- cross-posted to:
- world@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- world@lemmy.world
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I mean, we ended our war with Denmark and now share a land border with them. Might as well take the next step.
Keep in mind that right now there is in fact no such thing as an EU Associate Member status and this just a declaration of intent from von der Leyen.
Assuming there is genuine and lasting will from the various EU countries to actually create this, after the experience with the mess that was Switzerland and its special status, any EU Associated Member status will probably be designed as a standard thing rather than a hack for Canada like a hack was done for Switzerland, so it will probably take a while, plus these kinds of thing require unanimous approval of all EU member states (so it’s perfectly possible that countries with Russia-aligned governments like Slovakia will veto it).
At the moment this seems to mainly be talkie-talkie from von der Leyen, and this ex-German Defense Minister who left that post under a dark cloud is not exactly the most competent and serious EU Commission head we ever had or even somebody who genuinelly pushes back on America’s moneyed interests.
It might make more sense for Canada to be an EEA member (an already existing association with the EU that allows non-EU member nations to be in the Single Market) though within of the Single Market even via such a mechanism requires uniformization with EU product and service regulatory norms (don’t really want bleeched chicken or consumer chemical products following a “allowed until proven dangerous” regulatory approval process like in in the US) which I believe would be problematic for Canada right now since the norms they follow are aligned with US regulatory norms, not with the - far stricter - EU norms.
If there’s something I learned during the whole Leave debate when I lived in Britain is that seamless access to a highly integrated Products and Services market like the Single Market is nowhere as simple as “lets tell people what they want to hear” politicians (like von der Leyen and the UK Brexiters) portray it.
As you correctly point out, it’s probable that Canada’s associate membership will result in an EEA-lite relationship with the European Union. I can see the engagement being sectorial.
It’s going to be very hard for the Canadian economy to escape Washington’s regulatory power (Quebec’s French language consumer regulation being actively disputed by the US in trade negotiations is illustrative of this), but an associate membership will set up pathways of closer integration with the EU than having a simple bilateral relationship. It will probably also give Canada more leverage in future talks with the United States (and Mexico).
Obviously, none of this would have happened had Trump not pursued maximalist trade war aims coupled with an inflammatory rhetoric about Canada’s sovereignty. Canada ending up closer to the EU as a result of this (“integrated” within the EU!) is no doubt among the worst American soft power debacles of the postwar era
I would think that now that the alliance is established, any new members who joined could join as limited or associate members for the first X years as the country transitions to full EU membership. Politics takes time and there are likely specific legal frameworks Canada (or any given new EU country) would need to adopt.
It takes a long time to integrate with the EU Single Market even without having to actually design an entire new form of association, which is what an EU Associated Member would be.
All you have to do is look at the time it took to negotiate the British Exit Treaty which established their relationship with the EU after Leave, and this was a nation which started with regulatory norms entirelly aligned with the EU ones and wanted to be free to set their own norms on some domains, so a much simpler situation than trying to come up with a semi-convergence standard for countries following completelly different norms which aren’t trying to fully converge with EU norms to become EU members (the latter being a process that usually takes more than a decade, by the way).
So far all we have is the kind of rosy and incredibly vague talkie-talkie from a particularly incompetent salesman-type on the EU side, well before the “technical” people even just start looking into how to actually do it.
There being true will amongst the EU countries for this (which I believe there is: in the various countries here I lived in, the perception of Canadians is very positive), I suspect this “EU Member Association” from von der Leyen will in practice just be a fancy name for broad trade treaty on Products, rather than something akin to the EEA association.
Doesn’t mean that Canada and the EU can’t further converge and the thing turn into much more in the mid and long term, though, just don’t expect this talkie-talkie to yield anything genuinelly significative (rather than just loud politician proclamations about something which in practice is nothing special) in a year or two.
As an American:
Trump should be happy. This will allow us to export more to Europe and less to the USA. That should reduce our trade imbalance that is absolutely destroying the USA. That’s what Trump wants, right?
