As a factoid, Europe now has fairly stiff import taxes for individuals. When I order anything from outside the EU, it gets a 10 euro administrative charge, and a 20% surcharge. These are considerable expenses.

One of the goals of technocracy is to create a standardized worker. I'm just reading Dmitry Orlov's "Shrinking the Technosphere", and he writes:

The technosphere defined It demands homogeneity THAT THIS IS so is clearly visible in spite of all the talk about “diversity” and “multiculturalism” in the overdeveloped Western nations. When people say “diversity,” what they really mean is homogeneity: a common, simplified, commercialized mass culture organized around nationalist/globalist concepts and symbols. In the pursuit of total homogeneity, “diversity” turns out to be quite useful. This is not a paradox but mere misdirection. Over time tight-knit communities tend to develop their own unique local cultures, traditions, languages and dialects, and these allow them to withstand the onslaught of outside influence. People who share a common local culture recognize and automatically trust one another. This is true diversity: the diversity of distinct, separate cultures with unique traditions of mutual aid, cooperation and solidarity. And it is this that makes them hard for the technosphere to dominate and to control.

The goal of equalizing every worker provides an alternative explanation for the dwindling of our sundry clubs, lodges, and groups. The powers that be are destroying mutual trust, transactions outside the system, and small enterprise. It affects the family, clubs, but also unions and parties, which have degraded to one-size-fits-all blandness.