Brexit: The Angles of the UK's Departure

[Chase]

For those of you that are confused as to what is going on today with the European Union - here's the skinny. The United Kingdom held a nationwide referendum (a fancy term for a citizen-driven vote) as to what they should do with regards to remaining or exiting the European Union.

The European Union - to those who like me and aren't a part of it as a United States Citizen or someone that isn't a European, is a collective political and economical union of 28 countries in Europe.

Here's the impact of it:

Historic:

The United Kingdom will be the first member EVER to leave the EU - making today a significant date in history as a precedent setter for countries who may wish to leave the EU down the line.

Economic:

Starting with the positives, the UK will no longer have to pay the EU it's membership dues, saving the UK billions of pounds a year. However, the British pound took a significant hit, seeing a 31 year low as a result of the market chaos at the moment. This should NOT be permanent - and many 'Leave' supporters are definitely confident that they can return their economic prowess quickly - but the global markets and the pound are not as good as they might have been had 'Remain' won the vote.

Political:

This kind of upset vote was driven by the UK's populace, with the 'Leave' supporters consisting of the UK's working class south of the Scottish Border. Britain and Wales surprisingly took up the mantel for 'Leave' while the other half of the United Kingdom - Scotland and Ireland - overwhelmingly voted for 'Remain'.

The 'Leave' vote was driven in a form of "populist" "grassroots" approach - essentially mirroring the 'Trumpism' movement in America. Another term for this group is aptly named "Eurosceptics" (with Remainers also being called "Europhiles".) - and the leading political themes behind the Eurosceptics' cause are singular control of immigration and protectionist approaches to free trade - themes Donald Trump has made a name for here in America.

Geographic:

It's worth noting that Scotland recently voted for it's own independence from the United Kingdom and by something like 10% the country decided to remain in the UK. One of the reasons WHY was because they favored remaining in the EU - which now - obviously won't hapen.....(my keyboard is borked as of this post.....)

This means that Scotland may be looking to hold another vote in the future - along with Ireland.

It also means that the EU may have to double down on it's members in order to 'revent further exodus as other EU countries may wish to leave as well.

Trade:

The UK and the EU will have to provide new trade agreements and I would not see the EU being very kind in doing so. America has vowed to be neutral and trade to both.

[Shamitako]

Economic

Also worth mentioning is that the UK is like a massive part of the EU's economy, so this is a big hit to the EU as a whole (which from my limited understanding was already struggling) as well

[Chase]

Correct, the UK is the fifth largest economy in the world - perhaps the largest contributor with military items. It will certainly hurt all parties involved economically - at least in the short term. I - for one - think that everyone is going to be okay. I think the EU will be stronger because of it and I think the UK will be fine as a completely autonomous country.

[Odybld]

Britain historically has been waaaaaay ahead of the curve in preserving its status quo. Nothing new here. Britain solving their eu problem with a voting means it solves it without the rise of a powerful neonazi party or goverment OR a series of massive protests and a government from the left.

The union is a mess. More than half a decade of austerity and my country, Greece, hasn't seen a sliver of development after a shitton of reforms... Italy, Spain and Portugal are a mess too, France is a mess and it's one of the biggest countries in the union, from political strength as well. The shortsighted policy about the war in Syria and immigration and the terrorist attacks have bred and bred new generations of the far right... it's a total clusterfuck

The union will die one way or another: I prefer it to not be in the hands of these people

[RudeStyle]

Other countries are likely to follow in a vote (maybe not leave). Holland are calling for it, perhaps Finland and France also. For all we know in a few years the EU might not be around. The next 5 years are going to be big for my country and the rest of the EU.

Edited June 24, 2016 by RudeStyle

[Jiggle]

Also worth mentioning is that the UK is like a massive part of the EU's economy, so this is a big hit to the EU as a whole (which from my limited understanding was already struggling) as well

Works both ways, actually. No matter how successful GB's economy is, it's still not self-sustainable. It still imports heavily to fill in the deficit.

We'll see how it turns out, but so far, the general consensus is that it's a self-destructing move.

[Tartar]

@Odybld Wait, you're saying that the EU is the cause of the economical problems of the mediteranian countries? Said countries have been behind economically and development wise for the past 300 years, you can't suddenly expect them to make a rebound and become economic powerhouses in a few short years, the administrative and educational institutions are to blame. Real economic development takes decades if not generations.

Edited June 24, 2016 by Tartar

[Halloween]

Historic:
Greenland left EU before – albeit an earlier version.


Economic:
That's a straight up lie. Nigel even admitted it was, only an hour after they had announced the results. The actual sum is around £190 million/week, which they might have to cash out anyway just to access the common market. Along the fall of the pound, and the difficulty they will have to re-arrange their trade agreements, the benefits they reaped from being part of the international EU trade agreements, this was a huge economic loss for the UK.