Right?
Right, he said he didn’t need Canada and finds Canada nasty, so everyone, including him, will then live happily ever after. The sooner the better!
I’m jerking it to the fact that he’s probably super furious and jealous he wasn’t invited to the club. I hope he just dies from anger.
the fact that he’s probably super furious
I expect all the investment announcements coming out of Carney’s investor event is also causing Trump to be upset.
Maybe a chance of overload?
They should give Carney the Nobel Peace Prize. Trump would drop dead on the spot.
Carney does not deserve a peace prize, maybe a bankers prize but nothing from the Nobel commity.
He deserves it at least as much as Obama did, and way more than Kissinger did.
If Canada can get some of the consumer rights that Europeans enjoy I’d be for this in a heartbeat.
If Canada wants any kind of integration with the EU Single Market it will indeed have to follow regulatory norms for those products or services which are the same or even stricter than EU norms, which themselves are far stricter than US norms.
Further, those products when imported into Canada will also have to follow those norms so only American products following those norms can be imported into Canada.
So if there is genuine will in the Canadian political circles to integrated with the EU Single Markets, at least when it comes to product safety (not just directly but also indirectly, for example how not allowing bleeched chicken forces better conditions for raising them, which in turn means that amongst other things there is a lower incidence of things like Salmonella in the EU than the US) things will naturally get better from consumers in Canada.
That said, this is Regulatory uniformization. For consumer rights specifically, I think uniformization only happens with EU membership, which would me that for example things like minimum warranty durations per product-class from Canadians wouldn’t actually converge with EU-wide ones “merelly” by Canada becoming part or wholly integrated with the EU Single Market.
And have America invade us for threatening their corporations profit margins /s
I would love this but I don’t see it happening. fellows named Galen and Roger I doubt would be very thrilled.
Only more reason to do it.
We should invite Aldi and Lidl over
Fuck Aldi. I worked for them for several years, the cheap prices are at the expense of overworking their employees and keeping an absolute skeleton crew. In the one I worked at in the US, it was in the supervisor handbook that any employee that even joked about forming a union was to be fired on the spot. Legal protections vary state to state on that ofc, but I’m not interested in doxing myself further as to what state I worked in.
I’d only be interested in them being in Canada if the workers could unionize. They would still make a killing even if unionizing increased the costs of operation, their stuff would still be cheap compared to most grocers.
The closest comparison price and quality wise I’ve seen is FreshCo, but even then uhhh not really. The store brand items from Aldi were actually good or passable quality. The store brand items in Canada from any grocery franchise is shit imo.
I have never been to a US Aldi only the German and Austrian (Hofer) ones. And I have never worked for any. Their products are great and the prices reasonable. That’s what I am looking for.
The German and Austrian ones are much better from what I heard internally and I believe they are also unionized? Or just have more labour protections. But yeah the products are cheap and the quality was oftentimes acceptable or even better than name brand stuff. The cheap prices were the only reason I could eat well in the US. I love and hate them.
and I believe they are also unionized? Or just have more labour protections.
Well first off there are two Aldis in Germany, Aldi Süd (south, I think this is the one active in America and Austria) and Aldi Nord (north). Since they are different companies, they will have differences in how they treat labour organisations.
Genrally speaking they will both of course oppose them though, as companies are wont to do. For example two month ago Aldi Nord fired a member of the works council (something like a union rep, but independently elected by all employees), which is a rather… uncommon occurrence due to their legal protections. Their lawyer is optimistic.
The companies are unionised to a degree, for example the aforementioned work council had 4/19 members coming from Ver.di, a cross-occupational union for service workers of all kinds. It’s not uncommon for big employers like the Aldis to have several unions active among their staff, but all employees being union members is also rare.
Overall though it’s probably mostly the labour protections by law that you are seeing at work here. For example the possibility to create these work councils, which can have quite a lot of influence on company policy, is mandated by law. You have to announce a company wide meeting and then the quorum to elect a representative at that meeting is three(!) people, no matter the company size.
