Europe's bureaucracy problem has long since become a growth problem: those who have to document innovation first ultimately lose it to others

How bureaucratic hurdles threaten Europe's competitiveness

Regulation in Europe: A call for simplification for more growth

In political debate, reducing bureaucracy is often viewed merely as a burdensome obligation or a means of saving working hours. However, the reality is more complex: Europe's bureaucracy problem has evolved into a serious growth obstacle, jeopardizing the continent's innovation capacity and competitiveness. Regulatory frameworks not only influence companies' willingness to invest but also their ability to develop new products and compete internationally. Faced with stagnant economic performance and increasing pressure from global competitors, 13 EU member states are now calling for a comprehensive review of existing rules. This initiative aims not only to reduce the number of regulations but also to improve their practicality and effectiveness. This analysis highlights the key challenges and opportunities arising from the need for a consolidated approach to regulation to foster growth in Europe while ensuring the necessary legal certainty for businesses.

Why Europe's bureaucracy is a hindrance to growth

In Europe, discussions about reducing bureaucracy often focus on tedious forms, unnecessary documentation, and a few saved working hours in government offices. In reality, the problem runs much deeper. Regulation determines how quickly companies can invest, develop new products, expand their operations, adopt technologies, and grow across borders. It therefore affects not only the costs of individual businesses but also the productivity, innovative capacity, and strategic freedom of action of the entire continent. When regulations become contradictory, cumulative, or difficult to predict, an economic disadvantage arises that cannot be captured by a single statistic. It manifests itself in postponed investments, more cautious business models, longer development times, and the decision by high-growth companies to concentrate capital and innovation outside of Europe.

The initiative by 13 EU member states for a European year of implementation and consolidation is therefore more than just another political complaint about Brussels. Austria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, Estonia, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, and Slovakia are calling for a sector-by-sector review of existing European legislation. Existing rules should be examined for necessity, effectiveness, overlaps, and disproportionate burdens. New regulations should be more rigorously assessed for competitiveness, impact on innovation, subsidiarity, and practical feasibility. At its core, the demand is not to continually add new levels of regulation, but rather to first bring order to the existing system.

The initiative is politically significant because it unites almost half of the member states and brings together diverse economic models. Large industrialized nations like Germany and Italy are involved, as is Poland, a growing manufacturing and service hub; Denmark, an innovation-driven northern European state; and the Baltic states, digitally oriented and comparatively lean economies. Central and southeastern European countries are also participating, whose catch-up process depends heavily on companies investing, expanding production networks, and being able to effectively utilize the single market as a unified economic area. The common denominator is less a fundamental rejection of European rules than a growing concern that their quantity, complexity, and national implementation will overwhelm economic capacity.

The regulatory pause is not a political standstill

The term "regulatory pause" gives the impression that Europe should forgo new policies for a year. That would be neither realistic nor sensible. Security, energy supply, digital technologies, defense, climate adaptation, and international trade conflicts are developing too rapidly for European institutions to completely cease their legislative work. The proposal therefore does not aim for a blanket standstill, but rather a shift in priorities. Essential changes should remain possible, but the routine of constantly adding new obligations should give way to a focused program of implementation, simplification, interoperability, and review.

Economically, this distinction is crucial. An indiscriminate moratorium could delay necessary investment regulations, prolong legal uncertainty, or weaken the internal market. A targeted consolidation year, on the other hand, could improve the quality of the law if it is not only announced with high publicity but also methodically prepared. This includes a complete inventory of regulations in particularly burdened sectors, an assessment of their cumulative costs, and an examination of whether multiple reporting obligations require the same information. Equally important is the question of whether national authorities interpret European requirements differently, resulting in companies experiencing 27 different implementation realities despite formally uniform rules.

The productive core of the proposal therefore lies not in abandoning politics altogether, but in shifting from a production-oriented logic to a results-oriented logic. Currently, an adopted directive or regulation is often considered a political success. For companies, however, the real work only begins afterward. They must change processes, collect data, adapt IT systems, train employees, procure external consulting services, and document their compliance to various bodies. A modern regulatory policy cannot be satisfied with the mere fact that a law pursues a plausible goal. It must demonstrate that this goal can be achieved with reasonable effort, that the requirements are compatible with one another, and that the expected benefits actually materialize after implementation.

