A study from the University of Oxford advocates that Sweden, a European Union member since 1995, should adopt the euro in place of the Swedish krona.

In a 2003 referendum, 56 percent of Swedish voters rejected adopting the euro. The August 2009 study (“Too Much to Lose, or More to Gain? Should Sweden Join the Euro?”) stated this was due to “the popular perception…that to join the euro would involve relinquishing monetary policy independence to a pan-European body.”

While the paper conceded that in “joining the euro, Sweden would give up monetary sovereignty,” it stated that “the cost in terms of a loss of monetary policy autonomy would be negligible.”

The EU expects all member nations to join the European Economic Monetary Union and agree to share a single currency. Yet the United Kingdom and Denmark have negotiated an opt-out clause.

The Oxford economics paper concluded, “We hence believe that the answer to the question of whether Sweden should join the euro…should be answered with an unqualified ‘yes.’”