One of the nicer stories doing the rounds in Brussels these days is about how Europe’s COVID-19 recovery funds are spent. We’re talking about the roughly $869 billion in grants and loans the European Union’s 27 national leaders earmarked in 2020 for projects to kick-start their economies after the pandemic. By now, all member states have proposed dozens of different projects, with some of them already implemented. In Brussels, around 80 officials are working around the clock to process and evaluate these applications and check project details against a list of criteria such as green transition, digital innovation, economic and social resilience, and so on.
Which projects pass this scrutiny with the greatest ease? Interestingly, they’re the ones proposed by countries such as Greece, Ireland,
