If your population is shrinking, why do you need "growth". Cancer is a growth, after all. An unregulated one at that.

I've lived for extended periods of time in several European countries. There are times when an America misses being able to shop at 2am on a Saturday. But there are huge benefits to the European system. Image a six-week vacation, imagine fruits and vegetables that actually tasted like they were supposed to. Imagine good beer, a different good beer in every town. That's Germany, man. And you know what, they live longer they we do.

My experience is limited to the water area, and effectively, the European Union is vastly more regulated than the USA. Moreover, their extremely detailed rules are taken seriously. However, I dont think the tremendous rule-writing effort is directed against foreigners. Because of their rules, European consumers pay up to 10 dollars per cubic meter of drinking water, and this situation is a heavy competitive weight on European water-consuming/wastewater-generating industry.

My personal opinion is that European overregulation springs from a deep desire for detailed rules and total certainty. The dominant ethnic group in Europe, the Germans, love/need laws and rules. Once rules are clearly set, they are able to be very efficient. Also the French, in a different way, love heavy codes and wordy laws. For the rest of us, it may seem bizarre, but it is not malignant. Of course, I may be naive.

The European regulatory burden is most noticable in prices and availability. The regulation that is happening happens mainly as long as its mostly out of sight and isn't imposed directly on consumers but manufacturers.

I work in the road construction business (in Estonia) and EU regulations and requierments have pushed up prices constantly as we have to make new investments and creat unnecessary redundancies which wouldn't hold up to any serious cost-benefit analysis. There's also the question of imposing the same regulations for different countries that have different sized industries and financial resources.

You can get the same tasty fruits in the US (just pay more) but not necessarily the cheap stuff that might not taste as good in Europe.

As to shop times and vacations - they differ vastly from country to country, so I'd avoid generalizations there.

"imagine fruits and vegetables that actually tasted like they were supposed to. Imagine good beer, a different good beer in every town. That's Germany, man."

You can have all that on the West Coast, and more than that, women who don't all look like dairy cattle - a mix of faces and languages, not just a few European dialects and then some sullen immigrant ghettos. And better coffee, and real salmon, not that anemic steelhead they call salmon in Europe. All that and a decent work ethic, such as Germany forgot long ago, and a sense of growth and optimism.

women who don't all look like dairy cattle

Oh please Jim, I'm on the West Coast right now. This is a fat, fat country including the women. That's probably why we die before Germans. And you obviously haven't been to SoCal lately. We've got sullen immigrant ghettos galore. Thank god I don't have to commute to LA. But keep drinking that kool-aid.

It's easy to bash the EU mania for hyper-regulation, but in one sense it's the craziness of a fox. To the extent that worldwide standards in a particular industry are expected over time to tend toward greater regulation-- for example, environmental regulations regarding, say, factory emissions-- it makes great economic sense for a nation to get out front of those regulatory changes and create new technologies that can ease the transition for affected industries worldwide. Ironically, this is similar to capitalism's "creative destruction", and it can create entire new industries and many jobs.

There's a very regrettable American tendency to resist such destruction if it has the faintest whiff of environmentalism or regulatory interference: see the foolish refusal of Bill Ford and GM's honchos over the years to get out front of Toyota and Honda in producing hybrid vehicles. Detroit's now more than a day late, and billions of dollars short, in responding to a market opportunity disguised as a regulatory threat. How many other opportunities are American industrial titans missing because of their hostility to regulatory changes that will come sooner or later?

Re. the pissing match between the pro-California and pro-Euro posters (above), it seems obvious to one having lived and worked in both Cali and continental Europe that each lifestyle has its merits. European regulation helps enable a quieter and more sane life, particularly if one is not in a high-growth industry or a customer-facing, highly leveraged position with lots of financial upside for high performers. The typical trade-off here is the same one that Prof. Drezner would face were he to abandon academia and join, say, McKinsey: free time vs greater disposable income. A chacun a son gout.

As to food and women, there's utterly no question that the European approach yields better results. In both cases the US has far superior natural resources but the cultivation is lacking. European women are scrawnier but better turned-out and -coiffed, walk more gracefully, talk less loudly and act less agressively.

As to the diet/fat issue, again, no contest. Any survey of travelers waiting for a domestic flight at a US airport will indicate about 30-40% (on the West Coast) or 40-50% (in the heartland) are seriously obese. The percentage on the Continent is closer in my experience to 15% (more like 25% in the UK). Here too, we could gain a lot by emulating the Euro example.

