Part I — The Vision

The question no one asks any more

Why are we no longer great?

This question is virtually taboo in the current European debate. We may speak of “resilience”, of “adapting to a changing world”, of “sustainability” and “inclusion”. But the simple question — why a continent that led the world for five hundred years has surrendered its position in the space of fifty — is not asked. And if someone does ask it, they are dismissed as nostalgic, extreme or dangerous.

I ask the question here, openly. Why are we no longer great? And, more importantly: why should we not be able to become so again?

This piece is an answer in three parts. First, the vision: what Europe could look like in 2050 if we make the right choices. Then the diagnosis: why we have declined to this point. Then the evidence: one symptom — the false poverty debate — analysed in figures. And finally: what you and I can do.

This is not an academic piece. This is a call to action. Anyone who reads these words and believes them to be right should not nod silently. They should speak, write, vote and build. We have one, perhaps two generations in which to reverse the damage wrought by fifty years of destruction. After that, Europe will no longer be salvageable.

Where we came from

In 1945, Europe lay in ruins. Cities destroyed. Factories bombed. Millions dead. Millions displaced. A continent that had led the world for a hundred years had been reduced by two world wars to a smoking ruin. The United States was the new superpower. Soviet Russia threatened from the east. The colonial empire was crumbling. Everything was lost.

And then, in the twenty-five years that followed, something happened that is scarcely known in world history.

From 1948 to 1973, the West European economy grew faster than ever before or since. Germany achieved its “Wirtschaftswunder” — an economic miracle that transformed the country in twenty years from an occupied landscape of ruins into the world’s third-largest economy. Italy went from an agricultural backwater to an industrial power. France recovered and modernised. The Netherlands built the Delta Works, one of the world’s most ambitious engineering projects. Belgium, Austria, Switzerland, Scandinavia — everywhere, the same explosion of prosperity, technology and culture.

The disposable income of an average household doubled between 1960 and 1980. Unemployment in Switzerland: below 1%. In West Germany too. The Netherlands: around 1%. France: 2%. For the first time in human history, ordinary working families could go on holiday, send their children to university and afford a home.

We built Airbus. We built Concorde. We built Ariane. We built CERN. We built the first container ships, the first high-speed trains, the first nuclear-power programmes. We built European cooperation that was once visionary.

European scientists won Nobel Prizes. European companies — Philips, Siemens, Fiat, Volkswagen, Nestlé, Shell, Bayer, Michelin — were world leaders in their sectors. European art, literature, film and music were leading the world. European cities were the most desirable in the world. European universities attracted talent from every continent.

This was Europe. Just thirty years ago. It is not ancient history. It lies within living memory.

What we have lost

Today, in 2026, we look upon a different continent.

Our economy has barely grown for 25 years. Household disposable income has stagnated since around 2000, despite a growing economy — the difference disappeared into taxes, redistribution and overheads. Unemployment in the eurozone: 6.2%. In Spain: 10.3%. In France: 8.1%. Even Switzerland, once our example, is sliding back towards the European average.

Our major companies are losing ground worldwide. Airbus is losing out to Boeing and Chinese competitors. Volkswagen is closing factories and dismissing 100,000 employees. Siemens, Bosch, Philips, Nokia, Ericsson — all shrinking, all defensive, all losing market share to American and Asian competitors.

Our technological leadership: gone. The major AI models are being developed in California and Beijing, not Munich or Paris. The major chip factories are in Taiwan and South Korea. The major breakthroughs in biotechnology are coming from American laboratories. We have ASML, and that is magnificent, but one company does not make a continent.

Our science: declining in relative terms. The number of Nobel Prizes per head: falling. The number of patents per head: falling. The number of top-25 universities: America and Asia dominate, while Europe is falling behind.

Our military capacity: neglected. We could not defend ourselves against Russia without American assistance. For decades, we have no longer built what a great power ought to build: strategic capacity, technological sovereignty and energy independence.

Our culture: diluted. Our cities: often neglected, having become unsafe, and partially abandoned by the middle class. Our schools: levelled down. Our healthcare: overstretched. Our police: understaffed. Our public services: collapsing.

And our population: unhappy, polarised, cynical, and increasingly radicalised at both the left and right extremes of the political spectrum, because the centre no longer offers answers.

This is Europe. Now. 2026.

We did not cease to be a great continent because an external power defeated us. We were not overtaken because Asia or America did something extraordinary that we could not do. We declined because we systematically undermined ourselves. **We are the only civilisation in history to have dismantled itself of its own free will.**

I will lay bare the causes of this self-destruction in Part II of this piece. For now, one summary will suffice: we replaced respect as the organising principle of our society with envy. We made ambition suspect. We redefined prosperity as poverty, and proclaimed poverty a right. In fifty years, we dismantled what generations had built, and called it “progress”.

But Europe is not dead. Europe is confused, exhausted and misled. That can be reversed.

What other countries teach us

Before discussing how Europe can become great again, we must be honest: it can be done. Other societies show that it is possible — if you make different choices from those we have made.

Switzerland before 1990. Until around 1990, Switzerland had structural unemployment of below 1%. Not because the country was magical, but because it operated according to principles that the rest of Europe had long since abolished: limited benefits, high labour-market flexibility, strong local decision-making powers, mandatory job-seeking activity with genuine sanctions, and a culture in which work was a source of dignity. When Switzerland partially abandoned these principles under European pressure, its unemployment rose to European levels. **The lesson is clear: the Swiss model worked because it was different from ours, not because it was intrinsically Swiss.**

Singapore. In 1965, Singapore was separated from Malaysia as an impoverished port city without natural resources. Today, Singapore has a GDP per head higher than Germany, France or the United Kingdom. How? Through low taxes, strict law enforcement, meritocracy in government, quality education, and a culture of hard work and personal responsibility. Singapore has no minimum wage, limited benefits, and expects every citizen to support themselves. The result: virtually no unemployment, low crime and high prosperity.

