You are correct to hate the fascist European Union. We should all be sovereign states! Nigel Farage is correct on all accounts about the EU. The Queen of Great Britain should be jailed for her treason signing all those treaties with her veiled slave Prime Ministers.
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HumbleTangerine Wrote:Also, whilst membership provides several benefits (and cons of course) for some of the less rich countries, I think it's a pretty insane hyperbole to say chaos and anarchy would ensue without the EU.
Tell that to Ukraine......
ObW
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In today's time, at times of globalization, where we have growing up economy of USA and China and Russia with Putin who do what he want, it's only way for Europe is unite and finally be something like United States of Europe.
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To shed some more light on the trade agreement between the U.S and the European Union.
It's called TTIP (The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership) and will serve to make trading between the EU and US easier by removing toll fees and "unnecessary, bureaucratic regulations". Environmental activists have expressed concerns that some of the "unnecessary regulations" that will be removed serve the pupose of protecting animal rights and the environment.
The most controversial part of the agreement, however, is called ISDS (Investor-State Dispute Settlements), a part of the agreement meant to protect corporate investments. Basically, companies will be able to sue governments whose legislations threaten their own profit. The trials will be conducted in autonomous special court outside of national jurisdiction under high amounts of secrecy.
Swedish company Vattenfall has sued the German government for its decision to decrease reliance on nuclear power and eventually get rid of it completely.
Cigarette company Philip Morris sued the Australian government when they decided to issue warning labels on cigarette packages, since studies show that they have a great discouraging effect towards young potential buyers.
If TTIP is fully realized between the U.S and the EU the same possibilities will open up. If Sweden, for example, decides to legislate prohibitions of personal profit for educational companies since they clearly abuse the current system, our government could be sued. Decisions countries make to protect their own people and welfare would be at risk of never being realized (out of financial fear of a lawsuit) or to become a lot more expensive for taxpayers.
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HumbleTangerine Wrote:To shed some more light on the trade agreement between the U.S and the European Union.
It's called TTIP (The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership) and will serve to make trading between the EU and US easier by removing toll fees and "unnecessary, bureaucratic regulations". Environmental activists have expressed concerns that some of the "unnecessary regulations" that will be removed serve the pupose of protecting animal rights and the environment.
The most controversial part of the agreement, however, is called ISDS (Investor-State Dispute Settlements), a part of the agreement meant to protect corporate investments. Basically, companies will be able to sue governments whose legislations threaten their own profit. The trials will be conducted in autonomous special court outside of national jurisdiction under high amounts of secrecy.
Swedish company Vattenfall has sued the German government for its decision to decrease reliance on nuclear power and eventually get rid of it completely.
Cigarette company Philip Morris sued the Australian government when they decided to issue warning labels on cigarette packages, since studies show that they have a great discouraging effect towards young potential buyers.
If TTIP is fully realized between the U.S and the EU the same possibilities will open up. If Sweden, for example, decides to legislate prohibitions of personal profit for educational companies since they clearly abuse the current system, our government could be sued. Decisions countries make to protect their own people and welfare would be at risk of never being realized (out of financial fear of a lawsuit) or to become a lot more expensive for taxpayers.
Im not clear on whether you think this is a good or a bad thing?
The Vattenfall situation seems perfectly acceptable to me.
Vattenfall build and operate, in partnership with the German government, nuclear power plants. ROI is typically amortised between 25-30 years, but a few years in the Germans get cold feet over the use of Nuclear power following Fukushima, and effectively shut down the majority of their nuclear plant, meaning Vattenfall cannot recover not only their capital investment but their projected revenue for the next 20 years. This destabilising effect of the German decision, which Vattenfall has no control over has threatened to seriously impair the whole company.
If I was a shareholder of Vattenfall, I'd be suing the German government as well!
Im still pro-Europe, although I think use of the phrase "United States of Europe" conjures up unnecessary images which will cause some people to throw their hands up in horror.
