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Unlike Most Millennials, Norway's Are Rich (bbc.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: Best known for its Viking history, snow sports and jaw-dropping fjords, Norway is making a new name for itself as the only major economy in Europe where young people are getting markedly richer. People in their early thirties in Norway have an average annual disposable household income of around 460,000 kroner (around $56,200). Young Norwegians have enjoyed a 13% rise in disposable household income in real terms compared to Generation X (those born between 1966 and 1980) when they were the same age. These startling figures come from the largest comparative wealth data set in the world, the Luxembourg Income Database, and were analyzed in a recent report on generational incomes for the UK Think Tank The Resolution Foundation.
Compare this with young people in other strong economies: U.S. millennials have experienced a 5% dip, in Germany it's a 9% drop. For those living in southern Europe (the southern Eurozone suffered the brunt of the global economic crisis in 2008), disposable incomes have plunged by as much as 30%. Norway's youth unemployment rate (among 15- to 29-year-olds) is also relatively low at 9.4% compared to an OECD average of 13.9%. According to the BBC, this can be attributed to the country's rapid economic growth, thanks largely to their huge oil and gas sectors. "After seeing the biggest increase in average earnings of any large high-income economy between 1980 and 2013, it now leads multiple global rankings for wealth and wellbeing."
Compare this with young people in other strong economies: U.S. millennials have experienced a 5% dip, in Germany it's a 9% drop. For those living in southern Europe (the southern Eurozone suffered the brunt of the global economic crisis in 2008), disposable incomes have plunged by as much as 30%. Norway's youth unemployment rate (among 15- to 29-year-olds) is also relatively low at 9.4% compared to an OECD average of 13.9%. According to the BBC, this can be attributed to the country's rapid economic growth, thanks largely to their huge oil and gas sectors. "After seeing the biggest increase in average earnings of any large high-income economy between 1980 and 2013, it now leads multiple global rankings for wealth and wellbeing."
Turns out it's easy to run a "social democracy" when you're floating on a sea of oil you can sell to the rest of the world. Guess Marx forgot to put that part in.
Maybe they lack momma's basement for carefree gaming into their forties.
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As I've watched how Norway has been doing over the past 15+ years with their wise use and planning of oil revenues it has been clear that the Norwegian government has been planning for the future to ensure the prosperity of their citizens.
Now that technology is unlocking massive amounts of fossil fuels, it's unfortunate that other countries (I'm thinking of my country Canada) aren't following the example and planning for the future in the same way. I know that in Canada, there would be a major fight with Alberta to share tar sands revenue, but it would be nice if the Albertan government at least would follow Norway's approach and provide for their citizen's future.
Good on Norway, hopefully other countries will follow their lead.
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The oil & gas sector employed 1% of Norwegians last year (including suppliers). It represented 14% of GDP. However the sector is Norway's largest measured in terms of value added, government revenues, investments and export value (40%). All of the revenue is invested abroad using a SWF.
The fundamental problem western economies have is that almost all of them have not been producing enough skilled workers (aka, educated children) to deal with their ageing population demographics. They have tried various things, such as dumbing down degrees, introducing welfare for working families, and pouring trillions of dollars of QE money into a succession of bubble investments, but none of these things has fundamentally increased the number of babies being born that turn into the skilled doctors, engineers, teachers etc, that we need to replace the old people who are rapidly retiring/dying.
For example, in the UK, while some people are complaining that any net migration above ~100k is a huge and unsustainable number, nobody ever seems to realise that more than 500k brits die each year because they are old. The birth rate now roughly matches the death rate, but it didn't for a long time, so the UK needs to run a certain level of positive migration if it wants to avoid severe skills crunches over the next decade (of course there are valid arguments to be had that they are not doing enough to train their own youth, and that they are not necessarily getting the right sort of migrants). Essentially what they were doing (stealing skilled workers who they didn't have to pay to raise and educate) was actually quite ingenious, but has been largely rejected by the voters now. This same issue is playing out across Europe and even in the USA now.
At a fundamental level, you can print money, create property bubbles, whatever, but it will not fix the underlying issue that you are going to have a growing ratio of people not working to those that do. The only way you can balance that equation is either for those retiring to consume a lot less, or for those working to transfer more of their money to those who are not. That can be done through taxes, or other rent seeking behaviour, such as property prices, but someone is going to suffer. Unfortunately the older people are a larger bloc and vote more reliably, so for now the ones that will suffer will be younger folk.
The only way to escape this really is to move to a country like Australia that has much better demographics. Or a country like Norway where they can afford to bring in as many skilled workers as they need.
Just like the parrot I'm pining for the fjords.
Meanwhile in Australia, we give away our natural gas practically for free while suffering through insane domestic gas prices. Qatar which is a Middle Eastern shithole, actually collects more tax revenue from their gas exports than we do.
The lesson is that every Norwegian citizen is deeply invested in the oil industry, and their investments are paying off well.
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That help explains why Norway is the happiest country in the world.