South Korea. In 1960, poorer than Ghana. In 2026, richer than Italy, Spain or Portugal. South Korea has shown the world what a people can achieve when they are prepared to work, learn and reward excellence. From Samsung to Hyundai, BTS and K-drama — South Korea has raised its culture, technology and industry to world-class standards in just two generations.

Israel. In 1948, a collection of deserts and marshes, threatened by all its neighbours. In 2026, one of the world’s most innovative countries per head, and a world leader in cybersecurity, medical technology, agrotechnology and defence. Israel shows what a small people can achieve through education, ambition, entrepreneurship and collective will.

United Arab Emirates. In 1970, a collection of pearl-fishing villages. In 2026, a global city with skyscrapers, a knowledge economy, highly developed infrastructure and an attraction for talent from around the world. Within a single generation, Dubai transformed a desert into a metropolis. Not because it had oil — many oil-rich countries achieved nothing — but because it had ambition.

What do these countries have in common? Five things.

One: low taxes on work and entrepreneurship. Work still pays there. Entrepreneurship is rewarded, not punished.

Two: respect for excellence. Those who are better are allowed to be better. Those who work are respected. Those who achieve are admired, not envied.

Three: **a limited social safety net with strong incentives towards self-reliance**. Those who genuinely cannot work are helped. But no one is rewarded for not working.

Four: strict enforcement of law and order. The police have authority. Judges are respected. Laws are obeyed or punished.

Five: ambition at national level. These countries want to be great, want to be the best, want to contribute to the world. They are not ashamed of their success.

We once had each of these five things. We have lost each of these five things.

The road back lies in embracing them once again.

What we must do

This is not a tale of doom. We do not have to write Europe off. We are still a continent of 450 million people, with an enormous scientific base, world cities, capital, skills and knowledge. The tools for a revival are lying on the table. We must dare to pick them up.

Here is what is needed. Concretely.

1. Halve the tax burden on work

The tax burden on labour in the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy and Austria lies between 40% and 52%. This is the highest level in the world. This is not solidarity — it is disincentivising work in numerical form.

We must return to a tax burden on work of no more than 30%, as in Switzerland before 1990, as in the United States today, and as in Singapore. Every working European must retain at least 70% of what he or she earns.

The lost revenue can come from:

• Abolishing the many billions per country spent on welfare redistribution sold as poverty reduction (Part III substantiates this figure)

• Reducing the bureaucracy that has been inflated by decades of redistribution policy

• More competitive corporation tax that brings businesses back to Europe

• Ending EU subsidies with no demonstrable added value

2. Restore the incentives to work

Social assistance may never — including all allowances — be higher than the net minimum wage. Working must always yield substantially more than not working. In the Netherlands, Germany, France and Belgium, this is often no longer the case, meaning that the bottom end of the labour market is structurally staying at home.

This is not cruelty towards benefit recipients. It is protection of the work ethic of society as a whole. If work does not pay, nobody will work. If nobody works, nobody can redistribute. The system consumes itself.

3. Restore authority

Police officers, the judiciary, firefighters, ambulance workers, teachers, doctors — these people are the backbone of a civilisation. Every attack on them, verbal or physical, is an attack on civilisation itself. We must have zero tolerance for disrespect towards these professions. Immediate criminal consequences, no reduction in sentence, a permanent record.

At the same time, these professions must once again become attractive — in terms of salary, prestige and authority. Those who stand in front of a classroom should once again be allowed to set standards. Those who carry authority on the streets must also be given that authority. Those who save lives in hospital should not have to endure abuse from patients or relatives.

4. Restore education as a place of knowledge and excellence

For decades, we have levelled our schools down. Excellence was penalised because “everyone had to be equal”. Mediocrity became the norm. Talent was held back so as not to humiliate the weaker.

The result: a generation that can do less than its parents. The Netherlands is falling in international education rankings. German universities are losing prestige. French elite institutions are producing fewer and fewer leading thinkers.

We must restore differentiation. Grammar schools may once again be grammar schools. Excellence may once again be excellence. Children who can, must be able to. Children who want to, must be allowed to. **Equal opportunities: yes. Equal outcomes: never.**

5. Embrace entrepreneurship

Those who start a business, create jobs and generate prosperity — deserve gratitude, not suspicion. We must make entrepreneurs the heroes they ought to be. Lower taxes, less red tape, and greater cultural respect.

Every European country should aspire to be “the easiest country in Europe in which to start a business”. At present, that is often Estonia. In the past it was the Netherlands, with its Dutch East India Company and its Golden Age. We can become that again — if we treat entrepreneurs as friends rather than enemies.

6. Invest in strategic capacity

By 2050, Europe must be capable of defending itself, supplying its own energy, providing its own critical technologies, and producing its own critical medicines. Today, we are a long way from achieving this.

This requires massive, strategic investment in:

• Defence (2% of GDP is a minimum, not a maximum)

• Nuclear power (again, as France did in the 1970s — quickly, on a large scale, and without ideological objections)

• Semiconductors (we have ASML, we have the knowledge, we have the money — what is lacking is ambition)

• Pharmaceutical production (Europe used to produce its own medicines; now we depend on China and India)

• Quantum technology, biotechnology, space travel

These investments must be driven by ambition, not by subsidies. We must want Europe to be the world leader in these fields by 2050 — and that requires national and European will, not yet another subsidy scheme.

7. Limit the EU to what the EU must do

The European Union was once a sensible partnership between sovereign nations in areas where cooperation added value: the internal market, a common external border, and joint trade. It has overreached into a thousand schemes, directives, subsidies and interventions that offer no demonstrable added value and undermine the member states.

We must return the EU to its core: the internal market, external borders, defence cooperation and strategic autonomy. Everything else should return to the member states, and much of what lies within the member states should return to the regions and municipalities that know what is needed locally.

Subsidiarity is not an empty word. Decisions should be taken at the lowest possible level. Only what truly needs to be European should be European. The rest should be local, and therefore work.

8. Restore the culture

Our history, our language, our customs, our festivals, our religion, our science, our philosophy — none of this is accidental. It has been earned, inherited and built up. We may be proud of it.