Europe's weak growth is intensifying the pressure to act

The call for regulatory relief comes at a time of weak economic growth. The European Union's real gross domestic product grew by around 1.5 percent in 2025. While economic output increased in all member states, large economies remained weak. Germany achieved growth of only about 0.2 percent. A single year does not explain a structural crisis, but the combination of moderate growth, weak productivity growth, high energy prices, and increasing international competition is changing the significance of regulatory costs. In a dynamic economy, companies can absorb additional obligations more easily. With low margins, high uncertainty, and weak demand, these same obligations more quickly become a barrier to investment.

The development of corporate investment is particularly problematic. Between the end of 2021 and the end of 2024, it rose cumulatively by around 6.8 percent in the Eurozone, while the United States reached approximately 15.4 percent. The gap is even more pronounced for intangible investments, which include software, data, research, patents, and organizational knowledge. These investments, in particular, determine how quickly companies can productively utilize artificial intelligence, automation, and digital business models. Machinery and equipment remain important, but the industrial future increasingly hinges on the combination of physical production with software, data analytics, and scalable platforms.

Regulation is not the sole cause of this lag. Europe also suffers from higher energy costs, fragmented capital markets, a shortage of skilled workers, slow permitting processes, sometimes inadequate infrastructure, and a reduced supply of growth-oriented venture capital. Precisely for this reason, it would be analytically flawed to portray deregulation as a universal panacea. However, it is one of the few structural reforms that Europe can largely control itself and that could have a relatively rapid impact. Lower administrative costs do not replace energy policy or a functioning capital market, but they do improve the return on many investments and can accelerate the implementation of other reforms.

The actual damage is caused by cumulative stress

Businesses don't experience regulation as separate political jurisdictions. For an industrial company, environmental law, occupational safety, data protection, cybersecurity, supply chain requirements, sustainability reporting, product law, customs regulations, tax documentation, and national permitting rules all converge simultaneously. Each individual obligation may be objectively justified. The economic problem arises when the totality of these obligations isn't reviewed, deadlines clash, terminology differs, or identical data is required in different formats.

This cumulative burden does not affect all companies equally. Large corporations can build specialized legal, compliance, and sustainability departments. While regulatory costs are substantial for them, they can be spread across high revenues. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), on the other hand, bear high fixed costs relative to their size. If a report requires a similar technical infrastructure and legal review regardless of revenue, the burden per euro earned increases significantly for smaller businesses. As a result, regulation can unintentionally promote consolidation: it is not necessarily the most productive or innovative company that wins, but rather the one that can manage complex obligations most efficiently.

Indirect effects are also significant. A formal exemption for small businesses does not automatically protect them if large customers demand the same information along the supply chain. Sustainability, origin, safety, or due diligence obligations can be passed on to suppliers via purchasing terms and conditions. The small or medium-sized enterprise (SME) may not be directly legally obligated, but is nevertheless economically affected. A sound impact assessment must therefore consider not only the direct target group but the entire value chain. Otherwise, burdens are merely shifted from the legal text into private contractual relationships.

Good intentions lead to bad regulation

European rules fulfill important economic functions. Common product standards reduce transaction costs, consumer protection builds trust, data protection can legitimize digital markets, and environmental regulations prevent companies from passing costs on to the general public. A single market without reliable rules would not be freer, but more fragmented and prone to conflict. The crucial dividing line, therefore, is not between regulation and deregulation, but between effective and ineffective regulation.

Poor regulation often stems not from a flawed political objective, but from a deficient instrument. A reporting requirement can increase transparency, but it can also generate vast amounts of data that hardly anyone analyzes. Detailed technical specifications can create security, but stifle innovation if they prescribe specific procedures and preclude better solutions. A new due diligence obligation can reveal risks, but remain ineffective if companies primarily produce documents without altering the actual conditions in supply chains. The central economic question, therefore, is whether a rule improves real-world behavior or merely expands the production of documentation.

This is also where the danger of a purely quantitative approach to reducing regulations lies. The number of eliminated reporting requirements is meaningless if particularly costly or innovation-inhibiting regulations remain in place. Conversely, a new requirement can be beneficial despite additional costs if it generates greater societal benefits, corrects market failures, or replaces 27 national sets of regulations with a single European standard. Good reform policy, therefore, measures not only gross costs but also net benefits. It asks which goals can be achieved with less effort, which rules are essential for enabling competition, and which regulations sound good but have little practical effect.