To those criticisms I would add the standard criticism of most reporting on statistics: they've given us the average (by which they undoubtedly mean the arithmetic mean), but what's the median? Are Norway's millennials as a class rich, or is it a handful with insane incomes skewing the headline figure?
What are you supposed to learn?
Invest fossil fuel revenue in free education, generous unumployment insurance, generous parental leave, domestic companies outside of the fossil fuel sector? Also: high minimum wages.
America may not be awash in newfound oil, but the USA is a wealthy country that keeps creating wealth. Take an American company like Apple, awash in cash. The CEO gets $3 million base salary + $9 million for meeting his numbers for a total of $12 million. An Apple Genius (often a millenial) makes $15/hr and may get $10 off an Apple device for their perk.
In your judgement, is Tim Cook is worth the same as 400 Apple Genius in terms of contribution to the company and wealth creation?
In the USA wealth is not evenly distributed and any gains flow to the top 10% as seen in Tim Cooks performance bonus.
How to fix it?
Last I checked, the economy is booming and in the USA there are more jobs than workers available. It is time to use your social media skills to get organized and get a fair wage for your contribution, unless of course you think you are worth 400x (times) less than the CEO of your company.
Who should organize?
Apple Geniuses
Big Box Store Works (Home Depot, Lowes, Menards, Best Buy, Walmart, SamClub, Costco, Target)
Fast Food Workers (Taco Bell, McD;s, BK)
Dollar Store Workers
Convenience Store Works
Department Store Workers
Everyone has to do it together, or it won't work. No single company can have a competitive advantage with cheaper labor. However, most CEO's in a competitive sector like fast food can't raise wages without raising prices or cutting staff, because their competitors can still run cheaper. The entire segment needs to band together and demand higher wages/benefits.
Millennials! Pay Attention. There has never been an better time to organize and get your piece of the American pie, or you can just settle for the crumbs.
The question you have to ask yourself is what value do you contribute to the company in which you work?
This worked at the turn of the century for AutoWorkers and it could clearly work again.
https://youtu.be/vrw_WRhUfog
We're also running a total population Ponzi scheme at unhinged levels, to cover up economic issues.
. For lack of a better word, we're raping the young of a future here.
how is that relevant to anything ?? Most companies anywhere are small....
Please read what the word *socialist* means : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... aka the Bolsheviks
I'm also curious about their definition of "household", as this number seems rather high to me. Are these people living at home with their parents? I've been living in Norway for 13 years now and i haven't had even half that level of disposable income. I'm sure some folk earn this much, but the average?
It helps a lot that Norway has a small population. Those gas and oil reserves go a long way. And they get to export nearly all of their gas, since they use hydroelectric for most of their power. Canada probably is in a good position to do similar, but most of the rest of Europe is not quite in the same position.
And therein lies the problem.
"Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my Presidency. I'm fucked."; ~ Donald J. Trump
No, you idiot I kinda want to add, here in Sweden and in Finland and in Denmark too we also have not free but publicly funded education, generous parental leave and a blend of companies and also a mixture of government control and private companies if you want to add that as well.
Also neither Sweden or Norway have any minimum wage.
Even though we in Sweden, Finland and Denmark have all those other things you mention it's unlikely we have the same outcome as the Norwegians, at-least not here in Sweden thanks to massive shit-immigration instead ruining things.
But thanks for playing. But that isn't the reason and Norway just as Sweden likely already had all those things before too. Except minimum wage which we haven't had and don't have.
The difference between Norway and the rest of the Nordic nations is their oil and gas wealth which is stored into a fund which secure pensions and I think also other welfare things onward. In the 80s they found their oil and they have become richer because of the oil and gas not because of the stuff you likely are politically interested and make up is the reason they have become richer.
The oil and gas wealth is the difference.
Lots of European nations including the southern ones do have the other stuff you mention but clearly not the same development as Norway.
The thing to learn if anything is that if you sit on massive natural wealth resources don't let a private company and a few rich people get it all and the profits basically for free but rather invest it wisely into stock and only take some of the profits so that it can benefit everyone and last ~forever.
The one thing Norway have done differently is to wisely invest their money from natural resources and use it to fund their welfare / redistribute the profits to the population (in this case also by being able to have lower taxes than what we do in Sweden, Denmark and Finland, because here people have to WORK to generate all that money going into parliament spending and welfare.)
Find a valuable resource, give the gains to your people = they get richer. Amazing how that one worked? ...
If you read that wiki entry, you will learn that there's nothing in there that is incompatible with a market economy.
In fact, to quote the Prime Minister of Denmark himself (from the same article): "The Nordic model is an expanded welfare state which provides a high level of security to its citizens, but it is also a successful market economy with much freedom to pursue your dreams and live your life as you wish."
Market economies and socialism are a perfectly compatible. In fact, you could say that one does not work without the other.
You are welcome on my lawn.
There's a lot of them in Ballard neighborhood of Seattle, and they all seem to be doing well.