Political:
Also worth mentioning, younger voters where overwhelmingly on the "Remain" side; what pushed us over to "Leave" was voters over 65. And let's not pretend this wasn't racially motivated, because it predominantly was. The Bank of England, HM Treasury, pwc, National Institute of Economical and Social Research, International Momentary Fond, Oxford Economics, Oxford University and their researchers and OECD was just some of the institutions predicting an economic loss. People knew this.

Geographic:

Yes, Scotland and Northern Ireland might leave the UK – but what's a bigger problem is all the people that might have to leave London.

I, personally, travel to London to work 2-3 times a year. Of the companies I've worked on, roughly 1/3 of the people working there are UK citizens – London has simply become a mecca of people coming there from all over Europe to make money. If this means that the UK will disallow this kind of working situation, the media industry will simply move elsewhere – Berlin, Amsterdam and Stockholm being the main contenders. On top of that, the 1.3 million expats living in the rest of Europe might have to move back to England again, losing their jobs in the process. And the working market in the UK is not gonna be a fun place to be – with the pound doing a free-fall, and tourism decreasing because of the borders closing, I can't see a lot of positions opening.

The UK leaving EU also means things will change in EU. Stronger push for tax harmonization, weaker copyright protection, smaller budget (and thus the other countries has to pay more, which might result in more leaving). More regulations.

All that being said, I agree that EU, as it is right now, is deeply and horribly flawed, and need to their shit together if they don't want other countries leaving. There are countries that would be way better of without them, and there's countries that should be expelled, seeing as they don't live up to the requirements anyway.

[Odybld]

@Odybld Wait, you're saying that the EU is the cause of the economical problems of the mediteranian countries? Said countries have been behind economically and development wise for the past 300 years, you can't suddenly expect them to make a rebound and become economic powerhouses in a few short years, the administrative and educational institutions are to blame. Real economic development takes decades if not generations.

And economic strangulation takes a few years to choke a country. That's why Greece has a smaller GDP, a larger debt and higher unemployment rates, and vastly so, before the crisis begun and, subsequently, the remedies of the crisis. That's the shit you do for real economic development. But yeah, it's only us to blame and not the hardcore neoliberal austerity of the EU and the IMF.

Also, you miss the elephant in the room by the name of France.

[Chase]

I'm not going to argue the economic repercussions - because all I have to do is look at the United States' stock activity to know what's going on in the UK right now is not good for anyone's wallets over there.

However, I feel like the biggest thing that will come out of this is that Great Britain will be free from crippling regulations on businesses and - outside of EU countries for a while - the UK is in a prime position to make great trade deals elsewhere. The way I've seen the UK, they have always been a first-world country and one with significant clout on it's own - and as has already been said, the EU is a failing, stale experiment that is operating past it's shelf life.

Yes, there are politicians that are making things like immigration a big issue, and several of the voters yesterday bought into that message and hopefully it doesn't turn what Trump is spouting. I'm most excited about this because I feel like if any country is able and worthy of exiting the EU - it's the United Kingdom. It's a truly historical day and I got to witness it. -and, as a conservative politically this is a landmark victory for the conservative movement in an area where liberalism generally rings strong.

Even if the wool was put over the Leavers eyes - I don't think this will cause the UK to fall over and die. It's giving the UK the opportunity to take it's rightful place as a world power on it's own.

[Lil' Baby Rupe]

i wonder what the eu thinks of pretenders lmao!!!

Edited June 25, 2016 by Lil' Baby Rupe

[Imperial]

Europe made some poor choices for sure, but not all problems are due to this. The current mess in France in due to major changes the government want to make to labor laws in a country where usually as soon as you touch the smallest right of workers you end up with demonstrations. The law is supposed to give more rights an flexibility to employers. I haven't read the law so I won't say if it's good or bad but the main thing I remember from my courses on company laws is that if I want to create my own business, I should avoid to do it in France because employees can f**k you as they want. People imagine bosses are all big naughty billionaires exploiting them, but they forget that bakers are also bosses and that big companies are a minority (plus they are not necessarily evil). So this is not really linked to UE.

For terrorism, many extreme party say that we must close the frontiers to stop terrorists. It's stupid. All the terrorists behind last years attack on France were either French or Belgian. And even if they were from outside, blocking frontiers only stops people abiding the law, terrorist would merely be slew down. I personnally I don't want to start changing my life, living in fear due to a few attacks. More people die everyday due to cancer or car accidents than due to terrorist attacks. And they are not called "terrorist" without a reason. Close the frontiers, start acting like you're "terrorised" and they win.