Brussels has long since acknowledged the problem

The demand from the 13 member states does not meet with a Commission that fundamentally rejects reducing bureaucracy. The European competition agenda aims to reduce the administrative burden on companies by at least 25 percent and on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) by at least 35 percent. Recurring administrative costs of approximately €150 billion per year were used as a starting point. This results in the target of saving around €37.5 billion in recurring costs by the end of the current term.

The scale is relevant, but it needs to be put into perspective. 37.5 billion euros would provide noticeable relief, but it represents only a small fraction of total European economic output. The greater benefit, therefore, might lie less in the immediate cost savings than in faster decision-making, greater planning certainty, and lower market entry costs. If a company can launch a new product months earlier because permits, data requirements, and responsibilities are clear, the resulting growth boost can far outweigh the purely administrative costs. Conversely, a purely theoretical cost reduction remains economically weak if uncertainty, conflicting national interpretations, or lengthy procedures persist.

Simplification packages already underway address, among other things, sustainability reporting, due diligence obligations, sustainable finance rules, carbon border adjustments, agriculture, and digital product requirements. For 2025, the proposed measures were projected to generate annual net savings of around €15 billion, as well as additional one-off relief of approximately €5.6 billion. These figures demonstrate that the Commission generally agrees with the direction of the proposals. The dispute therefore revolves primarily around speed, scope, and credibility. The 13 member states are demanding not just isolated adjustments, but a systematic overhaul of the entire body of legislation.

The conflict lies between announcement and implementation

Politically, a paradoxical situation arises. Both the Commission and numerous member states declare reducing bureaucracy a priority, while at the same time, businesses increasingly perceive that the density of regulations is rising. This contradiction can be partly explained by time lags. Simplifications must first be proposed, negotiated, adopted, implemented nationally, and become effective in practice. Meanwhile, new requirements from previously enacted laws continue to come into force. For businesses, the burden can therefore increase in the short term, even though political discussions about relief are already underway.

Furthermore, there is a measurement problem. Governments and institutions often count the expected savings of individual measures without simultaneously providing a transparent comparison of all newly incurred costs. A credible assessment of the savings would have to show for each year which recurring and one-off burdens are newly added, which are eliminated, and how the net effect is distributed according to company size and industry. This should include not only reporting obligations but also costs for IT adjustments, certification, consulting, training, internal controls, and delayed market launches.

The initiative by the 13 states should therefore also be understood as a signal of distrust. It indicates that selective simplification is insufficient if the overall regulatory framework remains opaque. A company doesn't need a political list of completed measures, but rather a noticeably simpler day-to-day operation. Success is not determined by the number of omnibus packages or withdrawn regulations, but by whether businesses actually spend less time on documentation, can invest faster, and can scale more easily within the single market.

Gold-plating turns Europe into 27 regulatory areas

The debate about Brussels bureaucracy falls short if it ignores national responsibility. Gold-plating refers to additional requirements that member states add when implementing European law. This can include a broader scope, stricter obligations, additional approval stages, or more complex procedures. Such additions are sometimes politically motivated and can be objectively justified in certain areas. They become problematic when they are implemented without a transparent cost-benefit analysis and subsequently attributed to the European Union.

Economically, gold-plating undermines a key advantage of common European rules. Companies expect harmonization to ensure that a product, process, or report is treated according to largely the same criteria in multiple countries. If European minimum requirements are expanded differently at the national level, separate legal frameworks are created once again. A company then has to finance translations, consulting, and process variations for each country. Particularly high-growth smaller companies are discouraged from entering new markets because the fixed costs of expansion only become worthwhile with high sales volumes.

Responsibility cannot simply be shifted back and forth between Brussels and the national capitals. The Commission must ensure that regulations are clear, proportionate, and as interoperable as possible. The European Parliament and the Council must also rigorously assess the consequences of significant changes during the legislative process. Member States, in turn, should clearly identify, justify, and conduct their own impact assessments for any national tightening of regulations. Only in this way will it become clear at which political level the burdens actually arise.

