Jordan Carlson
Staff Writer
Britain has officially left the European Union (EU) as of Jan. 31. This may leave many questions in the air such as “what will trade deals look like now with the EU?” and “what happens to UK citizens living inside the EU?” and the future of the UK as a whole. The United Kingdom consists of Britain, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
The United Kingdom has been a member of the European Union since 1973, and remained for 47 years. In 2016, however, the vote to leave the EU was given to the citizens of the UK and the vote was a majority of 17.4 million citizens in favor of leaving the EU, and 15.1 million citizens who believed the UK should stay.
The UK decided it is no longer beneficial for the country and its citizens to remain in the political and economic union with 27 other European countries. This is due to economic reasons, including paying into the EU budget, where the UK had a net contribution of 8.5 billion euros in 2016, according to FullFact.org.
Another reason is the issue of free movement of migration between EU countries. This allowed citizens of the 27 countries in the EU to be able to work and migrate to any country in the union without needing a visa or citizenship.
The biggest trade issue, now that Brexit has been finalized, is how tariffs will work between the UK and EU and how trade will be tracked in regards to tax, due to open borders.
Britain’s current solution to this problem is to put a border between Britain and Northern Ireland in order to tax goods leaving the UK and into the Republic of Ireland. All goods that stay inside Northern Ireland will be able to get a tax refund, but the goods that go into the Republic of Ireland will be taxed.
The UK is looking into making a trade deal with the EU, similar to the trades deals that Canada and Japan currently have with the EU. This will reduce tariff prices on over 50% of exports leaving the UK and going into the EU, without having to pay membership and still having political freedom.
While Britain is officially leaving the EU, there is still an 11 month planning period of departure where the UK will have to get trade deals in place before deciding on what ties will be broken in 2021.
While the end of free movement has been one of the biggest reasons citizens in the UK wanted Brexit to happen, due to the fear of jobs being taken by immigrants, the side effect of that decision makes it difficult for British citizens to study and work abroad in the EU in the future.
However, all citizens in the UK from the EU will have residency in the country if they arrived before 2020. Any migrant that arrives until 2021 will be granted 5 years in the country in order to file the proper paperwork to gain permanent residency while still having the right to work in the UK.
The EU is offering a very similar deal to the UK citizens living abroad in the EU. This includes the proposal of giving British citizens the option to have associated citizenship to the EU which will grant them all the rights they had in the EU such as freedom of movement and potentially the right to vote in EU elections.
“Overall, I think Brexit is what’s best for the UK, it will help stabilize the economy and make more jobs available to the citizens, instead of outside migrants,” said Willaim Taylor, an international student at the University of Wyoming from England. “I see the economy in England going down at first but in the long term it will be stronger than ever.”
For the United States, Brexit poses a high impact on our economy. The US is currently the UK’s biggest trade partner outside of the EU and President Trump has already released a statement that he will give the UK the best trade deal possible once Brexit is finalized. While this seems promising, seeing as many UK citizens want out of the EU completely, only time will tell if this will happen. If it does, however, the US economy will see nothing but growth in the economy.
