It's terrifying, but practically every company that has contacted me in recent weeks has been offering to make us "compliant" with some new EU/state regulation: 1. One company contacted me asking whether we ship goods within the EU and whether we need help with the new PPWR "packaging" regulation. 2. Another company asked whether we already have an e-invoicing provider — and if not, we could do it through them. 3. Companies have been contacting me for years offering GDPR compliance. 4. Every now and then I get calls asking whether we provide mandatory "health care" for our employees. 5. Even though we ARE an IT security company, companies keep contacting me because of NIS2, asking whether we want an external security manager. 6. Consultants have already called asking whether we need ESG / CSRD reporting (sustainability reporting). 7. Last week yet another company reached out asking whether we need to update our "transfer pricing" documentation because of some changes in the law. What do all these companies and their services have in common? Their business is built on some state regulation. Outside the EU, nobody would voluntarily order their services. In the EU, you have to — because the law requires it. In economic theory, this is called rent-seeking: entirely new business sectors created without producing any real value — the only "value" is being compliant with some state regulation. They say the total tax burden in Slovakia is 64%. I'd argue it's substantially higher. EU companies have to pay for things that make no sense outside the EU and that nobody there would ever order without regulatory pressure. In my view, half of the costs European companies bear are compliance costs for some European/state regulation. And then we wonder why we're not competitive with the rest of the world. When you think about it, it's absolutely brutal. Doing business in the EU is masochism. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rent-s…

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