Media

In Economic.bg, IME’s chief economist Lachezar Bogdanov highlighted that the European Parliament has once again blocked a key opportunity for freer trade and stronger EU growth by rejecting the Mercosur agreement. He stressed that Europe needs to move away from excessive regulation and embrace economic freedom if it wants to boost prosperity amid near-zero growth in the eurozone and rising global competition.

In Dnevik, IME showcased a new manifesto called ‘Deregulation, not Simplification’ which focuses on measurable, tangible steps to reduce bureaucracy at both national and European level, while promoting competitiveness and dynamic market systems. By embracing market-oriented reforms, digital innovation and smarter regulation, governments can unlock Europe's full economic potential.

In Dnevik, IME showcased a new manifesto called ‘Deregulation, not Simplification’ which focuses on measurable, tangible steps to reduce bureaucracy at both national and European level, while promoting competitiveness and dynamic market systems. By embracing market-oriented reforms, digital innovation and smarter regulation, governments can unlock Europe's full economic potential.

Carlo Stagnaro of Istituto Bruno Leoni argues in Il Foglio that while EU digital regulations often burden innovation, abolishing the Union would worsen fragmentation and reduce freedoms. Evidence shows EU membership safeguards expression better than in illiberal states like Hungary, with many tech restrictions stemming from national governments, not Brussels. Historically, integration has boosted growth through liberalisation and competition – making Musk’s call to dismantle the EU counterproductive.

A new EPICENTER project shows that the quality of EU legislation is sharply declining: directives are increasingly verbose and syntactically complex, with sentences averaging nearly 39 words – well beyond plain-language recommendations. This growing obscurity, worsened by European Parliament amendments, drives up compliance costs, creates legal uncertainty and acts as a hidden tax on innovation. Clearer law-making, the analysis concludes, is vital for European growth.

KEFiM – an EPICENTER member think tank – analysed 190 Greek laws and 61 EU directives from 2022–2024, finding Greek legislation far bulkier: average 54 articles over 60 pages versus 49 articles and 25 pages for EU directives. Consultations are rushed at 16 days (EU: 84 days), while only 10% of Greek impact assessments quantify effects (EU: 65%). In 2025, Greece enacted 85 laws totalling 5,217 pages, with 71% including unrelated provisions, exacerbating complexity, implementation issues and transparency gaps.

Greek laws are longer, consultations shorter, and impact assessments almost never quantified, according to KEFiM's new study. The findings mirror EPICENTER's EU Regulatory Quality Index (EU-RQI), which examined 2022-2024 EU directives and found that excessive complexity, missing economic analyses in impact assessments, and poor implementation practices explain persistent delays and compliance deficits across member states.

KEFiM research: Greek laws average 60 pages vs 25 for EU directives; consultation periods are six times shorter; only 10% of impact assessments contain figures. The study complements EPICENTER's EU Regulatory Quality Index (EU-RQI), which scored EU regulatory quality at 66.9/100 and documented how regulatory overload creates the highest burdens in countries with weaker implementation capacity like Greece.

KEFiM's study of legislative quality finds Greek laws excessively long, poorly consulted and riddled with unrelated articles. The research directly references EPICENTER's EU Regulatory Quality Index (EU-RQI), which evaluated EU directives and found that sentences averaging twice the recommended length, incomplete impact assessments, and poor implementation create systemic transparency deficits that affect all member states.