Adopted in Vilnius, Lithuania on the 12th of September, 2013
During the conference “Preserving the Four Freedoms”
RESOLUTION
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The pursuit of success, happiness and wealth, work ethic, personal responsibility for individual fortune and communal wellbeing are the driving forces behind the prosperity of Europe, this could not have been achieved without the freedom of individuals. Europe became wealthy through peaceful, voluntary cooperation and the creativity of individuals.
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Currently Europe faces challenges. It is lagging behind the other regions in economic growth rates. For the first time in a long time wealth has stopped increasing. GDP per capita has stopped growing. Similarly, the EU has failed to catch up in competitiveness with the USA or the developed Asian countries.
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Many of the current problems in Europe are a result of over-regulation, extensive welfare states and inflexible labour markets, which erode competitiveness and sap economic growth. These problems are augmented by the fiscal irresponsibility of many generations of politicians, as well as reluctance to reform expensive and extensive sectors of economy, e.g. pensions, healthcare, and education. Postponing reforms, borrowing heavily, and shifting the burden onto future generations is unsustainable.
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The Eurozone debt crisis was further increased by design flaws in the Stability and Growth Pact, and by excessive credit at low interest rates to peripheral countries that made current market adjustments unavoidable.
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The European project was based on freedoms to work, trade, and invest regardless of national borders. Freedom to work, trade, and invest creates wealth and enables welfare.
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We strongly believe that an overall decline in personal responsibility, decline of entrepreneurship and over-reliance on the state are some of the key factors behind the current situation. Europe’s problems stem largely from a lack of personal initiative. Therefore we, the undersigned state and propose.
1. Europe would benefit from less welfare, less regulation and less government intervention; Europeans need more labour market flexibility and more market friendly policies. People, businesses and governments would gain from deep structural reforms designed to solve long-term imbalances and improve the competiveness of their economies.
2. European politicians have to assume responsibility for the mismanagement of the public sector and stop shifting the ever increasing costs onto taxpayers. Taxpayers cannot continue financing entire government controlled and tax-financed systems such as PAYGO pension system, health care and education. Politicians need to reform government-run sectors: improve management, reduce expenditure and cut excesses and inefficiencies.
3. National governments as well as the European bodies should base their policies on freedoms and liberties, not on curtailing and restricting peoples’ initiative. Creation of new “rights” based on restricting other peoples’ freedoms, results in the reduction of peoples’ natural and inalienable rights to liberty, wealth and happiness.
Lithuanian Free Market Institute (LFMI), Lithuania │Research Centre for Innovation and Economic Growth (RNH), Iceland │ F. A. Hayek Foundation, Slovakia│Civil Development Forum (FOR), Poland │Juan de Mariana Institute, Spain │Bruno Leoni Institute (ibl), Italy │Institute of Economic and Social Studies (INESS), Slovakia │Institute for Market Economics (IME), Bulgaria │ Institute for Research in Economic and Fiscal Issues (IREF), France │New Direction – the Foundation for European Reform, Belgium │ Centre for Economic and Market Analyses (CETA), Czech Republic│
