Lilico: Staying in the EU would see the UK facing up to economic domination
The following article appeared in the Daily Telegraph and is presented with permission by the author
The main arguments the Leave and Remain campaigns are offering regarding EU membership are geopolitical and constitutional rather than economic. Nonetheless, the economics is important. Furthermore, by understanding certain key economic facts we can grasp much better why the UK is likely to end up outside the EU within 10 years whether we vote to Leave or Remain in the referendum in June.
As members of the EU, we are part of the 500m population European Economic Area, in which there are no tariffs and within which non-tariff barriers to trade, capital flows and migration have been stripped away. We also get to influence the rules of the Single Market.
Britain has used that influence over decades to create a new economic orthodoxy in Europe, based around free trade, deregulation, privatisation, market liberalisation and the removal of state aid from failing businesses. (And, be in no doubt, the UK has been enormously influential in this.)
The full article can be accessed by visiting: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2016/02/22/staying-in-the-eu-would-see-the-uk-facing-up-to-economic-dominat/