That does not mean immutable conservatism. It means conscious continuity. We may learn, grow and adapt — but always from an awareness of who we are. A tree grows by holding fast to its roots, not by cutting them off.

The current self-hatred cultivated by sections of the European elite — the notion that Europe is fundamentally guilty of everything that has gone wrong in the world — is not only historically inaccurate, but suicidal. No people can be great if it hates itself. We must learn to value ourselves again, with our faults, our achievements and our potential.

9. Population policy

We do not like to talk about demography because every discussion of it immediately ends up in ideological pitfalls. Yet this is one of the most important questions for Europe: we are ageing rapidly, our birth rates are too low to replace ourselves, and our population will decline in the coming decades unless policies are introduced.

We must create a culture in which forming a family becomes attractive once again. Tax advantages for families with children, affordable housing for young couples, respect for homemaking for those who choose it, and a cultural shift that once again makes having children valuable rather than “a choice like any other”.

At the same time, immigration must be strictly controlled and targeted at people who contribute to our society, are willing to learn our language, respect our laws and embrace our culture — not replace it. Uncontrolled immigration is not solidarity; it is negligence towards both our own citizens and newcomers.

10. Ambition as a national and European project

This is the most important point. Every policy, every law and every choice must be tested against one question: **does this make Europe greater or smaller, stronger or weaker, more ambitious or more listless?**

For forty years, we have governed through risk aversion, defensive reflexes and the management of existing interests. It is time to think offensively again. What do we want to be in 2050? What is our goal? What do we want to be proud of when we leave this continent to our grandchildren?

For me, the answer is clear: we want Europe in 2050 to be the most prosperous, most developed and most innovative continent in the world once again. That is not nostalgic. It is ambitious. And it is possible — if we want it.

What we can be again

Allow me to paint a picture of Europe in 2050, as we can build it if we embark on this path.

Unemployment below 2%. As in Switzerland in 1975. Everyone who can work, works. Work pays. Benefits exist only for those who genuinely cannot work. Our labour-force participation is the highest in the world.

Tax burden on work no higher than 30%. Every working European retains 70% of what he or she earns. That is the standard. Tax avoidance becomes less attractive because the tax itself is no longer strangling. Capital returns to Europe.

Our companies once again become world leaders. Not just one ASML, but ten ASMLs. In semiconductors, biotechnology, energy, space travel, quantum technology and AI. European engineers, European entrepreneurs and European capital — we once again give them a reason to stay and build here.

Our cities once again become the most beautiful in the world. Amsterdam, Paris, Munich, Vienna, Milan, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Prague, Kraków — clean, safe, culturally vibrant and attractive to talent from across the world. We restore what had been neglected, build what is needed, and protect what is precious.

Our universities once again become the best in the world. Cambridge, Oxford, Leiden, Delft, Zürich, Heidelberg, the Sorbonne, Bologna — where the finest young people from every continent want to study because the knowledge, teaching and ambition here are unrivalled.

Our culture once again leads the way. European film, European literature, European music and European art — capture the world’s attention because we once again dare to be grand, profound and meaningful, rather than small, superficial and safe.

Our security once again assured. A European defence force that is taken seriously. A border that is defended. A police force with authority. A justice system that works. Streets where children can play again.

Our families once again strong. Children growing up with both parents. Grandparents who are involved. Values being passed on. Loyalty, responsibility and respect. This is the foundation on which everything rests — if the foundation collapses, everything else collapses too.

Our democracy once again respectable. Politicians who serve the voter rather than the other way around. Governments that dare to lead rather than hide. Voters who cast informed ballots rather than voting out of anger. Debate that is constructive rather than polarising.

This is Europe in 2050. If we want it. If we choose it.

But before we can get there, we must be honest about how we have declined. What follows is the diagnosis. It is uncomfortable. It is incisive. But without it, we will not understand what we must put right.

Part II — The Diagnosis

Envy as cancer

Europe is not collapsing because of immigration. Europe is not collapsing because of climate change. Europe is not collapsing because of inflation or war. Europe is collapsing because of an inner disease that has been deliberately cultivated for fifty years, passed on from one generation to the next in increasingly severe form, and which today is so deeply embedded in our tissue that most people no longer recognise it as a disease. They recognise it as a virtue.

That disease is envy.

Envy — that ugly, mean-spirited, petty feeling that drags people down and society with them. Envy that adorns itself with the finest words: social, solidarity, equality, justice. Envy that hides in tax tables, in textbooks, in television programmes, in trade union meeting rooms, in ministry policy documents. Envy that markets itself as morality while being its exact opposite.

And set against this disease is something we still possessed fifty years ago and have now almost entirely lost: respect. Respect for work. Respect for knowledge. Respect for authority that fulfils its duty. Respect for the partner with whom you build a life. Respect for the children to whom you must leave a country. Respect for the doctor, the police officer, the teacher, the entrepreneur, the king. Respect for the neighbour with the well-kept garden.

Respect builds. Envy tears down.

And Europe is being torn down.

How the poison was administered

Around 1968, something happened in Western Europe whose full price we are only now paying. Under the banner of ‘democratisation’ and ’emancipation’, every form of hierarchy was declared oppression. Every authority was suspect. Every difference was injustice. Every form of excellence was provocation.

The doctor had to stop being a ‘white coat’ and became a service provider who had to surrender his diploma at the customer service desk. The teacher was addressed by his first name by eight-year-olds. The police officer became a ‘cop’. The entrepreneur became a ‘capitalist’. The father became a friend who was no longer allowed to forbid anything. The king became a cost item. The civil servant became a profiteer.

We called this progress. We thought we were liberating ourselves. In reality, we systematically surrendered everything that holds a society together.

For a society without hierarchy is not a society. It is a mob. And a mob behaves as mobs have always behaved: it seeks scapegoats, it abuses, it loots, and ultimately it destroys itself.

This is precisely what we are seeing now.

**The symptoms everyone knows and no one dares to connect**

Ambulance crews are attacked when they come to collect an injured person. Doctors are spat at in their consulting rooms. Police officers are pelted with stones. Teachers are intimidated by parents who believe their child deserves a ten. Firefighters are attacked when they come to put out a fire. Bus drivers are beaten because a teenager did not want to buy a ticket.