Yeah, this, rather than the socialist and welfare approach which kinda all of Europe share but it's clearly not making people richer in the rest of Europe.
The only "great" insight story here is that if you invest the profits from your very rich natural resources into stocks and redistribute a small enough part of it to your people (in this case by being able to keep your generous welfare while still having lower taxes than others which offer the same) they get richer!!
If you spend it straight away you get less from it than if you invest it and don't use up too much of it.
And if you let private global companies take the gains from it and only charge a small tax on them they the people get less of the benefits and just a few people get huge benefits from it.
Yay. Surprising!
Mean-while here in Sweden the taxes for ore or minerals or whatever for a mining company is 0.1%.
Most of Norway's non-transportation energy use comes from renewable sources. And by “most”, I mean 99% (97% hydroelectric, 2% wind and other renewable sources).
Aaaaand... this is what happens when you use the Common Sense and you stop following all those anglo-austrian ridiculous theories about managing a country wealth.
When a country's wealth is managed with the evolution and welfare of its population in mind, rather than with making the richest people more rich hoping they will "give jobs" to the rest of the people, it happens that such country have sane, healthy and wealthy young generations. Sane, healthy and wealthy young generations that will keep investing in the society, will have the wealth and the time to create companies and businesses (they have indeed the time and the wealth to do so because they aren't struggling with money and wasting their lives working for 7 dollars an hour saving for visiting a dentist). Therefore, the people is able to have children, and the wheel keeps moving on and on.
Western societies, following those absurd and suicide economics dictated during decades that says you have to fuck yourself and struggle with money working like a donkey because God, The Market or whatever else says so... have fallen into the inevitable decadency of having already several generations that were wasting their lives working like donkeys for subsistency (or even worse: going to absurd wars) instead of making the society actually evolve with their workforce and talent well spent.
It is called Socialism. And yeah, as everyone can see, it doesn't involve "gulags" nor food tickets nor dictators with a moustache. It doesn't mean either you can't fund your very own company, have your brand new BMW in the garage of your very own house. It only takes Common Sense, and avoid having the main resources of your country (oil, wood, minerals...) in the very only hands of Mr. Burns-like billionaires, who are in fact only parasites sucking the common wealth.
Socialism, motherfucker. Socialism. The best, fairest and more evolved organization a human society can have.
Norway carefully used their assets whilst the UK pissed their oil wealth away. Africa is currently flogging all their mineral assets to China on the cheap to benefit a few bent politicians and supercar salesmen. Like the modern day Ant and Grasshopper!
I'd really need to hear what your definition of socialism actually is to square it with the notion being compatible with (or as you later suggest required for) a market (I'm assuming you mean a free one, or one that is reasonably so) economy. Otherwise I suspect you're guilty of choosing your definition of socialism post priori so that you can find one that doesn't look like a miserable failure.
Private exchange doesn't make sense if you have communal ownership. Maybe you're envisioning something like all private companies being employee owned (i.e., you can't hold stock if you don't work there and if you work there you must hold stock) but I don't think that's ever been tried. It's almost like a guild system, only with multiple competing guilds. This system also says nothing about personal income tax or social safety nets either as you could just as easily use this system regardless of how that's handled.
The only other thing you could possibly mean is that everyone acts as a capitalist agent, but the government takes most or all of their earnings. Essentially you seem to have private exchange in name only up since as soon as you make an exchange whatever benefit you gained from it becomes communally controlled. I suppose that works if you have a group of people that like playing free market just for the sake of playing free market. It would be a bit like playing Monopoly endlessly, only with real money that you never get to keep since just goes back in the tray. I don't know if there's a group of people on the planet weird enough to play by those rules. Maybe if the group were entirely self-selecting, but to suspect it on a population level for any ethnic group is suspect at best.
In the 1970's the UK was promised a golden age resulting from North Sea oil and gas. It seems never to have arrived, at least for most of the citizens, though we would certainly be deeper in the doo-doo without them.
The UK sold off the oilfields (and many, many other public assets) to the private sector and takes a slice in tax whereas the Norwegians kept theirs state-owned for the benefit of all their citizens.
Long-term perspective in the management of the government's petroleum revenues ensures that they benefit Norwegian society as a whole, and that future generations will benefit from Norwayâ(TM)s petroleum wealth. This has been a key principle in developing the financial and legal framework for the sector.
https://www.norskpetroleum.no/...
I disagree. If a welfare state needs nearly 100% effective taxation to stay afloat, it is nowhere near sustainable. Add welfare immigration to that, and it's destined to break down. Even the head of the national welfare organization recently went to the media to raise awareness of how the system is in danger.
Trivia: the cheapest bottle of rum I could find by a quick check of the booze monopoly (state run, of course), is $65.
