now somewhat thin and we have to cozy up to India, which indirectly funds the Russian war against Ukraine by importing Russian weapons and Russian oil/gas, the latter in huge quantities. Still, better than cozying up to China, because the possibility that Beijing teaches Brussels some cool tricks to keep the population under perfect surveillance scares me.

[joe_mamba]

>Still, better than not doing anything at all

How is Mercosur better for the EU citizens?

[CalRobert]

German car companies get new countries in which to see themselves destroyed by China?

[joe_mamba]

Super wealthy people in developing countries will still buy high-end Porsches and Mercedes G-wagons instead of Xiaomi EVs. For now.

But the EU makers likes of VW are fucked since they sell Chinese quality cars at premium prices and German union workers expect six figure salaries for a hard 35h week of bolting bumpers to cars.

[skippyboxedhero]

It is difficult to think of an economic region that is more opposed to free trade than Europe (that isn't a comedy country). Possibly some countries in South America?

Trade within Europe has massive restrictions. I have no idea why, given the stated aims of Europe...we are posting this on a post about the Netherlands trying to protect office software ffs, people think this isn't the case. One of the reasons why the EU created a trade bloc, and the same reasons why you see the same attempts in areas of the world like South America, was to limit the impact of free trade. This should be completely obvious given that the EU is not competitive in areas where they lack the ability to limit competition.

Also, I will point out: US policy is for the EU to do exactly the thing that you are suggesting. This has been the consistent position of Trump since 2016. The main blockers for this have been politicians in the EU. I am not sure how you equate being unreliable with subsidising EU defence spending to the tune of multiple trillions so that EU countries can spend on welfare either.

The EU self-image is totally bizarre, it is so out of touch with reality. Hostile to all forms of change and innovation: actually one of the greatest free traders there has ever been. Xenophobic and hostile to certain countries: possibly one of the greatest allies to these countries ever. Never gets any support on Ukraine, would be a leader if the US weren't such bastards: spent multiple decades fuelling Putin's state.

[inglor_cz]

There are still some protectionist issues on the single market itself.

For example, Poland defends its rail operator, PKP Intercity, against foreign competition by a series of dirty tricks, including "just never registering a sale of a depot to a competing corporation in the land registry".

[joe_mamba]

Almost every major EU country, has implanted some domestic protectionist rules to protect some of its politically well connected lobbyist industries or jobs from cheaper or more efficient intra-EU competition buying them out. The restrictions almost never are in reverse.

[dgellow]

> Hostile to all forms of change and innovation

I don’t understand how you can believe that about the EU. The union has been evolving so much since its creation. It is itself one of the greatest innovation in governance ever created. GDPR is an innovative framework making the EU leader in privacy protection. European open banking initiatives/frameworks are unique and have been leading the way forward for the past 20 years, and we are now reaping all the benefits with the latest payment system developments (PSD2 and others were already awesome but the payment standard is what makes the day to day citizens actually see the results). The 28th regime[0] in development is innovative. Schengen/TFEU Art. 45 is such an innovative policy. Where else can you move freely between so many countries?

That’s only from the top of my head and the few examples I’m familiar with

0: https://the28thregime.eu/

[karmakurtisaani]

These innovations don't count, since they didn't create any new oligarchs.

[skippyboxedhero]

GDPR is innovation...

I assume you don't live in the EU either...yes, there is an absolutely huge industry behind it, that is why it passed. Companies have to employ data protection officers, effectively a no-show job, and there is a whole industry of people connected to governments that facilitates this. And that also protects existing companies from competing because it is so expensive to handle customer data...as you need to employ an EU bureaucrat who is the equivalent of a CCP party official...that you have to pay for.

The weirdest thing is that the EU is maximally corrupt, and people are unable to see it because they are so enured to the corruption. It is all corruption. GDPR does not increase productivity, it is tax on consumers to produce something that is required by government with the surplus being passed to insiders (civil servants, unions, and billionaires).

Also, the per capita rate of billionaires in countries like Germany is higher than the US...this is whilst they have a population that has the same net financial wealth as Greece. In Sweden, 60% of total GDP was produced by companies controlled by one family until the 70s. The whole system is based upon large government in concert with large businesses and large unions. If you are in the club, you get a lifetime of free money. If you are out of the club...well, good luck competing with the migrants they are flooding into the country.

[phatfish]

The only people that think global free trade is a good thing are the top .001% net worth individuals which use it to wield power.

Trading blocks (like the European single market) are specifically designed to protect their members from shit that global corporations or other nations attempt to get away with.