This is not accidental. This is not incidental. It is the direct consequence of fifty years of systematically dismantling respect. Anyone taught that a police officer is a ‘cop’ spits at the police officer. Anyone taught that a doctor is a service provider attacks the doctor when the service does not suit them. Anyone taught that the teacher has no authority gives the teacher a headbutt.

Entrepreneurs are leaving the country. Not because taxes are too high — although they are, but that is not the deepest reason. They are leaving because they are no longer respected here for what they do. In the Netherlands, Germany and France, the entrepreneur who creates jobs, takes risks and works seven days a week is no hero. He is suspect. He is a ‘fat cat’. He is expected to be ashamed of his success. In Switzerland, America and Dubai — there he is respected. So he leaves, and we lose his tax contributions, his jobs and his knowledge.

Young people no longer want to become doctors, police officers or teachers. The shortages are structural and growing. Why spend seven years studying for a profession in which people spit at you? Why join the police and risk coming home in pieces on a Friday night, only to be criticised by a judge for using your weapon? Why become a teacher for a class of parents who threaten you with a lawyer over every disappointing mark?

Talent is fleeing public service. The best doctors are going to private clinics. The best lawyers are moving into commercial practice. The best engineers are going to companies abroad. What remains for the public sector? The mediocre, with the best intentions, in a system that does not respect them either.

Children are growing up without authority. Parents are no longer parents; they are ‘equal conversation partners’. Children are given a counterargument to every remark. Schools are no longer allowed to demand anything. Sports coaches are no longer allowed to be strict. Music teachers are no longer allowed to give criticism. And then we are surprised by generations unable to cope with adversity, collapsing at the first ‘no’, and receiving psychological care en masse for ‘burnout’ at the age of 24.

**Politicians are threatened, journalists are intimidated, scientists receive death threats.** Anyone who sticks their neck out in the public sphere is punished. Not with counterarguments, but with threats. Not with debate, but with hatred. The result? People with the strongest backbones withdraw. What remains in the public arena is the mediocrity that is not a target.

The envy industry

Who benefits from this disease? Who keeps it alive?

An enormous apparatus has emerged in Europe whose raison d’être is envy. Political parties that define themselves through redistribution. Trade unions that justify their existence by constantly pointing to alleged injustice. NGOs that raise money by exaggerating ‘inequality’ into a catastrophe. Civil servants whose jobs exist because they distribute subsidies that would otherwise have been unnecessary. Media outlets that generate viewing figures with stories about ‘the rich’ versus ‘ordinary people’. Academics who advance their careers by explaining everything as ‘structural violence’ and ‘systemic oppression’.

This envy industry employs hundreds of thousands of people. Every one of them has an interest in the continued existence of alleged injustice. If Europe announced tomorrow that poverty had been overcome, that inequality was bearable and that most people were simply doing well — they would lose their reason for existing.

So every day they manufacture new injustice. New groups of victims. New culprits. New poverty thresholds just above the current standard of living of the ‘poor’. New demands on the ‘privileged’ to give up more, confess more guilt and remain silent even more.

This industry feeds on the envy of ordinary people. It tells the low-paid worker that his problem is not his own position, but the size of top salaries. It tells the tenant that his problem is not the housing shortage, but the landlord. It tells the student that his problem is not his choice of degree, but the ‘elite’ that is ‘excluding’ him. Everywhere, the aim is not to improve one’s own position, but to pull someone else down.

And the ordinary European, tired, overtaxed and short of time, believes it. Because envy is the easiest emotion. It requires no self-reflection, no effort, no growth. It demands only that the other person be punished.

The great lie: ‘equality’

And then comes the most repulsive part of all. The envy industry does not call itself envy. It calls itself ‘equality’.

Let me be clear.

Equality before the law is an achievement of civilisation. Every citizen equal before the courts, equal voting rights, equal civil rights — I would defend these with my life.

Equality of opportunity is a moral principle. Every child, regardless of background, should have access to a good education and fair employment opportunities. That is defensible, and I defend it.

**But ‘equality of outcome’ — the idea that everyone should have, earn, own and achieve roughly the same — is envy dressed in a suit.** That is the lie through which politics has been conducted for the past fifty years. That is the justification with which we have raised taxes to suffocating levels, levelled our schools down into mediocrity, democratically crippled our healthcare, driven away entrepreneurs and discouraged talent.

Inequality of outcome is not injustice. Inequality of outcome is the result of differences between people — in talent, effort, choice and luck. People are not equal in what they can do, want or undertake. Every attempt to tax away, subsidise away or ‘equalise away’ those differences is an assault on what people are.

And the people who built this system know that. They know that perfect equality is impossible. They know that every attempt to achieve it ends in tyranny or stagnation. But the idea of ‘equality’ gives them power. It wins them votes. It provides jobs in the redistribution apparatus. So they keep the lie alive, decade after decade, and ordinary people pay the price.

What we have lost: the respect contract

In the past — and by ‘the past’ I mean until roughly 1970, well within living memory — Europe had an unwritten contract. Everyone respected everyone else in their respective roles.

The worker respected the boss who provided work, and the boss respected the worker who did it. The minister or priest respected the mayor, and vice versa. The schoolmaster respected the parents, and the parents respected the schoolmaster. Neighbours respected neighbours. Children respected the elderly. The elderly respected tradition. Everyone knew their place and their duty.

This was not submissiveness. It was civilisation. Civilisation is nothing more than a dense network of mutual relationships of respect, in which everyone knows what they owe another person and what that person owes them.

We cut through this network thread by thread. We called each wire “hierarchy”, “oppression”, “vertical thinking”. And every wire we cut, we later paid for with a new social problem for which we had to hire a new civil servant.

Children who no longer accept authority? New educational specialists. Older people who are lonely? New welfare workers. Neighbours who no longer talk to one another? New neighbourhood coordinators. Police forces that no longer function? New community police officers with new instructions. Doctors suffering burnout? New healthcare coordinators.

