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Moreover, intra-EU trade is as often in components as in finished products. Supply chains cross national boundaries. Restablish border controls and tarriffs and you wreak havoc on the whole economy built upon the assumption of open borders. And I'll give my consent to any government that does not deny a man a living wage-Billy Bragg
The integration of European coal and steel markets was to make war unthinkable between European states.
With hindsight, everything since the Single European Act was a bridge too far, politically. The Common Foreign and Security Policy and Cooperation in Criminal Justice never quite took off, the Euro is imploding under the weight of unrestrained internal trade imbalances, and Schengen is in the process of being rolled back.
Alternatively, the political layer could be retained and the economic union jettisoned. This would keep the useless Common Foreign and Security Policy, the Cooperation in Criminal Justice (including the European Arrest Warrant), the undermining of "the Community method" in favour of the "Intergovernmental Method"... But this is highly unlikely because the economic integration is deeper.
None of this will happen, the most likely scenario is the creation of a new layer of Kommissars (ECB President, EuroGroup Chairman, Council President, EFSF/ESM Chairman, Trichet's award-winning budget-dog-in-the-manger czar...) to the detriment of the "Community Method", a disempowerment of the European Parliament, more police cooperation to clamp down on popular discontent, a beefed-up Bolkestein directive to usher in an EU-wide labour race to the bottom, and the general penury that Merkel has promised us "for decades". I even foresee Merkel being Chancellor for 16 years (until at least 2020). There are three stories about the euro crisis: the Republican story, the German story, and the truth. -- Paul Krugman
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