I can certainly see a lot of parallels with the US or even Canada.
You have some states that generate most of the wealth – Germany, England and France – that are subsidizing the needier countries like Greece, Estonia, Italy and Romania. From a purely selfish point of view why would they hang around?
The other big challenge with the EU is there are so many rules and policies that it is effectively stifling business for all states. We opened an office in Soho this year. In Canada or the US this would be simple…. but not in Europe…. Crazy.
The Brits were also lucky that they didn’t join the euro zone. Their economy, to a certain extent, is relatively autonomous and they continued to have a modicum of growth while the rest of Europe tanked. I think it would be fairly easy for them to split as economically they are pretty much standalone.
I’m in the UK at the moment and it seems to have quite an interesting split based on the people I’ve been talking to. The younger and older generations seem to want to go. The 35-55 group seem to want to stay. Of course a sample size of 30 out of 60 million isn’t worth much.
If I were a Brit I’d probably vote to go, but then again I would vote to go if California tried to leave the US
Just echoing someone’s point above, it seems Germany control most of Europe. I find it amazing that Angela Merkel was able to achieve this through dubious financing/monetary control and back room deals; unlike 70 years ago when the might of the whole Third Reich failed to bring about the same thing