Every new layer of bureaucracy is a sticking plaster over the loss of something that once worked naturally: people respecting one another and therefore looking after one another.

The Respect Manifesto

I call for a cultural revolution. Not the left-wing revolution of 1968 that destroyed everything under the banner of liberation. A counter-revolution that builds under the banner of respect.

Respect for work. Every European who gets up in the morning to do their job — whether they are a refuse collector or a professor, a cashier or a surgeon, a carpenter or a minister — deserves respect. The idea that work can be replaced by benefits, that unemployment is simply a lifestyle choice, that effort is irrational because there is nothing left of it after tax — that idea is a poison we must draw out of our system.

Respect for the family. A father and mother are not equal negotiating partners of their ten-year-old child. They are authorities who raise their children, which is painful, which requires effort, and which occasionally means being strict. Every parent who dares to take on this task — dares to say no, dares to set boundaries, dares not to indulge their child — deserves respect and support, not suspicion from the youth-care apparatus.

Respect for old age. The generation that built this continent — that made one of the most prosperous societies in the world out of the ruins of war — deserves better treatment than we are giving them now. Their pensions are being stripped back, their care is fragmented, and their values are mocked by their own grandchildren. This is the deepest humiliation a people can inflict upon itself: despising its own builders.

Respect for authority. The police officer who has to disperse a drunken crowd at three o’clock in the morning. The firefighter who enters a burning block of flats. The paramedic who performs resuscitation in the street. The judge who has to deliver an impossible verdict. These people are our civilisation. Anyone who attacks them, verbally or physically, declares war on what binds us together. There must be zero tolerance — legally, socially and culturally — for any assault on these people.

Respect for knowledge. The doctor has studied for six years. The engineer has studied for five years. The judge has studied for seven years, in addition to years of experience. You, who have spent three minutes Googling, do not have an equal voice. This is not elitism — it is realism. Knowledge is earned and deserves recognition. Anyone who rejects knowledge because “everyone has their own truth” is declaring the Enlightenment bankrupt.

Respect for our heads of state. Where monarchies still exist — the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Spain and the United Kingdom — the monarchy embodies continuity. The king or queen stands above politics and personifies what remains while governments come and go. Where republics are concerned, the same applies to the office of president. Republican or oppositional resentment — “why him and not me?” — destroys the institutions that guarantee political stability. Europe’s most stable democracies are not coincidentally also its oldest — the correlation between respect for institutions and prosperity is empirically overwhelming.

Respect for your neighbour. Your neighbour with the beautiful car worked hard for it. His garden, which looks better than yours, is the result of his Saturdays. His children’s good school reports are the result of the effort he puts into them. Do not be jealous. Be happy for him. And learn from him.

Part III — The Evidence

The Great Poverty Lie

In Part II I described how envy has become the organising principle of our society. Now comes the evidence, in figures that no one can explain away.

I am going to show you what poverty really is. What a person truly needs to live with dignity. I am going to show you what Europe calls “poverty” today, and what it really is. And I am going to show you what it costs us that we have confused these two things.

Once you have finished this, you will never again be able to listen to the poverty debate in Europe in quite the same way. You will feel anger. Rightly so.

My Lake Garda

I was young when my parents took me to Lake Garda in Italy. We had a tent. An air mattress for each member of the family. A camping stove with one gas cylinder that lasted for weeks. A battery with a little night-light. And nothing else.

The campsite was a meadow belonging to a farmer. There was a water tap. There was a simple toilet. No swimming pool. No canteen. No entertainment. No playground. No little restaurant. No little supermarket.

For food, we cut potatoes into chips ourselves. We bought vegetables at the market at the end of the day, at clearance prices, or ate from preserving jars that my mother had prepared the previous season. We had meat sparingly — half a frankfurter each was already something special. We picked fruit ourselves, or received it from farmers.

We wore clothes passed down from brothers or neighbours. If something broke, my mother mended it. I did not have a bicycle during that holiday. No car. No television. No radio. No toys apart from what we had brought with us — a ball, a book and a wooden jigsaw puzzle.

Holiday insurance? Unthinkable. If you fell, you got back up. If you became ill, you waited until you recovered. If it was really serious, you went to a doctor and paid in cash.

This was not poverty. It was a holiday. And we were happy.

Millions of European families lived like this, year in, year out, between 1960 and 1980. Not in poverty. In a dignified, capable, self-reliant existence. Children grew up healthy. Adults were capable. Families were close-knit. Neighbourhoods were safe.

Remember this image. We will return to it.

What Poverty Really Is

Poverty is an absolute condition. It begins where a person can no longer maintain a dignified physical existence. Where they are hungry, cold, without shelter, become ill without the possibility of treatment for life-threatening conditions, or have no ability to save themselves.

Everything above that is prosperity in ascending degrees. More prosperity is better than less prosperity. But greater prosperity for someone already living far above the poverty line is not poverty alleviation — it is redistribution. Both are legitimate political choices, but it is intellectually dishonest to lump them together under one heading.

On the basis of the way of life I have just described — the Lake Garda standard, which was regarded as normal in Europe until approximately 1980 — we can calculate the real poverty line. What would it cost to live like that today, in 2026 euros?

For a family of four

Item	Amount per month
Accommodation (meadow pitch, tent, air mattresses, sleeping bags — depreciation over several years)	€ 55–75
Camping stove with one gas cylinder per month	€ 10
Food (potatoes, seasonal vegetables, preserved food, bread, occasional meat)	€ 50–80
Clothing (second-hand, passed down, mended)	€ 10–20
Essential transport (bus to the doctor or school)	€ 15–20
Lighting (battery with a little light, candle)	€ 3–5
Insurance	€ 0
Total	€ 145–210

For a single person

Approximately €85–€130 per month.

These figures are not extreme. They are not theoretical. They concretely describe how millions of Europeans lived, without being unhappy.

Living below this threshold — or even lower — is poverty. Without shelter. Without food. Without minimal clothing. That is poverty.

Everything above that is no longer poverty.

What the Netherlands Calls “Poverty” Today

Now for the figures that will make you stagger. I am using the Netherlands as an example because I know the precise figures there; the pattern applies to virtually every Western European country.

