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by arkh1 days ago |
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upvoteby davedx1 days ago|
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The EU is not "teetering on the edge of a crisis", why do you say that?
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upvoteby cezart1 days ago|
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Not OP but, EU economy is being squeezed by China on the industrial and tech front, and by the US on the innovation/startup front. It is clear EU is no longer at the technological/economic frontier like it used to be 10-20 years ago. At the same time there are serious demographic, budgetary and political challenges all across the continent. Dragi's report covers some of these. It feels like the whole system might fall into a crisis soon if measures are not taken
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upvoteby abirch1 days ago|
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Factor in that Europe is powerful partly because of its unity and there are many forces trying to undermine that.
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upvoteby logicchains1 days ago|
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Europe became powerful before it was unified, and ever since the creation of the EU it's been becoming less and less important on the world stage.
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upvoteby ben_w1 days ago|
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We first became powerful because we did the industrial revolution before anyone else, and used more of that capacity to fight the world (and win) than to fight each other.

When we fought each other, after the industrial revolution, that was the Napoleonic Wars and the two World Wars.

> and ever since the creation of the EU it's been becoming less and less important on the world stage.

I wouldn't say it was "ever since the creation of the EU", but rather "roughly between WW1 and decolonisation". Post-Cold-War the EU has taken over from the former global importance of the member states, e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brussels_effect

That said, east and South Asia are regaining their multi-millennia history of being the world's dominant power by virtue of having roughly half the total world population.

And to agree up-thread, there's plenty going that can rapidly turn the EU's economy into a disaster if not handled expertly.

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upvoteby mwigdahl1 days ago|
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There were a lot of European wars between the Napoleonic Wars and the First World War. I agree with your point overall but there was a lot of fighting each other during that timeframe.
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upvoteby klipt1 days ago|
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> the world's dominant power by virtue of having roughly half the total world population

If human+ level AI takes off one would expect to see a great decoupling of power from population.

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upvoteby ben_w1 days ago|
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Sure, but until then, proportional to each of [population, education/educated workers, capital, instantaneous industrial base, energy supply].

Asia's diverse, but I'd say they seem to be doing pretty well with rapid improvements across all fronts.

In comparison, the US's weaker (not weak-weak, just weaker) areas currently seem to be educated workers, instantaneous industrial base, and energy supply (relative to rapidly growing demand from compute); while the EU's weaker areas currently seem to be capital and energy supply (from supply shock, as it doesn't have the compute). The US and EU both have coming demographic issues, but not as soon as the other stuff becomes more important. People talk about China having demographic issues too, but they're a dictatorship, they can make it shift if they care to.

(And Russia's losing a lot of people, more educated people, capital markets, industrial base, and energy supply).

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upvoteby myrmidon1 days ago|
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> People talk about China having demographic issues too, but they're a dictatorship, they can make it shift if they care to.

China has a significantly bigger problem with demographics than the EU does, it is just on a slightly longer fuse, compare:

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/children-born-per-woman?f...

The big drop in Chinese fertility is going to be very disruptive in the near future, because it is much less gradual than European trends and the retiree/workers ratio is going to spike much harder because of that.

Having full authoritarian control is not gonna change anything now because it is already much too late (action would have been required like 35 years ago).

Best they can do is get through it somewhat smoothly.

edit: This is an even better visualization (projected working age population fraction)

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/population-young-working-...

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upvoteby 1 days ago|
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upvoteby rullopat1 days ago|
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The motivation that the USA entered WWII was not because they were generous, but because the 3rd Reich was effectively becoming a big European nation, so they had to do something to avoid it. A unified Europe is a thread to the USA and Russia and maybe somebody else too.
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upvoteby mr_toad1 days ago|
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> 3rd Reich was effectively becoming a big European nation

Even then the US might not have done much if the Nazis hadn’t kept attacking US shipping.

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upvoteby abirch1 days ago|
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Yes, Europe was powerful when they had colonies.

Currently, Europe can stand up against tech. Apple could easily prohibit iPhones from going into France but I doubt it cutting off the entire EU.

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upvoteby irishcoffee1 days ago|
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Stand up against tech? Cut off your nose to spite your face? Apple sure won’t care. Nor is Apple all encompassing of “tech”
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upvoteby ben_w1 days ago|
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> Apple sure won’t care

Europe collectively is about 26.7% of their 2025 revenue, according to SEC filings, so I bet they'd care.

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/320193/0000320193250...

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upvoteby oblio21 hours ago|
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It's worse than that. If Apple were banned, someone else would fill their spot.
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upvoteby irishcoffee7 hours ago|
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Oh no, Europe would stand on their own two feet!?
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upvoteby ben_w3 hours ago|
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Great for us here in Europe, but an even bigger reason for Apple to be upset about it.
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upvoteby pavlov1 days ago|
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So you’re saying that the war-ravaged Europe of 1946 that was split by the Iron Curtain and needed Marshall Aid was more powerful and important than today’s EU?

Insane take. But somehow people will go to any lengths to disparage the EU.

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upvoteby ywvcbk13 hours ago|
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Globally in relative terms? Kind of. Sure the gap to the US was huge but it still controlled pretty much entire Africa and much of Asia (with China and Japan obviously not doing great..)
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upvoteby logicchains1 days ago|
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More likely it just slowly declines like Japan. Or if anti-migrant sentiment continues growing at the current rate, it breaks into a race war when the AfD and PFN win the majority of votes in Germany and France respectively.
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upvoteby Paradigma111 days ago|
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I dont think these slow indicators and developments hold much water the next few decades. We have seen the first inklings what the brave new multipolar world is going to look like and it does not bode well for much of the world. As long as Russia breaks down before the shit really hits the fan, Europe should be fine(r) than most.
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upvoteby neonstatic1 days ago|
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> Russia is well on its way.

Including the warmongering angry midget next to the US, EU, and China is funny. Russia's economy, before they decided to shoot themselves in the face, was the size of the Netherlands. Whether they are in a recession or not is irrelevant to anyone but them.

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upvoteby ben_w1 days ago|
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I thought Russia was about 2x the Netherlands by nominal, and 5x by PPP?

More relevantly, they were one of the world's petrol stations, and now they're not.

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