But Like the German poet Goethe on his deathbed, the European Union is perpetually calling for more light. Alas, when the illumination arrives, it hardly seems to help. Telegraph writes today..
Today should see a document from the European Commissioners, who have noticed that the EU is insufficiently competitive.
Well, full marks for a statement of the bleedin' obvious, at least. If tradition is held, we can look forward to exhortations to greater efforts by EU workers, calls for "reform" and promises to create millions of jobs.
Surely you remember the Delors White Paper, the processes in Luxembourg, Cardiff and Cologne, and the summits in Stockholm and Barcelona? Perhaps you dozed off while the politicians were urging Europe's economies to greater efforts.
The most dazzling display was at Lisbon in March 2000, described by Tony Blair as a "definitive turning point". European Leaders promised to more than halve unemployment by 2010 and make it the best place for the internet.
The trouble is, not only do they lack the first clue of how to go about it, they see no conflict between this aspiration and piling still more burdens on those who might actually bring it about.
Since Lisbon, the tax and regulatory costs have risen furrther. The US Labour Department reckons that wage rates in Germany are a fifth higher than in America, while comparison with the far east, where the world's goods are made nowadays, scarcely bears thinking bout. No wonder the eurozone is stagnant, with rising unemployment.
There was too much blaih blaih at Lisbon for anyone to hear Otmar Issing, the European Central Bank's chief economist: "An EU which enchains its innovative potential through regulations, suppresses economic incentives through high taxes and seeks to protect its prosperity behind barriers, and which strives to redistribute wealth internally based on an ideology of equality portrayed as justice, renounces not only an important role on the world stage, but its own future." How much more light do they need? |