Expense of overworking their employees and keeping a skeleton crew
So the same as everywhere else?
Pretty much yep lol. To Aldi’s credit, I got USD$18/hr while everywhere else paid at most $11-13/hr. The working conditions sure as hell made you earn it though, I still have back pain from my manager pushing me to unload the food deliveries faster and faster. One whole food pallet of mixed foods, 7ft tall or more, needed to be done in 30 minutes on average, within 3 hours before opening. We would regularly get 6-7 pallets, and during peak sales I’d have to solo 10-13 pallets by myself.
Grocery workers need to unionize YESTERDAY. I wonder if a grocery store union could be an element in solving the overly greedy food profiteering. Call me a communist but food should only be sold exactly at how much it cost to grow and transport it to the store and a living wage for the farmers and employees. Go make profit somewhere else capitalist boy. Deeply interested in how those New York City owned grocery stores will play out. I hope they are successful.
NGL this was mostly just me ranting rather than making any worthwhile discussion lol
How do you not have Aldi? Even Australia has Aldi.
😫
Nobody knows yet what that actually means, at least not publicly, and we’re still hearing from Canada’s representative that he doesn’t know what it means. So, what is there to be excited about? We already have free trade with the EU. We obviously have good diplomatic relations. What is being added on? Until we actually know details, I’m not excited about anything here, because I don’t know what it is.
This is simply a public announcement from both sides to deepen cooperation on trade, defense and likely other areas as research etc. Not more, not less.
There is a lot that the EU and Canada can cooperate. Canada and the EU have also a lot of room to intensify strategic cooperation on resources, arms etc. I would assume that we see more concrete joining of forces on various initiatives as we go in the future. Right now there was for example Canada joining the EU’s SAFE program, which is the EU’s defense capabilities and arms procurement program.
Look, alert(canada) is 3400kms away from stockholm and 4100kms away from most larger canadian cities. Canada has a border with france and its right next to greenland, a place thats already european even though its technically not in europe. They speak european languages, and the list could go on.
I’m looking forward to learning more what this means and watching the meltdown south of our border.
I don’t think I want full EU membership, I don’t want another layer of bureaucracy where I’m at the whims of other countries’ laws and size. That’s trading one problem for another.
I do want closer trade, better investment options and markers, and the ability to work for European companies would be nice. Mutual defence I’m completely onboard with too. If Russia attacks Europe, I want Canada to be part of the defence. If the US attacks us, I want Europe at our backs.
Well you may be happy then. I’d personally love access to the Schengen area and the right to live and work in Europe. The other stuff is good too.
I doubt that is going to happen. Everyone who is expecting freedom of movement I think is going to be disappointed.
I agree. It won’t happen through this process. This is largely focused on freedom of movement for money.
Schengen would never happen.
Best case is that you get visa-free travel (which I think we already enjoy?) and maybe better access to European universities. Maybe easier to start working for a European country, but doubtful as they don’t want to off-shore as much as we don’t want to.
’m not 100% on this though.
My big worry is continued abuse of TFW style labour, where European countries might send problem migrants/refugees here. I would want some protection from that, because our employers are already abusive and use TFWs to suppress wages.
We’ll have to see the details, and it’s hard to have free movement but also limit it.
But as I said, there are European companies I’d like to be able to work at easier, and I’m sure there are European tech workers who could work here and benefit us.
There are no details at this time it all has to be worked out.
There are a lot of details to work out. I was just listening to Lawfare today and they were discussing the association between foreign workers and the rise of the radical right in Germany. Initially civil society was behind the influx but the mood changed after several years.
I can definitely see that. Immigrants are a huge focus by right wing news and scapegoated.
Where I live there are highly problematic immigrant sub communities that are causing trouble, but then it gets magnified massively on social media and the news.
