Quote Originally Posted by Viking View Post
And these belong to the rest of Spain why exactly?
Because Catalonia was riding on the Spanish wave the entire time. Spanish soldiers fought and bled to enrich the entire country. Spanish politicians negotiated the EU entry that Catalonia also profited from. The Catalans can speak Spanish now, which makes them able to communicate much better given that hardly anyone outside Catalonia wants to learn Catalan. And because the Catalans are doing well at the expense of the rest of Spain.

Here's also a somewhat older overview of the economic consequences: http://www.businessinsider.de/econom...op=1&r=US&IR=T

Here's the relevant part about Catalonia profiting off of Spain:

A Spanish commercial war would follow to take Catalonia out of the Spanish market, where Catalan goods and services are sold up to €39 billion ($51 billion), 18.5% of Catalan GDP. Since even newly independent countries are not prone to turn the other cheek to their would-be ruffians, those Spanish moves would surely provoke akin Catalan measures to wipe Spain off the Catalan market, where Spanish goods and services are sold up to €27 billion ($36 billion), 3,1% of Spanish GDP.
Yes, Spain also gains €16 billion in taxes, but it's only normal that those who make more money pay higher taxes, even if the tax rate is a flat percentage.

Keep this in mind: http://www.euronews.com/2017/09/14/j...lonia-yes-vote

What is really interesting is this article: http://www.catalannews.com/politics/...-rest-of-spain

It seems very suspect without knowing the state of the infrastructure in Catalonia and Spain and how high the investments were in the first place, but I couldn't find any numbers about infrastructure investments per Spanish region. The Catalan chamber of commerce is hardly an unbiased source either.

If the solution to every distribution problem is independence though, the West Germans need to vote about independence from the former DDR because we're all still paying to build it up and there are plenty of people who dislike that... #returnthewall