From Reuters: “Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government wants to water down draft car emissions legislation agreed in June by introducing the phase-in period, under a proposal circulated by German diplomats and seen by Reuters. Renault and PSA Peugeot Citroen have broken ranks with Paris to side with their Germany-based industrial partners Daimler, BMW and General Motors.”
Five companies with an aggregate market capitalisation of about 200 billion euro. In comparison the companies listed on the London Stock exchange have a total value of something like 3 trillion euro. So the the value of European companies, listed and not listed, must be at least 10 trillion euro.
So lobbyists representing 2% of business value and about 1% of the workforce are squeezing down on the German government’s environmental policy.
But there’s no need to be angry about this or feel a sense of injustice. Walk. Bike. Take the bus. A life choice which causes dependency on a car is, for many people, that: a choice.
However powerful a corporation is at lobbying, its power all derives from the customer.
