United States Draining the EU’s Business Potential, Says Expert

“The trade war between the European Union and the United States has reached a new level. Joe Biden has said it outright: Europe can only rely on itself,” said Olivér Hortay, head of energy and climate policy at conservative think tank Századvég, in a video posted on his Facebook page. According to the expert, the US is ruthlessly exploiting the potential of a weakening Europe.

In January, one of the biggest subsidy programs in US history came into force, aimed at luring green, innovative – partly European – companies overseas, said Olivér Hortay in his video. He added that as the European Union loses more and more energy-intensive companies to high energy prices, the companies that were previously subsidized here have already started to leave, companies that are now becoming productive and on which the EU has built its future.

The details of the US package and its likely impact have been known for more than half a year, but EU leaders have so far done nothing to stop it, beyond threatening statements and big-hearted promises.

They may have hoped that the World Trade Organization would intervene or that the Biden administration would ease the conditions out of friendship, although the latter is a rather naive assumption in the light of American LNG prices,

the expert pointed out.

But a recent statement has now highlighted that the US has no intention of helping the situation and Europe. Hortay said: “It has become clear that the problem will not solve itself. US President Joe Biden’s senior adviser John Podesta, who is in charge of the mentioned program, got tired of European leaders complaining and said flatly that they would not apologize for spending Americans’ taxes for the benefit of Americans.”

The US President’s consultant says it is time for Europe to take responsibility for developing its own industry, because the Biden administration is interested in American jobs, not European jobs. As the expert pointed out,

Podesta already takes it as a fact that a large proportion of green industrial products are produced in the US, and sees Europe as a buyer at best.

The US administration’s attitude is understandable, Hortay says, because they have been mandated by their electorate to represent America’s interests. What is more difficult to explain is how it is possible that EU leaders have so far hoped that the US would, out of friendship, fairness, or who knows what else, give up its own economic interests for the sake of Europe. This was nonsense before, but in the light of the new declaration, it is no longer valid, emphasized the expert.

The time for excuses and threatening statements is over. We must act, and act quickly, because the EU’s competitiveness is declining with every day of inaction. Even our most important ally, America, is now making it clear that Europe will not be saved. Either it turns on its heels and starts pursuing a self-interested economic policy, or it will disappear into the abyss of history, Hortay concluded.

Meanwhile, it is not only the EU and the US that are currently in an economic dispute, but also Hungary and the US. As Hungary Today reported earlier, the United States of America notified Hungary on July 8 last year that it would unilaterally terminate its double taxation treaty with Hungary with effect from January 8, 2023. The provisions of the US-Hungarian tax treaty on the avoidance of double taxation can still be applied to tax assessments until December 31, 2022. There are no changes in the tax treatment of income earned until the end of this year, however, meaning big changes are coming to the taxation system next year.

Featured photo via Pixabay