I'm not sure what "Trade within Europe has massive restrictions." means without context. Compared to some Randian capitalist utopia where there are no rules and no governments? Or compared to before the creation of the European single market?

[dgellow]

> I'm not sure what "Trade within Europe has massive restrictions." means without context.

We actually do have a good amount of issues regarding internal trades, according to https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2025/7792....

“The International Monetary Fund estimates that the persistent barriers to the EU single market still represented the equivalent of a 110 % tariff on services.”

There is a good amount of work to be done to complete the single market, what we currently have is way too fragmented

[skippyboxedhero]

That is politically impossible. Everyone knows it is impossible because if you open up some countries to free services trade then the political basis for the EU and the traditional governing countries would collapse.

The limitations on trade within Europe are intentional design. The attempts to stop the economy from collapsing with these massive government spending packages are the death throes.

[skippyboxedhero]

Services trade within Europe is often less free than services trade outside of Europe. The reason why is because there is a strong political constituency within Europe to ensure that certain kinds of sinecure jobs are not impacted by competition (and yes, as you helpfully point out, to blame that on "global corporations"...and people wonder why Europe had such a long period of dictatorships in the 20th century, "globalism", right? wink, wink).

[graemep]

> Trading blocks (like the European single market) are specifically designed to protect their members from shit that global corporations or other nations attempt to get away with.

Most of those global corporations are in favour of these trading blocks - they are the best placed to take advantage of them.

The EU is far more than just a trading block. The trading block is the countries they have free trade agreements with - the EEA,, plus the UK, plus Turkey. The EU is a political union.

Global corporation can lobby far more effectively than anyone else at the EU level.

[WarmWash]

They're letting Chinese cars in when automobiles are there last remaining mega industry.

How can you take them seriously?

[dgellow]

FWIW our local car industry had decades to prepare to compete in the EV sector and decided to do pretty much nothing + train China how to take over their market. We’ve been way too protective of that industry, I’m personally happy they finally have to face some real competition. Protectionism has its place in global trade but it should be with a very specific goal in mind, such as giving the companies some room to breath while transitioning to new technologies and avoid a complete disruption of your economy. You cannot do it just to keep a dying industry alive. But you’re supposed to replace the external economic pressure with internal political pressure (or similar), otherwise corporation just go with the status quo

[ReptileMan]

>Uh, no. The US soft power is turning to dust whilst the EU is out there building the new free [trade] world, with itself as the biggest lynchpin.

To quote when harry met sally - I'll have what she's having.

[SiempreViernes]

He's having a dish called "Watching Trump from a distance", you should definitely try it.

[ReptileMan]

It is amusing what he inflicts on USA and I thoroughly enjoy it ... But the idea that EU is taking leadership in this chaos is somewhere between laughable and delusional.

Actually EU is getting fucked on every possible turn. We are the ones that pay trough the nose for all his follies. We are weaker than ever and we have delusional commission in charge.

Compared to Ursula Trump is the reincarnation of Richelieu and Bismarck with a pinch of Disraeli

[tchalla]

I can’t believe people even think that the EU is coming out ahead of this in any sort of way. It’s really delusional.

[JumpCrisscross]

> whilst the EU is out there building the new free [trade] world, with itself as the biggest lynchpin

In the same way America is stuck in its military heyday past, the EU is stuck pretending its brand of multilateralism is still a thing outside its own borders.

[miohtama]

We can see this already in the case of failed EU Digital Services Act that is teethless due to trade negotiations with the US

https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-big-tech-law-meant-to-mov...

[iwontberude]

The problem for the EU is being so consumer centric but having a weak currency and diminished manufacturing (thanks to Russian invasion).

[yxhuvud]

What? In this case the problem isn't that EU wants to dictate things globally, but US laws that do just that. EU laws just apply to Europe. As time goes on and European agencies get their shit together and actually start to follow their own rules, it will mean a shitton of business will leave US companies.

[dgellow]

> always postpone solving issues to the latest possible moment

Germany has the exact same issue. Always looking to keep the status quo for as long as possible. It’s really a structural problem, it’s the result of the political system, elected leadership, demographics (mostly the voting population aging rapidly). I expect the same issue is shared by most Western European countries

[embedding-shape]

Isn't this simply a "human thing", keeping the status quo for as long as possible? I see the same European country I'm from, where I'm living currently, the South American country my wife is from and every single country I visit.

Maybe another framing, is there any countries where this isn't true? Where truly the default is to go against the status quo and continuously improve no matter what? I know there are a few countries people think are like that, but when you start reading about it, turns out to be kind of "hyped" and not matching reality.