The problem of Europe is not different from the problem of any individual country. We have poor leaders and stupid people. At the scale of a country you can usually deal with it, but with different countries with different needs and policies, each of them try to save it's own ass, yes it's a mess. But UE is still a good thing. The US alone are bigger than Europe. How could small European countries face bigger, more populated countries with much more ressources (European soil is quite poor I think) and so are much more influent ? With a union. That's why UE was created and that's why Europe is one of the main global powers.

And about the brexit, well, we already see what happens. An economical suicide. UK will lose its access to UE market. Even with new trade agreements it won't be that profitable, and if European leaders are not stupid they will let UK fall even more. The strength of UK is it's access to UE market from a country with liberal policies. But if they don't have this access anymore, why should they stay ? Companies choosing London as their European headquarters don't do it for UK market but for UE market. So they will leave. At first the chaos caused by the brexit will damage UE's economy, and not only UE's. But with time if UE plays well it can recover UK's lost strength, making it's remaining members stronger.

Another thing that will weaken UK even more is that "United Kingdom" shouln't be united much longer. Scottland is mainly pro-UE and even before the brexit they were close to take their independancy. Now they will probably leave UK. Then maybe others who wanted to stay in UE, who knows ? I don't think UK will fall is deep as Greece, but surely they just lost their place among the main European powers

[Chase]

People misunderstand the reasoning behind immigration reform in the United States on both sides because it seems like the righties only care about deporting our loved ones and that the lefties only care about letting someone take your job who doesn't originally come from here - and it's good to see that be a global issue, because several Leave voters had an undertone of nationalism behind their vote.

However, what needs to be understood about the border issue here is that the European Union has one of the most lenient legislators when it comes to border-crossing. The way it's currently set up people are able to freely go from country to country, live in France and work in England, without even needing a travel visa to do so. While that's perfectly awesome for law-abiding vagabonds, it's not a very good thing when a national security crisis elsewhere forces millions of people to become refugees and leave uncertainty behind those millions of identities.

That's EXACTLY what the Syrian crisis was for Europe. These refugees - possibly sheltering insurgents among their ranks (who are just as capable of radicalizing the French and Belgian terrorists associated with Paris and Brussels as they are with conducting the attacks themselves) - SWARMED the entirety of the EU and were at the leisure to travel extraordinarily freely, while yes, with the potential to displace workers who were already there because they brought with them skills and the willingness to take a lesser paycheck.

The difference between the United Kingdom and the United States here is that the United Kingdom had very, VERY little say on the matter alone due to sharing border legislation with 27 other countries and having to answer to authorities in Brussels. This made places like London just as much prone targets for radicalization and attacks as Brussels (which shouldn't be seeing attacks like the one it saw being the EPICENTER of the so-called "good" European Union.) and Paris. This wasn't a bid for nationalism. It was a bid for autonomy. The Britons who pulled the lever for 'Leave' want to be decide their own fate with the border legislation, with their trade deals, and with their economic prowess.

For better or for worse.

[DerogatoryTrainer]

Channel Tunnel this morning.

[Halloween]

Dude, where are you even getting your info from? To start with, Syria is a country in Asia. In fact, some EU countries refused to accept any refugees at all. And UK wasn't even part of the Schengen Agreement until last year – it's in no way obligatory, and the refugee crisis started in 2011, but since Syria isn't a member I don't see how that matters.

What's happening is that EU, as a large, voted to re-locate 160,000 refugees that had fled to Greece, Hungary and Italy, since those three countries were under considerable pressure. The UK opted out of taking a quota, but the (now former) prime minister agreed to still take in 1000 people (now extended to 5500, with a promise to take in 20 000 in five years time. For a country with 50m+ citizens, that's nothing.

Secondly, these refugees very unlikely to be sheltering any "insurgents" anymore. They're fleeing for their lives, because ISIS would kill them if they didn't. ISIS members themselves are not fleeing. The chance of being granted a visa anywhere in Europe right now is slim, and ISIS already has members spread all over – I find it hard to believe that any members would pretend to flee with their entire families even though they didn't have to, on a journey where, frankly, a lot of people die from the duress, for the off-chance they'd get a VISA in a country to terrorize when that country already has members positioned.

Third, the UK actually needs more workers, and with more people, there will also be more jobs, but Syrian refugees rarely speak enough English to start working straight off the bat.

And finally, a million people are leaving their entire lives behind to escape terrorism. To even arrive to the UK, they have money already, they're educated, and more people are good for the economy. In my personal opinion, it's a dick move to turn them away, and I cannot for my life understand people that refuse other people help when they need it the most.

