>The Euro took away the single most painful thing still plaguing travel between EU countries.
In other words, it took away one insignificant burden on travelling, something which people do a best a few weeks a year, and in exchange it devastated their jobs and communities, for which they depend on survival (and for having the money to travel) all year long...
>These days an EU citizen can up and leave to a different EU country with very little friction
Yes, and usually with tears in their eyes, because they're forced to leave their country, culture, friends and close family to go work on some country that did better. Often even at 40 years old or later, and after their job in their own country crushed, because (among other things) of the Euro. The saddest songs in most southern countries are about migrating.
The kind of migration you describe is only a good thing (and a chosen option) for more privileged people who chose to do it and can chose to live where they want at a whim -- not for the millions merely forced to go find work elsewhere.
>which was the idea
Yeah, just not an idea that people asked for -- just the dream of the elites that created and pushed for it.
Human migration is not some new 21st century phenomenon. Humanity has been migrating in search of food, peace, and (later) jobs since before civilization. The poorest of the most desperate poor have migrated not even because of those Maslovian needs but for religion: "The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you"" (Genesis 12).
The US suffers from the same problem. The rural interior has dropped out, towns have turned into ghost towns, and instead of picking up and moving for greener pastures, people cling to hope that their livelihoods will return.
They won't. The wheels of capitalism are ruthless. The market forces capital to become more efficient over time, and capital has left in search of higher efficiency. People can stay behind and wither or get with the program and move and thrive.
Freedom of movement in the EU is so precious precisely because it offers the choice to avoid desolation, to not be stuck in a place with no opportunity and no future. A unified currency is precious precisely because it is a store of wealth that transports across the Union without loss or risk of sudden inflation. If people decide not to make these choices that is their fault and theirs alone. It's not easy to pick up and move to a new place with a new language - I've done it myself - but it is very, very much doable, and the world's poorest do it every day, picking up and moving to the US/EU in search of opportunities which were completely absent in their home countries.
>Human migration is not some new 21st century phenomenon. Humanity has been migrating in search of food, peace, and (later) jobs since before civilization.
Well, slavery and poverty aren't new either, but at some point it would be good we'd left them behind.
Migration by reasoned choice is OK -- forced mass migration for man-made causes (war, unemployment, wealth distribution, kleptocracy, ecological disaster, etc) is bad, and we should fix its causes.
>They won't. The wheels of capitalism are ruthless. The market forces capital to become more efficient over time, and capital has left in search of higher efficiency.
Well, I don't believe in bending over to blind forces of nature. That is a regression to primitivism, when we made altars of forces like the thunder or rain that we could not control.
I believe in people actively shaping their future and their societies, and not just by reacting to some "market forces".
Capital would have us all live in slums and lick our master's boots if they could absolutely have its way.
>Freedom of movement in the EU is so precious precisely because it offers the choice to avoid desolation, to not be stuck in a place with no opportunity and no future.
Until now, the EU was enforced, and follows the politics, that precisely create this desolation, and turns countries into places "with no opportunity and no future".
Not playing that musical chairs game is the wiser choice.
In other words, it took away one insignificant burden on travelling, something which people do a best a few weeks a year, and in exchange it devastated their jobs and communities, for which they depend on survival (and for having the money to travel) all year long...
>These days an EU citizen can up and leave to a different EU country with very little friction
Yes, and usually with tears in their eyes, because they're forced to leave their country, culture, friends and close family to go work on some country that did better. Often even at 40 years old or later, and after their job in their own country crushed, because (among other things) of the Euro. The saddest songs in most southern countries are about migrating.
The kind of migration you describe is only a good thing (and a chosen option) for more privileged people who chose to do it and can chose to live where they want at a whim -- not for the millions merely forced to go find work elsewhere.
>which was the idea
Yeah, just not an idea that people asked for -- just the dream of the elites that created and pushed for it.