I’d personally be worried about a mass influx of skilled labour coming to Canada and oversaturating our job market further. It’s already difficult out here, but maybe it’d equal out with people from Canada finding more opportunity in Europe? I think the people who would rather stay in Canada might find the competition stifling though. It’s a compliment in a way, Europeans are incredibly talented and skilled people.
It’d be great for the country, but I worry it might not be necessarily great for Canadian worker rights and employment.
at the whims of other countries’ laws and size
A hypothetical full membership would instantly catapult Canada to the #5 spot in the EU, in terms of population size. Granted, the other four (Germany, ~85 million; France, ~60 million; Italy, ~60 million; and Spain ~47 million) are all significantly larger.
But in principle, I agree - at the very least, full membership would require a much more in-depth national conversation that we’re simply not having right now.
It would also triple the land mass of the EU! Canada is about 10 million km^2, EU right now is about 4.3 million km^2
I don’t think I want full EU membership
Carney has said previously Canada isn’t interested in this. We like making our own trade deals and agreements.
Well it is good that is not what this is.
I don’t think I want full EU membership, I don’t want another layer of bureaucracy where I’m at the whims of other countries’ laws and size. That’s trading one problem for another.
Well this is the problem the early north american colonies had, but (for all the issues of the US), a federal system ultimately worked out pretty well. Same with Canada’s state system, I assume.
No one wants to be at the whims of other countries, but that’s kind of the cost of facilitating completely open trade and movement. US States and current EU members don’t like it either (especially now), but ultimately those somewhat homogenized laws are what makes movement so frictionless.
I would like to see our dollar pinned to the EU, I know we are an exporter and that is not a good idea to have a stronger currency but if we can do that the world will move away from the US dollar even faster.
The USA invaded Venezuela to prevent them from doing oil deals with China in yuan which would challenge the USD as the defacto currency for oil trade.
So we can also further your objective just by turning away from fossil fuels.
Yen = Japanese currency
Yuan = Chinese currency (aka renminbi)
We should be electrifying as many things as we. It costs less to run and the electricity supply is more reliable than gas or diesel.
The world will still need oil for durable plastics until that is replaced too.
I like the idea of turning away from dino juice, but it would take a lot to actually get people to do it.
Or sell oil to China in Yen
or sell Yen to oil in China
Pinned while CAD and Euro are relatively close… Not after the Great Drone Wars when 1 CAD = 47 Euro and the
former USAGreat Wasteland is ruled by the Guzzoline Gangs.
So the WSJ’s reports were accurate, even though some officials were downplaying it. “Associate membership” might be more of a rhetorical device to describe a relationship than to do with actual membership within the EU’s systems, but if it can lead to better mutual recognition of standards, and greater freedom of movement of people goods and capital between us and the bloc, I’m all for it.
I pointed out recently that Carney is a man of deliberate words. Some things were said after by him that made me think this was coming and what it really means
not looking to become a member of the European Union
That could mean it wouldn’t be happening, or it could mean that the EU is initiating, not us.
He didn’t say we would not accept a membership, he said we were not seeking one.
He said that he is seeking a special relationship with the EU. Well, if the EU wants Canada as a member in some capacity, and asks and Carney negotiates, then he got what he said he wanted, while the WSJ still telling the truth. Since “associate membership” is not yet a real thing, it could be left to Carney to decide.
Again… a man of deliberate words.
Dude I can’t wait to move to the French motherland 😎
Just in time to institute age controls on social media and identify all accounts, everything said or looked at online, to make secret social scores to be used against their citizens!
Get your fucking politicians under control europe, or you will be the ones under control.
Well they haven’t managed to pass it yet, but not like your politicians aren’t trying:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protecting_Young_Persons_from_Exposure_to_Pornography_Act
Exactly.
We’re going to end up living with all the EU’s limitations and zero of their individual benefits.
Europe trusts government more and North America trusts corporations more.
Trump tantrum incoming in 3….2….
Ahhh - there’s the expected response. Could set your watch to it.
Open a better path to dual citizenship with EU nations pls.
Fuck yeah
