Economic-union Books

Europe Recast: A History Of European Union is the true saga of people's attempts to bring together the will of Europe as a whole, from the first struggling attempts at economic integration to the formation of the European Union. The writing style is scholarly without being overly pedantic, and detailed without losing its central themes in a morass of trivia. A straightfoward, scholarly history, examining events, motives, philosophies, and results, Europe Recast is highly recommended for students, scholars, researchers, and government policy makers.

This is the book to put into the hands of anybody who still thinks that Economic and Monetary Union would be good for Britain or for any other country. John Mills is a very rare person, an economist with business experience in trade and production. In this excellent book, he shows that Economic and Monetary Union would be bad for all our economies.

Experience shows that the more economically integrated the European Union has become, the worse it has performed. From its start in 1958, the original six members had no form of economic or monetary union, and they grew by 5.4% a year. Then in 1972 they created the currency snake; it lasted only until 1976. By 1974, economic growth had ceased. After the snake expired, growth resumed: 4.9% in 1976, 3% in 1977-80.

They created the Exchange Rate Mechanism in 1979 and it lasted until 1993. The ERM slowed growth and raised unemployment across the EU: growth was only 1.7% a year; unemployment averaged 7% and inflation 7.8%. Even so, we joined, because the whole establishment wanted us to, not because the people wanted to. Polls in 1989 showed that 93% of the Chief Executives of large British companies and City institutions believed that we should join the ERM. We joined in October 1990: during our two-year membership unemployment rose by 1.4 million and national output fell; manufacturing output fell by 7% and manufacturing jobs by 14%. It was worse for us even than for the rest of the EU.

In the same period, the rest of the world grew by 3.2%, proving that the EU's slow growth was not due to world conditions. The ERM was the main cause of the EU-wide recession: from 1990 to 1993, growth ceased altogether. After ERM expired, growth resumed: 2.9% in 1994, 2.4% in 1995. But implementing the Maastricht criteria for EMU slowed growth again and raised unemployment. EU unemployment is now 12%, 30 million, according to ILO figures.

What would entering Economic and Monetary Union mean for us? It would mean deflation, higher unemployment, slump. It would also mean the end of Britain's independence. Politics and economics are indivisible. The arguments for constitutional, economic and political independence are one. The experiment of making the Bank of England independent has clearly failed: we should call on the Government to reassert control of interest rates. This is a political demand, a constitutional demand, and an economic demand.

Under EMU, eight unelected European Central Bankers would control our currency, and as Keynes said, "Whoever controls the currency, controls the Government." To make EMU credible to the markets, they would keep interest rates high, imposing deflation. This would mean higher unemployment and taxes, lower wages and lower public spending.

The Gold Standard was a way of trying to fix currency values together. It failed disastrously, ending in the Great Crash. Economic growth ceased. After the Gold Standard expired, growth resumed. In 1931, Britain left the Gold Standard, devaluing by 24%; money supply rose by 34%; interest rates were about zero, and there was some tariff protection. Labour's `Iron Chancellor' Philip Snowden said leaving the Gold Standard "would reduce the standard of living of the workman by 50%." What actually happened? From 1932 to 1937, manufacturing output rose 58%; 2.7 million new jobs were created (1.3 million in manufacturing); growth averaged 3.8% a year, and living standards rose. Lower interest rates brought a boom in house-building.

By contrast, the French Government stayed in the Gold Standard and kept the franc overvalued: GDP fell by 17%, industrial production by a quarter, until the Popular Front Government devalued the franc.

This Government claims that the way to restore industry's competitiveness is to invest in skill. But this will not restore manufacturing while there is still not enough demand in the economy. The present regime of tight money and high interest rates, leading to a high exchange rate, doesn't work. It's like putting on the brakes when you're going up hill. An overpriced pound means dear exports and cheap imports: in the first quarter of 1998, our goods trade gap was £4.7 billion, the worst since 1990.

The remedy does not lie in reforming the labour market or the public sector. To stimulate output and employment, we need more demand, higher wages and more public spending. Supply-side reforms, better education, more information technology, may improve efficiency and productivity, but without an expansion of demand this can lead not to growth but to more unemployment and unused resources.

The Maastricht Treaty which set up EMU has only money and budget targets, there are no real world targets, for full employment or higher growth. It is innately deflationary: those not meeting the targets must deflate, yet those meeting them do not have to reflate. A Treaty cannot be reformed; it can only be accepted or rejected. Sir Nigel Wicks, Chair of the EU Monetary Committee says, "I would not regard monetary policy as an instrument for solving unemployment." We who have experienced decades of monetarism in action regard that as an understatement. EMU is monetarism on a European scale; it is Thatcherism on a European scale.

We need lower interest rates to fund projects fitting in to our plans for rebuilding Britain. We need lower taxes on jobs. We need taxes on capital: tax Murdoch, not toady to him. We need to legislate so that pension funds, which are heavily subsidised by taxpayers, are required to invest in British industry and services. The Government could promote investments with a high social rate of return. We need to reimpose controls on speculators. But we can't do these jobs when in EMU: EMU forbids them all.

