The Consequences

The Wall Street Journal posted an article today about Britain’s vote to leave the European Union. As many Americans are looking at their losses in the stock market today and wondering what is coming next, we all need to step back and take a deep breath.

The article reports:

The United Kingdom has always had Europe’s most robust democracy, and with Thursday’s vote to leave the European Union it has given its Continental peers a powerful example of the meaning of popular rule. Now we’ll see if the British have the wisdom to make the best use of their historic choice.

The article reminds us that Britain is the second largest and most dynamic economy in the European Union. The exit of Britain will probably cause more problems for the European Union than it does for Britain.

The article reminds us of some of the mistakes made by the European Union:

If the EU wants to prevent other countries from catching the Brexit bug, our advice is to avoid the temptation to punish the U.K. with an arduous renegotiation of terms for its re-entry into the common market. The perception of EU high-handedness is what alienates public opinion across the Continent. Brexit ought to be the wake-up call the EU needs to return to serving as a common market that encourages growth and competition, and not—as it has become since the late 1980s—an innovation-killing superstate obsessed with regulatory harmonization, tax hikes, green-energy dogma and anticompetitive antitrust enforcement.

People don’t vote to leave organizations that are well run and respect their freedom. The Brexit vote is the result of the actions of the European Union. It will be interesting to see if the European Union learns the lessons they need to learn before more countries exit.