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The single market is bigger on paper than in practice

The economic significance of regulatory fragmentation becomes particularly clear when comparing the European single market with the United States. Despite common institutions, the movement of goods and services within the EU remains burdened by considerable obstacles. Estimates equate the remaining barriers to customs duties of approximately 44 percent for goods and even around 110 percent for services. These figures do not represent actual tariffs but rather a model translation of differing standards, approvals, procedures, and market barriers into comparable costs.

Around 60 percent of European exporting companies report that they have to comply with different standards or consumer protection rules in different member states. This is particularly detrimental to digital services and knowledge-intensive business models, whose economic advantage lies precisely in low marginal costs and rapid scalability. If expansion into each additional country requires renewed legal adaptation, local registration, or special reporting, Europe loses some of the theoretical economies of scale of its single market.

Reducing intra-EU trade barriers to a level more comparable to trade between US states could increase European productivity by almost seven percent in the long term. Such model calculations are not precise forecasts and should not be interpreted as automatically achievable gains in prosperity. However, they illustrate the magnitude of the untapped potential. Europe's greatest deregulation reserve may not lie in the complete elimination of common rules, but rather in their more consistent harmonization. A clear European standard can be considerably easier to implement economically than 27 formally loose, but differing, national systems.

Small businesses pay the highest relative price

The European economy is largely driven by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). However, these companies rarely have their own specialists for every new regulatory issue. In practice, responsibilities are often taken on by management, finance departments, quality management teams, or external consultants. This ties up personnel who could otherwise be serving customers, developing products, or improving operational processes. The resulting damage, therefore, lies not only in the costs of consulting and software, but also in the lost entrepreneurial focus.

For startups and young technology companies, another effect comes into play. Uncertain regulation increases capital requirements because longer approval and development phases need to be financed. Investors value difficult-to-calculate legal risks at a discount or prefer business models that can scale more quickly in larger, more homogeneous markets. Europe thus risks producing innovative companies but losing them to other locations in later growth phases. The regulatory burden then acts like an invisible tax on scaling.

A blanket exemption for small businesses is not always the best solution. Permanent thresholds can create perverse incentives if companies deliberately remain below a certain number of employees or revenue to avoid additional obligations. Proportionate requirements, standardized digital procedures, longer transition periods, and simplified documentation are preferable. Rules should be designed so that growing companies do not abruptly encounter a cost wall. The goal must be to ensure protective standards without administratively penalizing growth.

Legal certainty is a location advantage

In public debate, regulation is often treated solely as a cost factor. This underestimates its productive value. Companies are more likely to invest when property rights, liability, data protection, contract enforcement, product safety, and competitive conditions are reliably regulated. Legal certainty reduces risk premiums, facilitates financing, and builds customer trust. Especially in international competition, a credible European standard can become a mark of quality.

The opposite of overregulation is therefore not a lack of rules, but rather improved predictability. Companies need stable targets, clear definitions, realistic transition periods, and compatible technical standards. Frequent revisions of poorly prepared regulations can be just as damaging as the original burden, because they devalue investments already made. Simplification must therefore be carried out carefully enough to avoid triggering a new cycle of reforms.

A regulatory pause can increase planning certainty in the short term if it is clear which projects are being suspended, revised, or continued. However, if the term remains politically vague, the opposite effect could occur. Companies would then not know whether to prepare for already announced requirements or expect them to be eased. The consolidation year therefore needs transparent criteria, a fixed timetable, and a publicly verifiable prioritization. Relief must not come at the cost of uncertainty.

Impact assessments must review the final text

The European Union already has a well-developed system of impact assessments. The fundamental problem lies less in a complete lack of analyses than in their scope and binding nature. Often, the focus is primarily on the Commission's initial proposal. However, during negotiations, Parliament and Member States amend key thresholds, deadlines, exemptions, and reporting obligations. If these changes are not systematically reassessed, the actual impact of the final legislation remains insufficiently understood.

Furthermore, impact assessments often focus more on direct costs than on long-term benefits, innovation effects, and follow-up rounds. A good analysis must capture both. It should examine how a regulation affects market entry, competition, investment, research, international supply chains, and the scaling of young companies. Equally important is the societal benefit, such as increased safety, reduced environmental costs, or greater trust. Only a balanced approach prevents better regulation from becoming a one-sided instrument against every new protective measure.