We need to keep out of EMU. Joining would clearly be bad for our health. Then we will rebuild Britain as a self-reliant, industrial and sovereign nation.

John Pinder is a major authority in the literature of the European Union and its evolution from the European Coal and Steel Community. Pinder, traces the history of Western Europe after the Second World War. He describes the accounts of the Europeans as they deal with post war life and the zealousness of creating an institution that would becaome the European union of today. From the small roots of the ECSC to the expansion into the social aspects of life to poltical expasnion and to geographical exspanion, Pinder gives detailed expalations. I highly recommend this book.

This is a very useful handbook for practitioners and teachers in antritust matters. This volume contents a complete overview of the european common legislation and the principles that orient the national antitrust laws in Europe. The organization of the information makes it an systemait and valuable reference to people starting in this area. The references to the jurisprudence and doctrine produced during the last 40 years is also useful and helpful. It is one of the top books regarding a systematic study about the requirements to analyze monopolistic practices. It is very useful to find differences between the US system and the european approach to the antitrust cases. Another area that is develop properly, is the relationship between antotrust an another fields like intellectual property, national jurisdiction and civil law.

I think this book explains very well how the economic integration in the Europe affects on the Korean consumer electronics firms. In particular, the empirical survey is very useful for not only Korean firms but also firms in other less developed countries, which consider to make FDIs in the Europe.

This book is very important for my research project, it's a key book, nice book, smart book ... ah ... delicious book! When you read it your body is electrisizing, you almost feel orgasm.
Read this book everybody!!!

Member countries of the EU are inevitably forming an increasingly integrated society. This integration has extended to the field of planning as well. The European Spatial Development Perspective, which was developed to address planning issues across the continent, is analyzed and documented in this book, based on a symposium led by Faludi in 2001. The essays in the volume should be of interest to planners in America, as we face many of the same problems and issues that our European counterparts are dealing with--sprawl, congestion, environmental concerns, inner-city economic decline--and as we figure out how to cross local, state, and regional boundaries for effective decision-making and consensus-building. What is striking to me is that, in this age of global competition, the EU is now actively dealing with spatial planning and development--something US politicians and leaders are slower in doing. I found Faludi's volume intriguing and the subject well worth investigating.

An introduction to the European Union for general readers and students. Focusing on events since the Maastricht Treaty, but also putting them in historical context, traces how the separate countries formed the earlier organizations that have progressively merged into one big union. The sections cover history and context, politics, economics, and law.

From back cover:

"'The European Union: Economics, Policies and History is designed to appeal to a broad range of people studying the European Union. By using a combination of economics, politics and history the author is able to give the reader a strong grounding in European integration and why and how policies are put in place.

Table of Contents:

1 - Intro to European Integration
2 - Brief History of European Integration
3 - Decision-Making Institutions of the European Union
4 - Basic Instruments: The Theory of Trade and the EU
5 - The Economics of Integration
6 - From the Single Market to the 'New Europe'
7 - Movement of Labor, Immigration and Asylum
8 - The Long Road to Economic and Monetary Union
9 - The EU Budget
10 - The Common Agricultural Policy
11 - Fisheries Policy
12 - Environmental and Energy Policies
13 - Regional Policy
14 - Social and Employment Policies
15 - Competition and Industrial Polcies
16 - Transport Policy
17 - The EU and the GATT/WTO
18 - EU Trade and Aid Policies
19 - The Common Foreign and Security Policy
20 - EU Enlargement

David Montgomery analyzes the United States between 1865-1925 in terms of the conflicting social classes that fought for control of industry and labor relations. He argues that class consciousness permeated all levels of social interaction both inside and outside of the workplace. Labor struggles with management about working conditions, wages, and for control of the shop floor. Montgomery focuses on the workers' lives in his investigation of this battle.

Montgomery delineates three different type of workers in the nineteenth century. Skilled workers, such as iron puddlers, maintained a degree of control over the workplace because of their specialized knowledge. Common laborers, such as railroad builders, provided the muscle that shaped industrial America. They exerted power because industry depended on them to survive. Operatives, or unskilled laborers such as textile workers, filled an interum position. Mostly women, these workers operated under a piecework system and possessed limited power over their jobs. The changes in industrial society reduced the power of skilled craftsmen and swelled the ranks of operatives.

Industry used a variety of methods to transform the workplace in order to marginalize skilled workers and increase the numbers of more easily controlled operatives. Scientific management served to explain, guide, and justify this transformation. Scientific management separated the mental component of commodity production from the actual work. This separation de-skilled workers and decreased their control over the industrial environment. The open-shop drive consolidated middle class opposition to the workers. Their hostility led to the inability of workers to enact reform legislation to remedy managerial encroachments into the shop floor. Welfare capitalism diverted workers attention from collective action and solidified their support for the company rather than class consciousness. Montgomery deplores scientific management, the open-shop, and welfare capitalism because they detracted from labor's traditional control in the workplace and limited their response to the problems of industrialization.