You haven't heard of any Norwegian brands because Norwegian industry exports very few consumer products, apart from seafood. It exports—among other things—oil, gas, lumber, aluminum, nitrogen, artificial fertilizer, ships, ship handling systems, petroleum prospecting and drilling equipment, subsea equipment (including ROVs), telecom equipment, automotive components, rocket engines and components, satellite components, and believe it or not, ammunition and high-tech weapon systems (including many used by US forces: sea-to-sea and air-to-surface missile systems, integrated sensor systems, remote weapon stations and more).
McDonald pays $16-$19+/HR in Norway
I'm guessing it's not something like North Korea or Venezuela, i.e. different to yours.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
No, it's the median: https://www.ssb.no/en/ifhus
Socialism is by definition incompatible with Nordic Social Democracy model. We categorically reject all main cornerstones of socialism, and instead go for market economy with high taxation that funds the baseline income level and services.
We do have socialist in every Nordic state by the way. They're the marginal far left parties, rejected by overwhelming majority of the populace. Here in Finland for example, far left openly socialist Vasemmistoliitto holds between 5 and 8% of the vote, and is a minor party. They also have some communists in their party, but their leadership generally denounces communism and sticks to socialism. I can provide citations for that as well.
It would be very helpful if wannabe far leftists from across the pond would stop insulting our countries, our politicians and our ways of life by maliciously branding them as "socialist" for their own political purposes. Have your class war if you want, but leave us well out of it.
It's nice to see that our second female PM is almost as good as the first.
That's if she still *is* PM. Haven't looked at the TV since the footy ended.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I may post more in-depth later. For now I can't stop giggling at all the right wingers here who after years of screeching "that's socialism' every time anyone breathed a hint of a word in favor of a social safety net who ar now trying to walk that back and claim "That's not socialism at all!"
*GIGGLE*
You're forgetting that due to Quebecois, it's legal to secede from Canada. If the push you're suggesting would come to shove, Alberta would likely secede from confederation.
In your judgement, is Tim Cook is worth the same as 400 Apple Genius in terms of contribution to the company and wealth creation?
Yes. That "Genius" can be replaced by literally tens of thousands of IT people here at /. alone, let alone across the US. Tim Cook has shown an extraordinary talent for supply chain management and operations and his decisions directly affect 100,000 people. Paying him 400 times what the "hipster Geek Squad" member makes is quite understandable.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Fun detail. Norway doesn't actually burn it's oil and gas in meaningful amounts. Their electric grid runs mainly on hydro. Carbohydrates are for export.
It's the median per household. The median for a single person with no children (i.e. a household of one) is about 285,000 NOK after tax. https://www.ssb.no/en/ifhus
our ruling class has paid close attention to how Norway's working class works together, doesn't fight among themselves and ensures everyone has food, shelter and healthcare and made sure we don't do the same. We've got an extensive network of social wedge issues that keep us divided and at each other throats so we don't ask too many questions. We've also got a constitution that limits the effects of democracy, or as many would put it, "It's a Republic!".
Oh, you meant the working class. Yeah, we haven't learned a God damned thing. We voted for a bitchy oligarch with a penchant for outsourcing instead of the guy that wanted to give us health care and then when we realized we didn't like her we voted for a guy who sits on a golden throne/toilet as our populist champion.... Does of us that did vote anyway. We're not paying a lot of attention really.
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At one time only hikers and mountaineers would know they existed, along with maybe a few outdoor photographers who used their pop-out mitts.
For some reason the brand became sort of trendy with the chav element at one point.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
We're talking about the American definition of socialism though which boils down to "not shitting on the poor". As the poor are only there because they didn't work hard enough, any state support is equivalent to the actions of murderous dictatorships past and present and carrying military grade weaponry about day to day is the only way to prevent those slackers from trying to take that well earned money away from you by force.
Ballard hasn't been Norwegian since the last shop selling lutefisk closed, and syttende Mai parades stopped hosting members of the Norwegian royal family. I grew up in Ballard, my next door neighbor Ron Olsen, used to record the Scandinavian Hour in his basement - and messing around with all that vintage 60s and 70s radio/audio gear is what got me into electronics back then...
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
That's always the argument against raising wages in the States. If we raise wages companies will just raise prices and you won't make any more money. Now, I know enough to know this is bunk. Inflation can be controlled so long as productivity is going up, and here in the States we've doubled in in 40 years while wages for low end employees have droped 20-30% in real dollars (seriously, I made $6/hr at a jack in the crack in 95 which was equal to $10 today. These days they start kids like I was off at $7.25-$8).
I guess what I'm really asking is, what do you say to people who tell you we should keep wages low because it'll mean lower prices and an overall better life. It needs to be pithy, because the folks you're arguing with have been told this repeatably by large Political Action Committees with a vested interest in keeping wages low.
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That ignoring the AGW alarmists is a good thing for our kids? But, no, that's pretty much impossible, right?
So, why is it okay when Norway does it, but the height of evil when we do it?
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Depending on how you want to define socialism, you can get a pretty broad collection of countries. In the long run I suspect that Marxist ideologies tend to result in countries like North Korea or Venezuela, but not all socialist systems are necessarily Marxist ones. I've simply never heard of any country which has tried what might be coined as "free market socialism" and it's not something that would have a lot of overlap on the Venn diagram with other forms of socialism.
