Jamie Dimon Is Totally Right About Europe

Of all the American barbs raining down on Europe over the past few days — from Elon Musk’s risible claims of censorship by Brussels to the Trump administration’s warning of civilizational wipeout — those from JPMorgan Chase & Co. boss Jamie Dimon are probably the most cutting. Europe has a “real problem,” he said at the weekend, while outlining three of them: Anti-business bureaucracy, internal fragmentation and a lack of innovation. “A weak Europe is bad for us (in America),” he warned.

Dimon isn’t the first banker to complain about bureaucrats. Financiers are always lobbying governments for looser regulation. But he’s no culture warrior taking potshots like JD Vance. On the issues he raises, he’s correct. It’s been more than a year since Mario Draghi said much the same thing in order to shock the continent out of declining productivity and stagnant growth in a more hostile world where old trade ties mean nothing. Since then, crickets. Internal disagreements, institutional inertia and beggar-thy-neighbor budgeting have left Draghi’s calls for €800 billion ($932 billion) of fresh investment, nimbler industrial policy and capital-markets integration in suspended animation.