Mitch,

Pardon my Bay Area bias, but the West Coast begins at at the Kenai Peninsula and ends at Santa Barbara. Southern California was settled by Midwesterners, two generations after coming in from Germany and Scandinavia. Ditto for the immigrant ghettos, beginning with all those white people. Give the Koreans and Vietnamese a generation and see where they settle. LA schools were segregated in the 40's, I understand. On the other hand the Sacramento area has the highest rate of intermarriage in the country, from what I hear, and that is bound to leave any European country in the dust. Lumping these areas together as the "West Coast" is just about meaningless.

"talk less loudly and act less agressively"

You cannot be referring to German women.

I spent close to a decade in Germany - extensive research into the beer situation, and it's drinkable if you happen to like lagers - and about twice that long in the Puget Sound, after growing up in the Bay Area. As for fruits and vegetables, the situtation in Germany is simply grim for about eleven months of the year. I recall nearly being in a car wreck as a passenger when the driver saw a watermelon in a shop window for the first time in his entire tour - the need for boutiques advertising "Suedfruekte" says it all about availability. Things like snow peas, gai lan, bok choy, and taro were simply unavailable; in Nuernberg where we lived, neither a metropolis nor the boondocks, winter squash, sweet potatoes, and cassava were available ony in a military commissary. Apples - maybe one or two varieties; plums - only Damsons. I don't recall ever seeing peaches on offer.

It is pretty senseless to generalize about a country the size of a continent, or about a continent, for that matter. By US do you mean Illinois and Mississippi - or California and Washington; by European women do you mean Germans or Irish?

Obesity rates seem to be going toward the (unacceptable) Anmerican norm in Europe, very sadly.

Jim, my experience of German women (and food) is limited to Berlin, which probably has something of the same relation to the country as New York does to the US. Not representative, I'm sure. As to food, I've never experienced in Europe the shortage of vegetables and fresh foods that you describe, but perhaps that's because my time was spent mainly in places known for their culinary traditions.

It is pretty senseless to generalize about a country the size of a continent, or about a continent, for that matter. By US do you mean Illinois and Mississippi - or California and Washington; by European women do you mean Germans or Irish?

I guess my European data set derives from my experience of France and Switzerland, and to a lesser extent northern Italy, Spain, Berlin and the nordics. And, yes, it's valid to say that European women 1) are slimmer; 2) drink more bottled water and less sugary soft drinks; 3) eat less, and eat better than their US counterparts. Your mileage may vary.

Re the US, of course there are exceptions. From what I've seen, women in New York, San Fran, Austin TX and Boulder CO are on average much more athletic, slim, attractive than women in Dallas or DC or Detroit.

Anyway, the main point is that senseless for each side of the Atlantic to bash the other. There's a great deal we could borrow from from each other, to our mutual benefit.

There's a very regrettable American tendency to resist such destruction if it has the faintest whiff of environmentalism or regulatory interference: see the foolish refusal of Bill Ford and GM's honchos over the years to get out front of Toyota and Honda in producing hybrid vehicles. Detroit's now more than a day late, and billions of dollars short, in responding to a market opportunity disguised as a regulatory threat.

How about Volvo, Mercedes, Fiat and Renault? How many other opportunities are European industrial titans missing because of their desire for unnecessary regulations that they want to protect their domestic markets from competition?

"There's a very regrettable American tendency to resist such destruction if it has the faintest whiff of environmentalism or regulatory interference: see the foolish refusal of Bill Ford and GM's honchos over the years to get out front of Toyota and Honda in producing hybrid vehicles. Detroit's now more than a day late, and billions of dollars short, in responding to a market opportunity disguised as a regulatory threat."

Can't agree with you on this one. First, the Big 3 were focused on meeting California's (now abandoned)"zero-emission" regulations with pure electric vehicles, which, because of their reduced range, long charging times, and heavy, expensive battery packs, were clearly not going to be popular. Second, there is no regulatory push for hybrids -- the Prius is making it on its own, although not until Toyota made it very distinctive looking, so buyers could show off their conspicuous non-consumption. Honda's hybrids, which look ordinary (and don't get great gas mileage) aren't selling very well.

The typical trade-off here is the same one that Prof. Drezner would face were he to abandon academia and join, say, McKinsey: free time vs greater disposable income. A chacun a son gout.

Yes, but the problem is that European hyperregulation leads to stagnant economies; while Dan can choose academia or McKinsey, Europeans by and large can't. The "Free time" is forced collectively; it isn't a matter of taste.

