I won't even get into the aircrew aspects right now, as it is just a nightmare. Swedish pilot, flies for UK company(managed aircraft) aircraft "based" in Belgium, but physically most flying is to/from Moscow and other EU and non-EU countries.
But the issues are not limited to our industry.....nor are they easily settled. An "infamous" case between what would normally be considered northern European countries with clear rules and agreements, is Netherlands and Denmark. A slaughterhouse in Denmark needed extra workers and contracted to a Dutch company to provide them. According to Dutch law, which is clear in the matter, these men were employees of the Dutch company and they paid Dutch taxes on their salaries. They all live in Netherlands, so seems straight-forward.
But the Danish authorities are demanding income tax as well, claiming that they are de facto employees of the slaughterhouse in Denmark, as the management of the slaughterhouse issued their day to day work duties and regulated their working hours etc(!)
This has been going on for YEARS with no settlement, because both countries are sticking to their rules and will not negotiate. In the meantime, the Danes have attacked the only target available to them---the Danish slaughterhouse, and demanded penalties for not withholding income tax. Of course, they defend themselves by saying that they never hired these men, but signed a contract with another company. So the battle goes on.
EU is not helping, national laws are not helping and at the end of the day, the Dutch workers will not be earning in Denmark, the slaughterhouse may not be able to process what they can sell, due to lack of skilled workers, and the net result is a system-wide loss. But explain that to a desk-jockey in the Danish tax office.
Aviation-wise, I was offered a Jersey contract, when I was later wrongfully dismissed, neither the Jersey Labour Tribunal, nor the legal system in the aircraft registered country would hear my case. So as far as I am concerned, EU including the JAA/EASA nightmare is a waste of time and money. I have to admit that there has been no major European war since 1945, so the primary objective of keeping Germany in check seems to have worked so far.
Other than that, which might have been accomplished in other ways, having non-elected technocrats and office geeks running our lives on all too many levels has been a very high price. How can it be that disgraced and elected politicians that get removed from national politics, always seem to end up in some high-paying position in EU?
Amazing.....