I'm just curious what the hell it's supposed to mean as the examples I give above seem odd. The first doesn't seem as though it would be what most socialists would consider a socialist system. The second seems to work, but it's still strange. It would essentially be everyone working for state owned (but not necessarily state run or centrally planned) companies (and free to choose their own line of work) and free to purchase as they choose, but only after the government uses a 100% (or near enough) tax rate to give everyone the same amount of money to engage in commerce as they will. I just don't see that being particularly stable if people can immigrate and emigrate freely. Maybe it works if the country doing it is a very tight cultural group such that people are very reluctant to leave and it's not welcoming to outsiders so most don't want to join.
The Gen Xers did alright and the boomers made out like bandits, but the Millennials are screwed. They're not getting pensions, their 401ks get eaten up by fees and the periodic stock market crashes brought on by weak regulation and risk free bail outs and their student loan debt means they can't start life until their 30s. Meanwhile outsourcing + H1-Bs means they're in intense competition for decent jobs so they worked much, much harder than their parents and grandparents for much, much less.
.com and house bubbles masked the ill effects of supply side economics until 2008 when it all came crashing down). With control of the government came control of media (Sinclair media's been allowed to buy up all local stations).
The right wing in America (who's defining feature is a pro-corporate bent that wants low wages, lax environmental regulations and lax worker protections) knows this. They're currently in control of all branches of Government (the Democratic party moved the Overton window to the left so Clinton could sail into the Whitehouse and got away with it when the
The question is, Americans may be ready for Democratic Socialism but will they get it? The ruling class has so much wealth and power now they can bury the will of the people. It's been shown a 2-3 week ad blitz is enough to change the public's opinion on anything. Hell, we can't get more than 60% of the population to agree that healthcare is a right and thanks to our political system that gives extra voting power to rural states (a Montana voter has something like 42 times more voting power than a California thanks to our Senate) and the effect of "swing states" I'm not sure any of this matters.
It literally doesn't matter how much evidence you have that Democratic Socialism works. The people opposed to it have unlimited money (we gave it to them) and the last two generations are very much in the "I got mine, fuck you" school of thought. Maybe when those people start dying. Hell, we (mostly) got gay rights. Then again the new SCOTUS might shoot all that down...
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Unfortunately the only thing the Trump pseudo president baby can babble is "but the Refugees" destroy Europe :-/ I have to say, things are pretty good here in Berlin, Germany, Europe. Actually I avoid traveling to the USA for all the crime, shootings, TSA and such, ... Instead I now travel more in Europe, France, Spain, Czech, Poland, and all the other nice neighbours we got. Together we are stronger!
It probably works out about the same for people in the U.S. once you count social security payments, income tax (federal and state), sales tax, sin taxes on alcohol, "luxury tax" on cars, and then the big monthly bill for the health insurance. That last one can be a real killer, because it's not a tax, it's a bill that's due whether you have the money or not.
Well, on the other hand Norway gets 98% of its electricity from renewable sources, and only 2% from fossil fuels, and about half of cars sold there are fully electric or plug-in hybrid.
And speaking of getting rich raping Mother Earth, if fossil fuels are the reason why Norwegian millennials are rich, why aren't Russian millenials rich?
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alvinrod challenged:
I'd really need to hear what your definition of socialism actually is to square it with the notion being compatible with (or as you later suggest required for) a market (I'm assuming you mean a free one, or one that is reasonably so) economy. Otherwise I suspect you're guilty of choosing your definition of socialism post priori so that you can find one that doesn't look like a miserable failure.
Private exchange doesn't make sense if you have communal ownership.
Social democracy isn't socialism. Hell, even socialism isn't socialism.
Theory be damned, socialism in practice is a philosophy that holds societies ought to provide the essentials for life (food, clean water, shelter, education, health care) for all their members, regardless of their income level, as fundamental rights. The definition of "pure" socialism-as-economics isn't really even worth discussing, because there is no such functioning economic system in existence. And there won't be, ever, as long as human beings are fallible creatures.
Communal ownership of some basic resources (infrastructure, for instance) is baked into western democratic practice. That's the case because it makes sense that those resources be held in common. Worker-owned companies can and do thrive in hyper-capitalist America, as long as their underlying business models are realistic and responsive to their markets.
Yes, you can build a wall of rhetorical purity around the term - or you can simply acknowledge that social democracy is the modern face of socialism, and it is not failing (at least, in the Scandanavian and Benelux countries) by any objective measure.
Life is complicated. Much too complicated, in fact, to be adequately modeled by rigid, ideological absolutes ...
Check out my novel.
Liberals would be more inclined to serve in the military of a social-democratic state like Norway.
There was no left-right difference in attitudes toward military service in the US until Vietnam. Vietnam draft deferments for the wealthy is what soured the left on the US military; the Establishment was for the war, but it had no skin in the game.