Glad to see you've arbitrarily shucked everything south of Santa Barbara off of the West Coast, Jim. My own feeling is that Sacramento might as well be Illinois, its so far inland.

Anyone who wants to start waxing eloquent about how the EU is overregulated vis-a-vis America has never read the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled "hot or not" flamewar over German women. I, personally, come down on the side of hot.

If your population is shrinking, why do you need "growth" this is really right, of course.

Nina said:

If your population is shrinking, why do you need "growth" this is really right, of course.

Public policy ponzi schemes need increasing population to remain hidden. Shrinking population growth is going to show some of our self deceptions. Should be fasinating even though painful.

Corrections taken re the Big 3 and hybrids-- not the best example, as there was no regulatory push for hybrids. I suppose the best policy-- assuming that Matt Simmons is right about Saudi fudging of the reserve numbers-- when the oil price approaches $100/bbl will be to subsidize GM and Ford's production of hybrids with proceeds from some sort of national sales tax tied to vehicles' gas mileage. Before conservative knees start a-jerkin' on this, note that this is the prudent national security approach, as Prius-driving former CIA Director James Woolsey will attest.

Yes, but the problem is that European hyperregulation leads to stagnant economies; while Dan can choose academia or McKinsey, Europeans by and large can't. The "Free time" is forced collectively; it isn't a matter of taste

"Forced"? You mean that European McKinseyites, investment bankers, software salesmen, telco entrepreneurs, real estate brokers etc are actually prevented from working long hours? The difference isn't regulatory but cultural. Ironically, it's Europe that's more child- and family-friendly on this matter.

Even the French horror story example of inspectors patrolling cubicles at 5:30pm for lawbreaking workaholics is more honored in the breach: I know of no instance where this ever happened at my former French multinational employer.

However, it was clear that the French employees were more efficient than those of us in the US, mainly because the notion of tweaking a powerpoint presentation for the 37th time into the late night ran against cultural norms of decency and common sense. By the same token, employees in Texas tended to be more efficient than those in New York because family comes first in Dallas, Austin and Houston.

In any case, I suspect that when telecommuting and working from home-- which are growing at the rate of ca 17% per year, ie doubling every four years-- become more entrenched, America will finally offer private sector professionals a more normal, ie more European, work-life balance.

"Glad to see you've arbitrarily shucked everything south of Santa Barbara off of the West Coast, Jim. "

Hardly original to me; read Nine Nations of North Ameirca, which came out back in the 70's, and hardly arbitrary - that boundary has been in place for thousands of years. Chumash settlement stopped in Ventura County, and from there all the way to San Diego was Uto-Aztecan speakers of Takic, which makes the area linguistically and culturally part of the Soutwest and Nevada more than California.

"My own feeling is that Sacramento might as well be Illinois, its so far inland."

The distances involved are similar to the difference between Paris and Moscow. Quite a reach.

SOmeone mentioned population growth. Another way in which the picture of Europe we get on this side of the pond is distorted is the presentation of stats on fertility. Glenn Reynolds likes to believe that fertility is negatively correlated with state intervention. The truth is the opposite. Anyone care to guess which west European nations have the highest fertility rates? Here are the EU leaders (EU average fertility is 1.5 births per woman), all of which intervene heavily in the family realm:

1. Ireland 1.99 (heavy state intervention via the state-supported and -established Irish Catholic Church)

2. France 1.90 (heavy state intervention via tax bonuses, generous family leave, work-life balance regulations)

3. Norway 1.81 (similar to French state interventionist model)

4. Finland 1.80 (similar to French state interventionist model)

5. Sweden 1.75 (similar to French state interventionist model)

If we include Iceland (fertility rate of 2.03), the picture becomes even clearer: it appears that state intervention in support of families, whether the nation is Catholic or Protestant, economically liberal or economically interventionist, increases a nation's fertility rate.

Within the EU, note that the laggards are countries that have IIUC only weak state intervention on behalf of families; previously in these (mainly southern European) nations, family support was left to the Church which, given the decline of faith in those nations, now has little influence on child-bearing decisions by those populations. The state has yet to fill the void left by the Church's decline.

Rank among the (west European) EU 15:
15. Greece 1.29
14. Spain 1.32
13. Italy 1.33

Finally, re. Eastern Europe by far the worst of a bad lot is Russia. That Russia's fertility rate is far lower than that of any of its peers is testimony to the near-total collapse in the Russian state's effectiveness during and after the privatization era. Putin is a thug but he's at least cognizant that there can be no restoration of his people's confidence in the future without the strengthening and improvement of that complete shambles that is the post-soviet Russian state (cf the Huntington thesis in "Political Order").