A mandatory review of major regulations at least every five years would be particularly beneficial. This review would use predefined key performance indicators to determine whether the objective has been achieved, what the actual costs were, and whether any unintended consequences have occurred. Rules without demonstrable added value should be simplified or repealed. Effective regulations could be reaffirmed and, if necessary, harmonized across Europe. Such a review process would shift the burden of proof: not every rule would automatically become permanent simply because it was once politically enacted.

Digitalization can reduce or automate bureaucracy

Digital administration is often seen as a solution to bureaucracy. Indeed, it can accelerate processes, avoid duplicate data entry, and make data interoperable between authorities. The "once-only" principle, according to which companies only have to submit information once, has considerable potential. Standardized data models, machine-readable standards, and central European interfaces could be particularly beneficial for companies operating across borders.

Digitization, however, does not eliminate unnecessary obligations. A superfluous form remains superfluous even if it is filled out online. Poorly designed portals can even increase the workload if companies have to enter the same data in different systems, switch between technical formats, or manage new access for each authority. The benchmark, therefore, should not be how many administrative services are available digitally, but rather how many process steps are actually eliminated.

Artificial intelligence opens up additional possibilities for checking regulations for overlaps, automatically assigning reporting data, and guiding companies through requirements in a context-sensitive manner. At the same time, there is a risk that authorities will demand ever more data because its processing is becoming technically simpler. However, the lower collection costs for governments do not justify an unlimited expansion of reporting obligations. A digital relief strategy must therefore be combined with data minimization, clear purposes, and binding rules for deletion or reuse.

Geopolitics changes the standard for good regulation

European economic policy no longer operates within a stable global order. Trade conflicts, state-supported overcapacities, resource dependencies, military risks, and competition for future technologies are increasing the pressure on companies. At the same time, energy supply, defense capabilities, digitalization, and decarbonization must be financed. Additional annual investments of at least 750 to 800 billion euros have been estimated for these tasks. More recent estimates place the need even higher in some cases.

Against this backdrop, regulation becomes a strategic resource. Europe cannot compete in every sector with lower wages, cheaper energy, or larger capital markets. However, it can be attractive through reliable standards, rapid market access, and a truly integrated single market. Conversely, unnecessary complexity exacerbates existing disadvantages. A company operating in Europe that simultaneously faces higher energy prices, more difficult financing, and slower permitting processes is particularly vulnerable to additional documentation and reporting costs.

This does not mean abandoning European environmental, social, or safety goals in global competition. A mere race to the bottom in terms of regulation would ultimately damage trust, quality of life, and political stability. The strategic task is to combine ambitious goals with technological openness and rapid implementation. Europe must regulate more strongly what should be achieved and prescribe less detail about how companies achieve it. Results-oriented standards are more likely to foster innovation than rigid process requirements.

A consolidation year needs measurable rules

For the proposed year to be more than just a political symbol, it must be tied to verifiable criteria. First, a sector-by-sectoral assessment of the burden on regulations would be necessary. This assessment should consider not only individual regulations but also their interplay. Particularly relevant would be energy-intensive industries, mechanical engineering, chemicals, logistics, construction, digital services, the financial sector, and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) operating across borders. Companies and employees should be systematically involved, ensuring that well-organized interest groups do not dominate the selection of regulations to be abolished.

Secondly, every major new reporting or compliance obligation requires a cross-check against existing requirements in the same policy area. The frequently used principle of "one in, one out" can provide guidance, but it must not be applied mechanically. A socially necessary rule is not invalidated simply because an equally large existing obligation cannot be eliminated. Rather, what is crucial is that new requirements provide an opportunity to reorganize the entire process and eliminate redundancies.

Third, European and national authorities should use common data standards. Where the same information is needed for statistics, taxation, sustainability, customs, or oversight, it must be examined whether it can be used multiple times with consent and a clear purpose limitation. Fourth, any additional national rules implementing European law should be transparently disclosed. Fifth, the actual net reductions in bureaucracy must be published annually and independently verified. Without such metrics, deregulation risks becoming a bureaucratic narrative itself.