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I use the dictionary definition:
Well, the income tax rate in Denmark is just over 60%, so it fits that definition, too.
Denmark. Denmark plays by those rules. More than 60% of income in Denmark goes to taxes. Last time I checked the definition of "most", 60 percent meets the definition.
Face it: The happiest countries in the world are the countries that have struck a balance between socialism and market economies.
You are welcome on my lawn.
"Meanwhile outsourcing + H1-Bs means they're in intense competition for decent jobs so they worked much, much harder than their parents and grandparents for much, much less."
At least you mention this important issue. Illegal aliens from Latin America have forced down wages for low income earners, like construction, farm work, etc. H-1bs are forcing down wages on middle class workers. This has been observed happening in the real world. Get rid of the foreigners, and the wages will go somewhat up. It is the rich whom are lobbying for foreigners (Zuck, Gates, etc.).
Norway is probably the only oil-producing country on earth that managed to share oil revenues among citizen. Most of the time oil is a curse for the people, resulting in corruption, kleptocracy and dictatorship.
What? Why didn't the oil/gas CEOs get all of it?
Invest fossil fuel revenue in free education,
That's a tax and spend government policy, nothing is free. If education were free then it would not require petroleum revenue.
generous unumployment insurance,
Also a tax and spend government policy.
generous parental leave,
I'm guessing also tax and spend.
domestic companies outside of the fossil fuel sector?
Tax and spend.
Also: high minimum wages.
Not tax and spend but not a burden on the economy if there is cheap oil to tax, and people can afford the higher wages because they see government subsidized education, parental leave, and unemployment insurance.
Oh, and it's easier to afford these things for a government that relies on it's NATO treaties to defend them against potential invaders instead of spending that money on funding their own military.
I'm sure that having enough hydroelectric power to provide 98% of their electricity demands helps. It's easy to sell petroleum products real cheap when you don't have to burn it for lights and cooking. Places like Saudi Arabia might have a lot of cheap oil but without something to keep the lights on then they are living in grass huts instead of high rises made of concrete and glass.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
Even with that definition, I think there's a bit of a sticking point on what exactly is meant by "regulated". I'm not sure how much you'd appreciate your grocery shopping choices (i.e., your personal exchange) to be regulated by the rest of your neighbors. Do they get to pick what you're having for supper or what products can be sold at the grocery store?
Otherwise I'm not sure what you mean by "regulated" as unless you're thinking in terms of what is typically meant by government regulations. You can have those kind government or even community (think HOA) regulations without socialism so I don't believe that's a useful description.
Also, you'd need to plot out all of the countries and measure happiness and to what extent their governments are market socialist. Otherwise you can explain Norway, Denmark, etc. being happiest because Scandinavians are just happy people among a large set (for example, lots of good looking blonde women would make most people happy) of other explanations. China and Viet Nam are more classic mixed economies, but I don't know where their blend of market socialism lands them on the happiness axis.
My guess is that if you do a multivariate regression, there are other factors with more explanative power. I'm not even sure if you could do this kind of analysis as there aren't enough examples of what you'd probably classify as your brand of socialism to perform the kind of statistical analysis you'd need. But without doing that, you can't make that claim. Otherwise someone could just as easily point out some other ridiculous correlation and say that their reason must be correct. Let's pick something particular insidious such as lack of black people to illustrate the point. And before anyone jumps all over that, I don't believe (or have any good reason to believe) that would be the cause any more than market socialism.
Regardless, I suspect that if you tried to join the Socialist party in just about any country, the idea "capitalist economy with extensive social programs" would not be the platform of the party or one that they're likely to accept. It's no more than I would expect "drug induced orgies" as a form of worship to be a mainstay position of any Christian church so I probably wouldn't try to tell congregations that I'm Christian and slide that idea by them. The point is that if your point of view is going to be seen as heresy at best by the mainstream of that group, you may just want to characterize yourself as something else. Hence the term "social democrat" that gets used.
Social democracy is the model it can also be referred to as.
A mixture of state intervention (free education, free/ low cost health care etc.) and a regulated market economy. It is what Australia and NZ would refer to their systems as, even the right wing parties adhere to it as it would be political suicide to disestablish it.
Undercutting and weakening it is another thing however.
No one in NZ is conscripted/ coerced into being a doctor.
New Zealanders are well balanced with a chip on each shoulder. One represents Australia, the other the rest of the world
we allow ourselves to be swindled out of it.
I was reading the SMH yesterday about your electricity 'reforms'. Way to go Australia! What a dumpster fire that has turned out to be, as bad as your thieving banks.
New Zealanders are well balanced with a chip on each shoulder. One represents Australia, the other the rest of the world
Until you realize that 22% of Norwegian GDP is pulled from the ground, their model would not work here as we only generate 7.6% of our GDP through oil and the greens want even less of it going forward. We should stop comparing ourselves to norway, we don't generate money in the same way.
