Abstract
The Danish success of flexicurity has long intrigued European policymakers, yet a widespread reluctance to adopt the model persists. However, the digital revolution and a shifting geopolitical landscape now demand an urgent awakening. Europe’s economic divergence from the United States is no longer just a matter of growth; it has evolved into a critical military and strategic dependence, laid bare by conflicts in Ukraine and security concerns in Greenland.
As highlighted in the Draghi Report, Europe’s stagnation is inextricably linked to the “tech” sector—a domain fundamentally defined by high rates of experimentation and failure. While traditional European employment protections may remain compatible with legacy industries, they act as a structural barrier to high-tech innovation. The prohibitive “cost of failure” in Europe—where rigid labor laws inadvertently stifle the very sectors like AI that ensure future job security—decimates profitability and paralyzes the venture capital investment necessary for breakthrough technologies.
This session builds upon the core findings of our Bocconi/HEC research and expands the analysis specifically for the German context. We will quantify how exit costs and dismissal complexities deter capital allocation in R&D-intensive sectors, examining the specific structural challenges within the German “Mittelstand” and its manufacturing-heavy economy. Ultimately, we argue that a targeted flexicurity model has become vital for restoring technological sovereignty and long-term prosperity, while providing a rigorous analysis of the political and institutional hurdles that continue to obstruct its implementation.
Speaker
Yann Coatanlem is an economist and President of Club Praxis, a multidisciplinary think tank that advocates for the integration of Big Data into public policy, specifically for the modernization of tax and welfare systems. His work has earned multiple accolades, including the Special Prize of the Political Economy, Statistics, and Finance section of the Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques.
Having spent the majority of his research career at Citigroup as Managing Director and Head of Multi-Asset Quantitative Analysis, he is now the co-founder of GlassView, the pioneers of Neuro-Powered Media™. He serves on the board of the Paris School of Economics and is the co-author of Capitalism against Inequalities (PUF, 2022), featuring a postface by Nobel Laureate Philippe Aghion. His literary and economic contributions have been recognized with the Prix Turgot and the Prix Louis Marin.
Since 2023, Coatanlem has been a pivotal voice in highlighting the “cost of failure” within the innovation gap between Europe and the United States. His research was instrumental in embedding this critical factor into the European Commission’s Competitiveness Compass. His publications with Bocconi University (2024) and Bocconi & HEC (2025) garnered significant attention from the European Parliament and the DG Research and Innovation, directly influencing the Draghi Report and sparking national debates. Most recently, in 2026, he co-authored a strategic piece for the Atlantic Council proposing original frameworks for the Climate Club to catalyze green financing.
An alumnus of ENSIMAG and HEC Paris, Yann is a recipient of the French National Order of Merit, the Gold Medal of La Renaissance Française, and the Médaille d’honneur des Conseillers du Commerce Extérieur.