The political alliance has discernible limits

The 13 signatories form a relevant, but not a majority-capable, reform coalition. Large member states and important political forces do not unite behind the initiative. This limits the likelihood of a genuine, general moratorium. At the same time, the composition makes it clear that the criticism cannot be reduced to a single ideological camp. Industrialized countries, northern European reformers, and Central and Eastern European growth centers all recognize a common problem.

The initiative could still fail if it is perceived as a blanket attack on environmental, social, or consumer protection. Those calling for simplification must therefore specify which obligations do not generate sufficient added value, which data are collected twice, and which procedures can be shortened without compromising the objectives. General terms like "bureaucratic monster" may mobilize political support, but they are of little help in the technical revision of complex legal matters.

Conversely, it would be a mistake to dismiss all criticism of regulation as lobbying against necessary standards. Businesses possess practical knowledge about implementation problems that public administrations often lack. This knowledge should be utilized, but supplemented by data, employee perspectives, consumer interests, and independent evaluation. A robust reform process combines economic experience with democratic oversight. It neither replaces policy with corporate desires nor ignores the real costs of political decisions.

Competitiveness is not created simply by fewer rules

A credible reduction in bureaucracy must be part of a broader European growth strategy. The productivity gap with the United States stems primarily from weaker technological development, less widespread adoption of digital solutions, lower levels of intangible investment, and a smaller number of globally scaled companies. Added to this are fragmented capital markets that fail to adequately channel private savings into productive investments. Even perfect regulation alone would not solve these problems.

Parallel reforms are therefore necessary. Cheaper and more reliable energy, faster planning and approval processes, an integrated capital market, better cross-border infrastructure, greater professional and academic mobility, and innovation-friendly public procurement would amplify the effect of regulatory relief. Completing the single market for services is also crucial, as modern industrial products are increasingly linked to software, maintenance, financing, and data services.

The danger lies in using deregulation as a politically more convenient substitute for making more difficult decisions. It is easier to announce a general relief quota than to open up national protection markets, reallocate budget funds, or genuinely integrate a European capital market. A serious competitiveness strategy must therefore not isolate simplification. It must link regulatory reform with investment, market integration, and institutional speed.

Europe's strength lies in better, not cheaper, standards

The central economic policy perspective is not that Europe has too much government and other economic areas too little. Successful economies combine clear rules with high adaptability. Europe's problem is less the existence of demanding standards than their overlapping, differing national application, and slow correction. The continent should not try to restore its competitiveness by dismantling every form of protection. Rather, it should eliminate the costs of poor coordination.

A year of consolidation can be an effective catalyst if it alters the entire life cycle of legislation. Before a rule is enacted, alternatives and their impacts must be thoroughly examined. Significant changes must be reassessed during the negotiation process. Additional requirements must be transparent during national implementation. After several years, the regulation must demonstrate its effectiveness through measurable results. Digitization must eliminate redundant data entry, rather than simply processing existing complexity more quickly.

The provocative truth is this: Europe doesn't lack political goals, but rather the ability to implement them simply, quickly, and consistently. The initiative by the 13 states therefore addresses a real weakness. Its economic justification lies not in the notion that every rule destroys prosperity. It lies in the understanding that even worthwhile goals lose their legitimacy if their implementation is unnecessarily expensive, incomprehensible, or ineffective.

The break would only be an improvement if less comes back afterwards

The success of this initiative will not be measured by whether Brussels officially declares a year without new legislation. A politically binding work program that limits new initiatives to what is essential while systematically streamlining existing regulations would be more likely and sensible. Crucially, this period must not simply see a lump sum of postponed projects resurfacing, triggering a new wave of burdens.

Europe needs lasting regulatory discipline. This includes a cap on avoidable net administrative costs, full digital interoperability, regular impact assessments, and a clear allocation of responsibilities between the EU and its member states. Equally necessary is the courage to actually abolish ineffective rules. Simplification must not merely mean publishing guidelines, slightly postponing deadlines, or redesigning forms.

The 13 states have identified the right conflict, but they haven't automatically provided the complete solution. A regulatory pause can facilitate investment, strengthen business confidence, and make the single market more efficient. However, it can only be economically convincing if safeguards are maintained, national burdens are taken into account, and the actual impact is measured independently. Europe's competitiveness will not be decided by boundless deregulation and ever-increasing regulations. It will be decided by whether the continent learns to achieve greater impact with less complexity.

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