How does getting your ass blown off make you a man? If anything, getting into the way of bullets only increases the chance to become less of a man, depending on what part they shoot off.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The decisions of Bin Laden affected millions, how much should we have paid him?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
That's not what socialism means. Not at all.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Carbohydrates are for export.
Italy is the country with the massive pasta reserves.
You are aware that you are arguing your case against a country that just basically proved that the OPPOSITE of what you suggest is making its people rich, yes?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Let's not forget Norway is by far one of the most expensive countries in the world to live in. Those 460,000 kroner (around $56,200) won't last nearly as long as you think.
Not by law ...
https://www.lifeinnorway.net/n...
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
>
Market economies and socialism are a perfectly compatible. In fact, you could say that one does not work without the other.
Oh shit, The angry old white men aren't going to like this...
That's socialism, bro.
Call it what you want - The result is some of the happiest, healthiest, best-educated free people in the world, with 80%+ less crime than the USA. If that's "socialism" I think many, many Americans would happily take it.
Hell..I live in California and almost 50% of my income goes to taxes (Federal + State + St Sales Tax)
A million deaths. He paid, but unfortunately just once.
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I was reading the SMH yesterday about your electricity 'reforms'.
I was reading the Weekly World News about President Bat Boy's illicit offspring with Marilyn Monroe on Mars. That's about the same level as the Sydney Morning Herald.
Communal ownership of some basic resources (infrastructure, for instance) is baked into western democratic practice. That's the case because it makes sense that those resources be held in common.
For some things - such as utilities and public parks, I agree it makes sense. HOWEVER, too often people want communal ownership AND communal control over those resources - and that breaks down quickly. Direct democratic operation really doesn't scale well at all; could you imagine having hundreds of thousands of people voting monthly on decisions made by your local utility? Best to think of it as a corporate model - the corporation (utility/park) is owned by the people (the shareholders) who empower control over the corporation to a small group. And review the performance of the group every few years. In other words - a republic model of control, rather than a democratic (mob rule) method.
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See here. We're below population replacement rates. In fact it's one of the things that is freaking out a lot of (right wing) voters since it's immigrants that are replacing them. The actual (economically) right wing aren't so freaked out since the immigrants tend to be socially right wing because they hail from deeply religious countries.
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not quite as well as they could have, but they made a serious go at it. The went from a third world hell hole to a first world nation in about 50 years. But when the price of oil tanked that was kind of that. The sanctions didn't help either (and I have no bloody idea why my country is sanctioning another country that has not attacked us or our allies... It honestly feels like we're attacking them for being socialistic... ).
John Oliver has a pretty good piece on it. I think if they'd had another 50 years to stabilize they could have weathered it (or if those aforementioned sanctions didn't exist and they could get some aid in).
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So everyone owns the grocery store, but most people don't get a decision about how it's run? That sounds a bit like another political ideology that was opposed in the 1930s and 1940s...
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The US has socialized medicine (Medicare, Medicaid, and ~45% of all healthcare spending is by the Federal Government), socialized education (free K-12 throughout the US, and highly subsidized/free universities/colleges in many places), socialized welfare (SNAP, Welfare, etc) socialized retirement (Social Security) and highly regulated corporations (SEC, FDA, EPA, IRS, etc). I guess we're socialist, too, comrade!
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Energy sector jobs, particularly those based on carbon, have historically been one of the greatest wealth generating sectors. The abundance of carbon-based energy supplies were one of the big driving forces in the rise of the industrial west, which lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty and improved the heath and general welfare of entire nations. No "renewable" energy source has such a record; those expensive and unreliable "boutique" energy sources are primarily good for virtue signalling and fostering the political corruption that comes from fighting over government subsidies - each has its niche (solar, for example is great on Earth-orbiting satellites, and off-grid living in low latitudes) but they cannot be used as primary power sources without being backed-up by ready-on-demand nuclear or carbon-based generation.
It doesn't have to be carbon based generation to back up the wind and solar. It could be storage like hydroelectric dams. Norway has a lot of hydroelectric, it provides 98% of their electricity now. I don't know what the ratio would have to be between hydroelectric and unreliable energy like wind and solar but I'm guessing that there is a lot of room for Norway to experiment to find out.
I agree that fossil fuels brought the West from the stone age and into the iron age and beyond. Without coal there is no steel. Without steel there are no steam engines. Where I might disagree is in that fossil fuel was alone in this. Water wheels and sails did a lot to help civilization develop and spread. Mining coal and iron for steel allowed for sailing ships large enough to "stop the wind", called windjammers. These iron works often had tools powered by water wheels. It took all three, wind, water, and coal, to get where we are.
I guess if we don't want our young people becoming economically wealthy from oil and gas, we can encourage them to be drug dealers or pimps...
That only works if there is someone that can afford hookers and blackjack. The young people might be able to sell this stuff if the old people made their money from something else. I'm guessing that an economy that made their money on something other than drugs, prostitution, and gambling might be able to survive for some time high on the hog from that wealth, so long as there are some pig farmers to provide the hogs. There will be a point that the wealth runs thin or something replaces that source of wealth.