As for trade deals, this guy puts it better than I could:

"If you are Nissan or some other car producer with major production in the UK, today, the same safety standards and environmental standards allow you to sell everywhere in the European market," Jacob Funk Kirkegaard, an economist at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, told me. But if the UK leaves the EU, "you would no longer be able to sell into other European markets, not because you face a small tariff but because you'd have to go through another set of safety certifications. This kind of thing would be repeated in every industry you can think of."

[Imperial]

Dude, where are you even getting your info from? To start with, Syria is a country in Asia. In fact, some EU countries refused to accept any refugees at all. And UK wasn't even part of the Schengen Agreement until last year – it's in no way obligatory, and the refugee crisis started in 2011, but since Syria isn't a member I don't see how that matters.

What's happening is that EU, as a large, voted to re-locate 160,000 refugees that had fled to Greece, Hungary and Italy, since those three countries were under considerable pressure. The UK opted out of taking a quota, but the (now former) prime minister agreed to still take in 1000 people (now extended to 5500, with a promise to take in 20 000 in five years time. For a country with 50m+ citizens, that's nothing.

Secondly, these refugees very unlikely to be sheltering any "insurgents" anymore. They're fleeing for their lives, because ISIS would kill them if they didn't. ISIS members themselves are not fleeing. The chance of being granted a visa anywhere in Europe right now is slim, and ISIS already has members spread all over – I find it hard to believe that any members would pretend to flee with their entire families even though they didn't have to, on a journey where, frankly, a lot of people die from the duress, for the off-chance they'd get a VISA in a country to terrorize when that country already has members positioned.

Third, the UK actually needs more workers, and with more people, there will also be more jobs, but Syrian refugees rarely speak enough English to start working straight off the bat.

And finally, a million people are leaving their entire lives behind to escape terrorism. To even arrive to the UK, they have money already, they're educated, and more people are good for the economy. In my personal opinion, it's a dick move to turn them away, and I cannot for my life understand people that refuse other people help when they need it the most.

As for trade deals, this guy puts it better than I could:

"If you are Nissan or some other car producer with major production in the UK, today, the same safety standards and environmental standards allow you to sell everywhere in the European market," Jacob Funk Kirkegaard, an economist at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, told me. But if the UK leaves the EU, "you would no longer be able to sell into other European markets, not because you face a small tariff but because you'd have to go through another set of safety certifications. This kind of thing would be repeated in every industry you can think of."

Chase is partially right on a point, it's much easier to enter Europe from the eastern countries than anywhere else and from that refugees can easily go anywhere in Europe, something many people didn't like. But I agree with all your other points.

I remember seeing a cop (I think) in Calais (where there's a huge camp of refugees trying to go to UK that is often destroyed by the police) saying that among the several thousands people there, almost all where just refugees trying to build a new safer life for their family. All the bad things we heard about refugees was the work of maybe a small hundred people (and that doesn't even mean they're terrorists). They are just here to have a good life like us. Because they were unluckily born in the bad country means they are stealing our jobs ? No more than any French guy applying to the same job as me. And if you can't compete with a man who barely speaks your langage and who is usually less qualified than you, well, the problem is probably you.

Also I find quite funny that Americans are so worried about immigration. If I wanted to make an internship in the US, it would have taken 2 months and an heavy procedure to get a visa, against 2 weeks for Korea and Japan (one to fill the papers, one to get the visa). I'm sure even China isn't so strict. For a country saying to be proud to be built by immigrants and who celebrates every year the day native Americans welcomed the immigrants, it's quite contradictory

[Red_Chaos]

Also I find quite funny that Americans are so worried about immigration. If I wanted to make an internship in the US, it would have taken 2 months and an heavy procedure to get a visa, against 2 weeks for Korea and Japan (one to fill the papers, one to get the visa). I'm sure even China isn't so strict. For a country saying to be proud to be built by immigrants and who celebrates every year the day native Americans welcomed the immigrants, it's quite contradictory

bro, we have problems with ILLEGAL immigration. aka the guys who dont follow proper protocols and come in illegally

[Shamitako]

bro, we have problems with ILLEGAL immigration. aka the guys who dont follow proper protocols and come in illegally

The reason for that is primarily because of our painful immigration process. Outside a few exceptions, it can take months or even years to get into the US legally

[Maelstrom]

The UK was only the 4th biggest contributor to the EU. Germany paid in the most.

And it got money back because it didn't need/get the farming subsidies.

Any other subsidies and benefits from the money paid in will be lost, but they just won't pay in anymore.

They will lose the favorable trade status it had as part of the EU, but as you all have mentioned, it's an economic powerhouse and I doubt the other EU countries can afford to hike trade prices/taxes up much.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36027205

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-32810887