In today’s Cato Online Forum essay, Iana Dreyer of the EU trade news service Borderlex marshals public opinion data to support a rather gloomy prediction about the chances for a robust and comprehensive TTIP outcome. Despite having “strong ‘Atlanticist’ instincts and the vision for Europe as a dynamic, globalized, economic powerhouse,” the EU’s business community and its cosmopolitan policy makers are likely to be thwarted by demographics: especially, by the aging German voter.

Iana concludes that the likely outcome will be a TTIP agreement that reflects the sensibilities of older, risk‐​averse Europeans who are unwilling to gamble with their social safety nets, even though those safety nets are not really on the negotiating table, which means a rather shallow and limited agreement at best.

The essay is offered in conjunction with a Cato Institute TTIP conference being held on Monday. Read it. Provide feedback. And register to attend the conference here.