ObW
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OlderButWiser Wrote:Im not clear on whether you think this is a good or a bad thing?
The Vattenfall situation seems perfectly acceptable to me.
Vattenfall build and operate, in partnership with the German government, nuclear power plants. ROI is typically amortised between 25-30 years, but a few years in the Germans get cold feet over the use of Nuclear power following Fukushima, and effectively shut down the majority of their nuclear plant, meaning Vattenfall cannot recover not only their capital investment but their projected revenue for the next 20 years. This destabilising effect of the German decision, which Vattenfall has no control over has threatened to seriously impair the whole company.
If I was a shareholder of Vattenfall, I'd be suing the German government as well!
Im still pro-Europe, although I think use of the phrase "United States of Europe" conjures up unnecessary images which will cause some people to throw their hands up in horror.
ObW
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I am strongly against it. There are several ways companies can protect their profits from being undermined by national legislations; expropriation insurances for example. ISDS is cheaper and more comfortable - for the companies that is.
Had the Australian government anticipated a massive lawsuit when they changed their cigarette legislation for the sake of saving lives, it could have affected their decision. The possibility of a nation revoking its legislations out of a justified fear for corporate lawsuits becomes even greater when we're dealing with less financially stable countries.
The mere thought that important decisions to benefit the public could be made impossible by too much corporate power is repulsive. Especially when there are other ways to protect companies from being unfairly abused by national legislation. The complete lack of a principle of public access makes the matter even worse.
I attend a private school in Sweden. Our national results have been dropping rapidly ever since we made our educational system more liberal than most other countries in the world. Private schools get away with handing out way too optimistic grades for the sake of attracting students and therefore increasing their own profit. They get away with cutting corners wherever they can, whether it means hiring an insanely low amount of teachers or something else, for the same reason. Profit.
In the 8 courses I'm currently taking I have actual course books in 1 of them. My computer has been broken for a year because it's a really old and cheap one imported from an obscure company in China. 150 students are cramped together in a building fit for around 100 students. We don't have any kind of councellor; nobody has received any help in their university applications and our school nurse is only present once a week on Mondays.
Meanwhile, the company that owns my school made a profit of more than 4 billion Swedish crowns between the year 2012-2013.
The situation for Swedish education is reaching its bursting point. Privatization has been the biggest national mistake in recent memory. If the ISDS concept is fully realized, our government will face heavy lawsuits from a large number of companies if the day comes where they listen to the people who elected them and make schools a governmental practice again. Perhaps the financial threat would be too great to even do something about the problem.
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Sounds to me like you need to change schools, never mind opt out of Europe :p
I assume, from your level of interest that your studying Europe/Economics as one of your subjects?
Interesting debate to have with someone your age 
ObW
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OlderButWiser Wrote:Sounds to me like you need to change schools, never mind opt out of Europe :p
I assume, from your level of interest that your studying Europe/Economics as one of your subjects?
Interesting debate to have with someone your age
ObW
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I should have changed school a long time ago, but I only have one month left now.
And actually, I'm not studying economics. Or well, I do partially, but there's no particularly big emphasis or anything. It's just that my first election is coming up and I wanted to make a well-informed decision so I started reading up on the pros and cons of the European Union since the topic has left political parties in my country somewhat divided on the left-right scale
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I'm pro European Union, but I still don't know who I will vote during the next election... 
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In Italy the Democratic Party, which is pro-Eu and which is already the governing majority had a big result during these elections, with over the 41% (in 2009 they had the 26%)
I was a little afraid about the result in France, and obviously the xenophobe LePen had her victory... :-(
But more or less everywhere in Europe the right party is becoming bigger, so I'm not surprised of the results in UK and other places...
@Solemn, I admit my ignorance about Sweden political situation, I read something about it but I wanna see your opinion after the elections... And also the opinions of the other guys from every-where. ;-)
Any suggestion about Spanish situation?
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