In 2024, Statistics Netherlands, together with Nibud and the Netherlands Institute for Social Research, established a new poverty line for the Netherlands:

• Single person: €1,600 per month

• Couple without children: €2,145 per month

• Couple with two young children: €2,625 per month

• Two-parent family with two teenagers: €3,000 per month

Compare this with my Lake Garda standard:

Definition	Single person	Family with two adults and two children
Real poverty line (Lake Garda standard)	€ 110	€ 190
Official “poverty line” 2024	€ 1,600	€ 3,000
Ratio	14× higher	16× higher

———————— ———————— ———————— Definition Single person Family with two adults and two children

Real poverty line €110 €190 (Lake Garda standard)

Official €1,600 €3,000 “poverty line” 2024

Ratio 14 times higher 16 times higher ———————— ———————— ————————

The “poor” family according to the official definition therefore lives at a level **sixteen times higher than what my parents and I experienced as a dignified holiday.**

And that is only the poverty line itself. What does such a family actually receive?

The Actual Standard of Living of Europe’s “Poor”

A person receiving social assistance in the Netherlands receives in 2026:

• Basic social assistance for a single person: €1,402 per month

• Basic social assistance for a married couple: €2,002 per month

But this is only the beginning. On top of this come:

• Housing benefit (up to €400 per month)

• Healthcare allowance (~€140 per month)

• Child-related budget (for families)

• Child benefit

• Energy allowance

• Remission of municipal taxes (~€40–€60 per month)

• Individual special assistance

• Individual income allowance

• City pass or equivalent (free public transport for children, library, swimming pool, museum)

• Sports allowance, cultural allowance, computer allowance

• Grocery bonus

• Winter allowance

Net, a single person receiving benefits therefore has approximately €1,900–€2,100 per month in disposable income. A family receiving benefits, with two children, has approximately €3,200–€3,800 per month.

On top of this, outside these cash amounts, the “poor” European in the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, France or Scandinavia receives:

• Full or largely subsidised health insurance

• Free primary and secondary education for children

• Heavily subsidised higher education

• Heated home with running water, sewerage and electricity

• Legally guaranteed housing (through priority allocation schemes)

• Access to a GP, hospital and medicines after the excess

• Police, fire brigade and ambulance services at no personal cost

• Free public transport for children

• Library, sports facilities and culture

• Legal aid where necessary

• Additional support from food banks

**The total real standard of living of a benefit recipient in Western Europe — cash plus all public services — amounts, in my estimation, to between €3,500 and €5,000 per month at equivalent market prices.**

Compare that with the Lake Garda standard of €190 per month.

The European “poor” lives at a level **twenty to thirty times higher** than what my generation experienced as a dignified holiday.

What this means for the global situation

To complete the picture, let us consider what poverty really means on a global scale. The World Bank defines extreme poverty as living on less than $2.15 per day. That is approximately €60 per month.

Approximately 700 million people on Earth live below this threshold. They are genuinely poor. They genuinely go hungry. Their children genuinely die from preventable diseases.

When we use the word “poverty”, we should be talking about them. About the Ethiopian farmer whose harvest has failed. About the Bangladeshi family in a slum. About the Afghan girl who is not allowed to attend school. That is poverty.

Not the Rotterdam mother who complains that she cannot go on holiday twice a year. Not the Amsterdam student who considers himself “poor” because he does not have a new iPhone. Not the Berlin single person who feels disadvantaged because the energy allowance is not high enough. Not the unemployed Parisian who visits the food bank in the third week of the month while using the latest-model smartphone.

When we use the word “poverty” for people living at a material level envied by the world’s population, we are violating the language. And in doing so, we demean the truly poor on this earth, whose suffering we trivialise by placing our own dissatisfaction on the same footing.

How we arrived at this absurdity

This is no accident. It has been systematically and deliberately constructed in three steps over fifty years.

Step 1: The relativisation of poverty

Until around 1970, poverty in Europe was defined in absolute terms: no bread, no roof, no clothing. Anyone in that situation was poor. Anyone who wanted more was expected to work.

From the 1970s onwards, a new definition entered the statistics: poverty as a relative concept. Someone is “poor” if they have less than a certain percentage of the median income. Under the current EU definition: less than 60% of the median.

This is a mathematical impossibility disguised as morality. As long as incomes are not perfectly equal, there will always be “poverty”. If all of Europe became twice as wealthy tomorrow, the “poverty rate” would remain exactly the same. The relative poverty threshold is a system that guarantees poverty can never be eradicated, however much prosperity increases.

Why would an institution choose such a definition? Because an institution concerned with combating poverty has no interest in the success of poverty reduction. If poverty were genuinely to disappear, so too would the institution’s raison d’être.

This definition is therefore not science. It is institutional self-preservation.

Step 2: The inflation of basic needs

Alongside the relativisation came the inflation of what counts as a “basic need”.

In 1960, a basic need was: shelter, food, clothing and warmth. That was all.

In 1980, electricity, running water, sewerage and child benefit were added.

In 2000: telephone, television, refrigerator, washing machine and insurance.

In 2010: internet, mobile phone and computer.

In 2020: smartphone, streaming subscription, childcare, sports club and culture pass.

In 2026: everything the middle class has, minus approximately 20 per cent, is regarded as a “basic need” to which every European should be entitled.

Each decade, the standard shifts upwards. What was a luxury for the previous generation becomes a basic right for the next. This means that the “poverty threshold” rises mechanically with prosperity, and that “poverty” statistically never declines however wealthy we become.

This is not morality. It is the institutionalisation of expectation inflation.

Step 3: The political coalition around “poverty”

The inflated definition of poverty creates a vast apparatus of stakeholders. In every European country, tens or hundreds of thousands of people work directly or indirectly in what is called “anti-poverty policy”: civil servants in social services, employees of aid organisations, policymakers, researchers, communications officers, care workers and welfare workers.

All these people have an interest in the continuation of “poverty”. If poverty were genuinely to disappear, they would lose their jobs.

