Fiscally conservative countries (Germany, the Netherlands and others in the Frugal Four) in the EU have for a long time preached countries must "balance their budgets". Now Germany balanced too hard and didn't invest enough, their car companies are experiencing a decline while the Chinese companies are growing, and the rest of their industry got addicted to cheap gas which isn't available anymore. The UK left the EU. And the EU is incapable of creating large tech companies.