Why do conservatives not support greater state intervention on behalf of U.S. families, which are struggling with far greater burdens than single Americans face? Whatever happened to Ben Wattenberg's catch-phrase, "help the puppies, not the yuppies"?

Link to Eurostat data:
http://tinyurl.com/rz2ud

Link to a BBC survey of family policy and demographic trends in France, Norway and Sweden, demographic collapse in Iberia and Italy etc: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4837422.stm

Actually, a correction about Russia: the huge tide of petrodollars washing across Russia since 2000 has changed Russian attitudes toward the future, hence toward child-bearing, and reversed the fertility trend that was apparent throughout the 1990s (when I was there). Obviously, one of the biggest drivers of fertility is economic growth (which is both cause and effect). But the point remains that targeted state intervention helps, not harms, fertility rates.

IMHO it would help this nation greatly if we were to cease stigmatizing every type of European statist intervention and examine, on a country-by-country basis, what works and what doesn't. Several European nations-- the nordics, Holland in particular-- combine significant labor flexibility, high growth AND heavy state intervention and regulation. The Euro picture is a lot more complex than one would infer from the crude stereotypes perpetrated by US bloggers and pundits.

thibaud´s argument that heavy, intrusive, expensive regulation acts as a dynamo, as a growth factor, generating change and progress, sounds to me - bizarre. If regulatory burden causes economic developement, then why Europe is stagnant? Change seems to happen mostly in wild frontiers, on the unregulated margins, undiscovered yet by the bureaucrat.

Regarding European dairy cattle, have you been in Budapest? Szép a kislány ...

Jaimito, why is there such dynamism in places like Finland, which are far, far more heavily regulated and taxed than the US? (Hint: note that those same nations that favor fertility tend to also have excellent educational systems.)

I didn't say that all intervention is positively correlated with higher growth. Likewise, I reject the notion that all intervention is negatively correlated with higher growth. Again, the picture is complex. Individual countries' experience varies. There are many types of intervention, some of which hurt growthand dynamism, some of which aid growth and dynamism, and some of which are worthwhile regardless of their impact on growth and dynamism.

If you want to point to specific policies in specific countries, I'm happy to listen. Otherwise, you're just reinforcing the US blogosphere's abysmally low signal-to-noise ratio on matters European.

I think thibaud raises some interesting points. First, I think some of the extremely low fertility we see in Southern Europe is a statistical artifact from a transition from early childbearing to a society were women putting of childbearing till later in life. That said, there is a problem. The Scandanavian countries dealt with this --with partial success-- earlier in creating programs which support working mothers (more childcare, mandated maternity leave, etc) . I would say another advantage was their relative ethnic homogenity (until lately) which gave the welfare state the underpinnings of ethnic solidarity. The upshot is that indeed, state action can help reverse dangerous declines in fertility.

some of the extremely low fertility we see in Southern Europe is a statistical artifact from a transition from early childbearing to a society were women putting of childbearing till later in life

Absolutely right. Feminism, specifically women having careers, hit southern Europe later than in the north. Some demographers think this implies that southern Europe will in the next decade or two reverse the decline as they learn to accomodate women's entry into the professional workforce. One problem with this analysis, I think, is that presumably the (previously paternalistic and macho) Irish also have seen a sharp increase in the number of professional women and some increase in delayed child-bearing during their own period of rapid economic growth-- and yet their fertility rate is the highest in the EU. I don't have all the data but I'd have to assume that generously pro-family church/government intervention and cultural norms have made Ireland a leader and the mediterranean Euros laggards on this. There are Europeans, and there are Europeans.

Regarding regulation triggering growth, I want to bring up one example in favour of thibauld. Germany in the nineties imposed the world's most rigorous water and wastewater standards, with the idea that this will make Germany into a leader in the exploding global environmental industry. The price or this (sometimes absurd) regulation was (and is being) paid by the German consumer and industries where water is an important input. In Koln I have seen water bills of 7 - 8 dollar per cubic meter. On the other hand, Siemens has become the world largest supplier of environmental equipment and services, but it was done by buying American companies. I dont know if regulation as an industrial policy works, I think it is more an expression of the collective thinking of the nation. Germans, for example, love regulation. At trade meetings, they avidly discuss the latest developments in regulation and how to implement them. For some regulatory standards there is yet no technical solution, and they love the challenge. The approach reigning in my country, how to evade any additional restriction, is simply unthinkable for Germans. On the other hand, thibauld, regulators and other State central planners are bad for the economy.