In addition, political parties build their profiles around combating poverty. The media gain attention from emotional stories about poverty. NGOs raise money by magnifying injustice. Every European who makes a living from this system has an interest in the continuation of the “poverty crisis”.

This coalition — civil servants, aid workers, politicians, media and recipients — forms a politically powerful group that dismisses any attempt to redefine poverty as “callous” and “antisocial”. Any politician who says “we have overcome poverty” is immediately attacked. Any voter who has doubts is labelled “elitist” or “insensitive”.

That is how the lie persists. Not through evidence, but through coalition maintenance.

What it costs us

The Netherlands spends approximately €25 billion annually on what is called “anti-poverty policy”: social assistance, allowances, schemes for people on low incomes, municipal anti-poverty budgets and special assistance. Comparable — and often higher per capita — amounts are spent in Germany, France, Belgium and Scandinavia.

Divided among the eight million working Dutch people, that is €3,125 per worker per year — or approximately €260 per month — that you surrender to what you are told is poverty reduction.

If we adopted a real definition of poverty — the Lake Garda standard — we would need at most €100–€200 million per year per country the size of the Netherlands for genuine poverty reduction. This concerns approximately 10,000 genuinely poor people: homeless people, undocumented migrants without a support network and severely disordered individuals.

The difference, approximately €24.8 billion per year in the Netherlands alone, is not poverty reduction. It is redistribution of wealth under the label of poverty.

Per working Dutch person, this means: **€10 per year towards genuine poverty reduction, €3,115 towards redistribution.**

For every euro that genuinely goes towards poverty, therefore, €300 goes towards redistribution sold as poverty reduction. Comparable ratios apply to all Western European countries.

This is not a mistake. It is systemic deception on the largest scale ever produced by European politics.

What it costs us beyond the figures

The direct fiscal costs are not even the worst of it. The hidden costs are more serious.

Loss of self-reliance. Those who learn that the state takes care of everything lose the skills to save themselves. Cutting potatoes into chips, preserving vegetables, mending clothes, inflating an airbed, operating a gas hob, coping with adversity without immediately turning to psychological care. These were ordinary skills possessed by ordinary people. Now they are “practical skills” for which people take courses in adult education.

Destruction of work incentives. If benefits plus allowances are almost equal to the net minimum wage (and that is the case in the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium and France today), working at the bottom end of the labour market is financially irrational. For a few tens of pounds a week, someone would have to get up early, travel, follow instructions and shoulder responsibility. The rational choice is to stay at home. Thus we create the structural unemployment that we then lament.

Discouraging generations. Children growing up in families that have lived on benefits for decades learn that the government will look after them. They do not learn that work has value. They take on the dependency. We are creating generations that can no longer do what we ourselves took for granted two generations ago. The statistics on intergenerational dependence on benefits are shocking: children of parents receiving benefits are two to three times more likely to end up on benefits themselves than children of working parents.

Cultural dependence. A people accustomed to having every risk covered by the state loses its moral resilience. Every setback becomes a violation of rights. Every pain becomes grounds for compensation. Every rejection becomes oppression. Thus a people becomes steeped in a culture of entitlement, in which people no longer help one another because “there is an agency for that”, and neighbours are no longer neighbours but competitors in the benefits system.

Poison in the social contract. The working European bearing a tax burden of 40–50 per cent sees his tax money going to people who live materially at a level that, historically and internationally, is called prosperity. He sees that working yields him little net benefit over not working. He draws the conclusion: the system is unfair. This conclusion is not extremist. It is rational. And the political consequences of this rational conclusion will be felt for decades to come.

What a return to reasonableness would deliver

Suppose that Europe were to adopt a genuinely absolute definition of poverty tomorrow. Suppose we were to say: below the Lake Garda standard, you are poor; above it, you are not poor but may be less prosperous than others.

What would that mean?

People genuinely living in poverty in Western Europe: several hundred thousand. Primarily homeless people, undocumented individuals without a support network, and severely disordered individuals. These people deserve targeted, generous assistance. Individually tailored, with case management, focused on genuine reintegration or permanent care for those who need it.

**Cost of genuinely combating poverty: several billion per year across the continent.** More than enough for targeted assistance to this specific group.

Funds released: hundreds of billions per year across the continent. These could be used for:

• Reducing the tax burden on working people by approximately 15 percentage points

• Investment in public services that genuinely work (the core functions of policing, education and healthcare)

• Paying down public debt that would otherwise fall on our children

• An entrepreneur-friendly climate in which to generate prosperity

**Effect on the labour market: Swiss pre-1990 unemployment figures within reach.** If working once again provides substantially more than not working, people will return to work. Within ten years, our unemployment rate could fall to 1–2 per cent, from the eurozone’s current 6.2 per cent. That means millions of additional workers, millions of additional taxpayers, and millions fewer benefit recipients.

Effect on prosperity: substantial growth. A continent with low taxes, high labour-force participation, respect for entrepreneurship and a healthy work ethic grows faster than a continent that does the opposite. The economic history of the past fifty years proves this time and again.

Effect on morale: the restoration of dignity. Those who work are respected. Those who support themselves are proud. Those who raise their children with a sense of responsibility see them as adults capable of standing on their own feet. That is the legacy we ought to leave. Not a culture of dependency.

Part IV — The Way Forward

The indictment

What has happened in Europe over the past fifty years concerning the concept of poverty is no accident. It is not a mistake. It is not a misunderstanding that can be corrected with better information.

It is a systematic, deliberate, decades-long operation to dismantle genuine poverty as the justification for an enormous apparatus of redistribution, and to fill the resulting definitional space with redistribution of prosperity, sold under a morally authoritative label.

It is deception. And it is deception on the largest financial scale ever organised by European politics.

The responsible parties are not one party or one movement. Those responsible are a cultural coalition extending from the progressive left to Christian social democrats, with the cooperation of virtually the entire civil service, the entire aid sector, the entire NGO sector and the entire public broadcasting system. This coalition has developed its own language — “vulnerable”, “in need of assistance”, “disadvantaged”, “marginalised” — with which any attempt at redefinition is dismissed as “hard-hearted”.

