For Europe, the stakes are almost existential. How can we avoid relegation to the club of second-rate countries? This soft underbelly of followers, condemned to adopt the standards and technologies of the winners of this new century, notably the United States and China. In a thick report – nearly 400 pages – submitted on September 9 to the President of the Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, Mario Draghi, the former President of the European Central Bank and former President of the Italian Council, details at length the reasons for Europe’s decline: stagnant productivity, sluggish innovation, forced investment… All of these factors explain why real income has grown almost half as fast in Europe as across the Atlantic since 2000. A relative impoverishment, painless in the short term, unsustainable over decades.
Reversing the trend means investing a lot – really a lot more! – of money. Between 750 and 800 billion euros, more than the Marshall Plan envelope in the aftermath of the Second World War, argues Mario Draghi, who defends the idea of a new major European loan. Except that, with the exception of France and Italy, this martingale does not appeal today to Ursula von der Leyen or the chancelleries of the other Member States.
“Already use up the money available from the previous major loan, the one launched in February 2021 in the aftermath of the first wave of Covid,” the Commission President replied in essence. Of the approximately €720 billion available from Brussels by 2026, only €213 billion have been released halfway through by the Member States, according to a recent study by the European Court of Auditors. Above all, only half of the sums paid have apparently reached the accounts of the final beneficiaries.
Finally, the Twenty-Seven have still not agreed on the tax revenues to be found to repay the bill. Carbon tax, tax on financial transactions, tax on digital giants? The clock is ticking and this question will poison discussions on the outlines and size of the future European budget. If Emmanuel Macron supports the roadmap of the former Italian Prime Minister, he no longer has the political weight of four years ago to make his voice heard, while France’s public accounts are in disarray. Like many others, the Draghi plan could well join the graveyard of lost reports.