[weinzierl]

It's a manager thing, something you learn in business school and from airport-lounge management lit. "Decide at the last responsible moment" has its place but managerial types often undeservedly elevate it to a general principle.

Technical people are usually not like that. If anything they fall into the opposite trap: Always chasing the latest and greatest and wasting all their energy on novelty churn.

[TeMPOraL]

People talk like "status quo" was inherently a bad thing, and that any change to it is good by default. On the contrary, "status quo" is usually a hard-won place, a foothold against strong tides, a position that you try to preserve while carefully considering your next step, because a careless step will just send you falling back down to whatever hellhole reality your predecessors dragged themselves up from.

Status quo is not a stable state, it's a state you defend.

[dgellow]

The problem is defending a status quo adapted to a past reality that doesn’t make sense anymore. You need change to adapt to an evolving world, with new challenges, new alliances, new industries, etc

[dgellow]

Some countries with different politics like China do not seem to suffer the same issues, or at least not yet. Or maybe the country is defending a different status quo (the mono-party)? But they seem to be eager to develop the infrastructure and country as a whole.

Not that I would want to live under their political system, to be clear. I wish we could have a democratic system AND also be eager to develop our regions instead of being so protective of everything

[legulere]

I don’t think it’s different politics directly in China. The people believe that change means change for the better. In the west people have lost all hope for progress.

[dgellow]

The people of China don’t have much say, I’m not sure what they believe matters too much, the government has a strong control over the media and can and will silence dissenting voices.

In europe we’ve been generally pretty bad over the past decades at presenting positive arguments for liberalism, which is a shame. Similarly the EU is notoriously bad at communicating how it benefits the people, most of the communication assumes people already accepted it was a positive thing and already bought into European values, isn’t of arguing why they matter. The fact EU members blame EU institutions for their own local issues whenever something goes wrong doesn’t help…

[legulere]

The Chinese Government isn't like Russia where power is mostly legitimised by having power, like the law of the jungle. A big part of its legitimacy is from economic growth and lifting people out of poverty.

[CalRobert]

Not to mention being overrun by Dodge Rams that do not meet EU safety roles but come in under a loophole. I like living here mostly but a lot of what makes it nice is threatened by the US.

[Waterluvian]

This is part of the point of Carney’s Davos speech. Us middle powers need to de-Americanize together or we don’t stand a chance at succeeding.

[WarmWash]

Which might be impossible given that sacrifices will have to be made in the interim, and people already riot if you even hint at moving retirement age up a year.

[throwaway85825]

The problem is the government treating people like the enemy drowning them in paperwork. Western governments believe they can create the perfect citizen if they just surveill them and regulate them enough.

[stingraycharles]

Don’t forget that they’re in the process of letting our digital government identity being managed by a US company. It’s absolutely ridiculous.

[vanviegen]

Another way to look at it is that things just move slowly in government land. The tax office moving towards Microsoft has probably been in preparation for half a decade... And do you really believe the government is technically capable of switching DigiD to a different provider on a (relative) moments notice without causing large scale outages?

We'll start seeing government bodies moving away from US IT suppliers in a couple of years.

[WarmWash]

The actual question is if (capable) SWEs will choose working for (or be a founder of) Dutch/Euro tech companies over US ones, or even leave the US to live there.

Europe is an excellent value prop if you want to be a bartender or baker. Its decidedly less so if you want to be a white collar/gold collar worker.

[CalRobert]

I left the US in my 20's to live in Europe and I like raising kids here (I'm now in my 40's) but honestly... it was a stupid thing to do. Meanwhile, my in-laws, who stayed in the US, are now retiring to France in their 40's with a few million dollars.

The opportunity cost of living in Europe is absolutely enormous. You're basically lighting $1-2 million (or more, perhaps) on fire for every decade you're here instead of the US.

Though I don't find myself wanting to move back to California any time soon...

[vanviegen]

> Its decidedly less so if you want to be a white collar/gold collar worker.

If you want to earn big money, you're better of in the US, for sure. Quality of life though, as a white collar worker?

That does probably have its effect on economic growth..

[WarmWash]

>That does probably have its effect on economic growth..

Yes it does, it has kept the US economy growing and relevant. Europe has been economically stagnant and resting on its laurels for 30 years.

Also QoL in the US is high, you just need something like an SWE job to access it.

[weinzierl]

> France, Germany, etc. are much better examples when it comes to sovereignty.

France maybe, Germany most definitely not.

[Georgelemental]

No, not France either. It used to be, and some inertia from the Gaullist past remains, but the current leadership is as useless as everyone else.