We, the working Europeans, have financed this coalition for fifty years. We have paid for the lie with our taxes, our work incentives, our self-reliance and our children’s future.

Enough is enough.

What to do

Something of this magnitude does not happen by itself. It does not happen through one election, one party or one politician. It happens through a cultural and political movement spanning generations.

Such movements always begin with individuals. With people who dare to say what others think but do not express. With people who dare to build what others only criticise. With people who dare to lead where others merely follow.

I call upon you to show that leadership. Not as a politician — most of you are not politicians, and that is fine. But as a parent, an employee, an entrepreneur, a neighbour, a citizen.

Raise your children with respect and responsibility. Teach them that work has value, that effort is rewarded, and that self-reliance is freedom. Do not indulge them into becoming dissatisfied adults.

Be proud of what you achieve. Do not be ashamed of your success. Celebrate it. Share it. Inspire others. Envy thrives in darkness; let the light shine on achievements honestly earned.

**Support entrepreneurs, scientists, artists, athletes — every European who is trying to achieve something.** They are the engines of our future. They deserve admiration, not suspicion.

Respect those who deserve respect. The police officer, the doctor, the teacher, the firefighter, the nurse. Greet them. Thank them. Defend them when others attack them. They are the backbone.

Refuse the language. When a politician, journalist or aid worker speaks of “poverty in Europe” — ask for the figures. Ask for the definition. Ask for a comparison with Lake Garda, sub-Saharan Africa and the nineteenth century. Do not allow yourself to be deceived any longer by emotional images without a numerical basis.

Restore the distinction. In every conversation, in every debate: distinguish absolute poverty (genuinely grave, affecting a small number of people) from redistribution (large-scale, a political choice). Both are legitimate subjects, but they are not the same subject.

Vote for what makes us greater, not what makes us smaller. Every vote for a party that sells redistribution of prosperity as poverty reduction is a vote against your children’s future. Every vote for a party that dares to build, dares to undertake and dares to lead is a vote for what we can become again.

Be fearless in public debate. Say what you think. Endure the attacks that will come. Anyone proposing something new in Europe in 2026 will immediately be attacked as “extreme”. This is precisely how the current system protects itself against change. Do not be intimidated. Today’s “extremism” is tomorrow’s ordinary politics — if it is right.

Find your fellow campaigners. There are millions of Europeans who think as you and I do. They feel alone, because the media, politics and the cultural establishment tell them that they are marginal. They are not marginal. They are the majority that has not yet found its voice. Connect with them.

To our children’s children

What we do now, or fail to do, determines how our grandchildren will live. That is not rhetoric. It is a fact.

If we do nothing, they will inherit a continent that has squandered its prosperity, abandoned its culture, exchanged its ambitions for comfort and lost its place in the world to peoples whom we once underestimated because we thought ourselves superior.

If we act — if we restore respect, define poverty properly, make work pay again and embrace ambition once more — they will inherit a continent of which they can be proud. A continent that once again has something to offer the world. A continent that dares to be the best again.

We, this generation, are the last who can still turn this around. The generation that experienced the European miracle of 1948–1975 is dying out. They carry with them the memory of what it was like when we were great. They know that it can be done. They know what it feels like.

We must pass that memory on. And not merely pass it on — we must bring it back to life. We must pass it on to our children not as nostalgia, but as proof: look, we once did this. Look, this is what is possible. Look, you can build this again — if you dare.

To my grandchildren I say: I knew Europe when it was great. I spent holidays camping at Lake Garda at a time when we were happy with less. I saw our cities flourish, our scientists make breakthroughs, our companies conquer the world and our culture lead the way. I also saw us give it away — bit by bit, through a decade of poor choices.

But I have also seen peoples rise again. Germany from the ruins of 1945. South Korea from the poverty of 1960. Israel from nothing. Singapore from an impoverished port city. What they could do, we can do too.

Conclusion

Europe once again. Not as a sentimental yearning for the past, but as a concrete ambition. Not as a small continent trying to survive, but as a great continent that dares to lead again. Not as an envious collective dragging one another down, but as a respectful people lifting one another up.

To the reader who has endured this to the end:

You face a choice. Every European faces this choice, each day anew, in a thousand small moments.

Do you choose respect or envy?

Do you choose to raise your children with boundaries, or indulge them into becoming dissatisfied adults?

Do you choose to wish your neighbour well in his success, or vilify him in the neighbourhood WhatsApp group?

Do you choose to greet and thank the police officer in the street, or film him to make a mockery of him?

Do you choose to pursue your entrepreneurial ambitions in Europe, or move to a country where you are still respected?

Do you choose to trust the doctor, or abuse him when he does not tell you what you want to hear?

Do you choose to vote for parties that build prosperity, or for parties that dismantle it under the banner of “fair distribution”?

Do you choose to work, or stay at home because it makes hardly any difference anyway?

Every choice towards respect is a brick in the new wall. Every choice towards envy is a brick removed from the existing wall. And the wall is Europe. And the wall is the inheritance we pass on to our children.

We have one, perhaps two, generations left in which to reverse the disease. After that, Europe will be beyond saving. After that, we will be a third-rate continent, regarded by the rest of the world with mild amusement as an old museum. After that, all we will be able to do is tell our grandchildren what we once were.

I refuse to accept that.

I refuse to accept the inheritance of fifty years of the cult of envy as inevitable. I refuse to accept the excuses that "times have simply changed" or that "you cannot turn back the clock". I refuse the moral blackmail of the envy industry, which dismisses every call for respect as "far-right".

Respect is not right-wing. Respect is civilisation.

Those who want civilisation choose respect. Those who choose envy choose ruin.

Lake Garda awaits. Not as poverty. But as a reminder of who we were, what we were capable of, and what we must become once again.

Europe anew.

*Jacobus van Merksteijn is a systems architect and works on political consequence modelling within the Nova Democratia project. This manifesto was written to be shared and disseminated — openly and without restraint. Every European may read it, every European may share it, and every European is invited to join the movement for a resurgent continent.*