My guess is that the future source of wealth will be nuclear power. Of course we'll still have some wind and water power, solar and coal too I guess, but the bulk of it will come from nuclear.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
It's "the Alberta Government, Eh" - amirite?
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Because Russia is a fascist oligarchy, and they keep the profits to the elite only. Much like China.
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When we're at our best, we are.
You are welcome on my lawn.
It is socialism, and many Americans would love to see it happen here. And it will.
You are welcome on my lawn.
And that my friend, is why California is most desirable state to live in, and we have a bigger population than any other state in the US. Because it's nice here.
You are welcome on my lawn.
I live in California, and I pay about the same tax rate as Denmark. And it works. This is nicest place I've ever lived.
You are welcome on my lawn.
No, dumbshit. Socialism doesn't require government ownership of the means of production and distribution. Don't they teach fucking anything in school any more? Did you drop out before taking one world history course?
You are welcome on my lawn.
a political and economic theory of social organization that advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned OR REGULATED by the community as a whole
YOUR definition of Socialism. Means of production, distribution, and exchange owned ... by the community as a whole. YOU used that as what socialism is, and that means everyone owns the store. But in typical fascist (for that is what socialism leads to) manner, only a select few get to determine what happens with that grocery store.
Dumbshit.
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BS. You're retired, you pay nowhere near 60% of income in taxes. I'd be surprised if you pay over 30%. But feel free to pay another 30%...
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About 70% of all Federal spending goes to those at or below median income.
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Well, it was a rhetorical question with a rather obvious answer. The real interesting question is why people in places like Russia put up with it? That's a very important thing for Americans to be thinking about.
Here's something to chew on, though. Norway ranks #1 in the world for press freedom; Russia ranks #148. This is good proxy for overall political freedom and the degree to which the people control the government, and vice versa.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
I'm retired, but my income still puts me in the top bracket. And, my wife isn't retired.
You are welcome on my lawn.
You missed a pretty important word in that quote of yours: Welfare. Welfare is not socialism.
I'm fairly sure quite a few CEOs out there deserve at least the same.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
You haven't been around that long, so I'm going to indulge you with a response. Of course social welfare programs are part of socialist systems. Where did you get the idea that they are not?
You are welcome on my lawn.
"The moment you conscript (yes) a doctor or teacher, and Require society to pay them a set wage, you'll find that they become in short supply, especially when considering the rest of the market is more or less open and free."
Except, of course, that's EXACTLY what happens in basically the whole of first world with the exception of USA without the ominous results you predict. By the way, even in USA, that's what happens to military personnel, which your country doesn't seem to be in short supply, either.
But, of course, don't let reality get in the way of your very well built rationalizations.
"Do they get to pick what you're having for supper or what products can be sold at the grocery store?"
Yes, at least, up to a point. In most countries there are in place one regulation or another regarding, i.e. the ability to sell (or not) tobacco, alcohol and/or prescription drugs.
"I suspect that if you tried to join the Socialist party in just about any country, the idea "capitalist economy with extensive social programs" would not be the platform of the party or one that they're likely to accept."
Where are you from? I say this because that's exactly what any Socialist party in any European country would support: "capitalist economy with extensive social programs". Maybe it is "communist party" what you are looking for, not Socialist. And even Communist parties, starting on the late 70's early 80's, had strong factions embracing what was called "eurocommunism" which is, basically, that: "capitalist economy with extensive social programs".
I think you should review your sources.
It's not that hard, the explanation was already given: a country with relatively high taxes that are used to provide (for free or a small fee) services that benefit the population at large. Mainly safety, education and healthcare. You get to keep the money you make in transactions, just not all of it. Everyone is OK with this because they value an equal society where no one is "left behind" more than a society where its acceptable if some people don't make it and others make it many lifetimes over
So, socialism is a good thing. That's my point.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Not really. The social safety nets were first introduced by von Bismarck, a very conservative monarchist. There were meant to suppress socialism and because it was a christian thing to do. This is why it is so ironic when the modern German christian conservatives try to dismantle them, showing that they are neither.
The USSR, on the other hand, had no general welfare programs except for a constitutional right to a job.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
Even though we in Sweden, Finland and Denmark have all those other things you mention it's unlikely we have the same outcome as the Norwegians, at-least not here in Sweden thanks to massive shit-immigration instead ruining things.
Why are you so negative about immigration? If anything, emigration to America has improved the lives of Swedes on both sides of the Atlantic for more than a century. One point three million Swedes emigrated to America starting in 1638. This not only improved the emigrants own economic situation, but also that of those remaining in Sweden. Major changes in Sweden were brought about because the 1907 Swedish Parliamentary Emigration Commission started social and economic reforms in Sweden in order to reduce emigration. It did so by "bringing the best sides of America to Sweden."
Today, without immigrants, our Scandinavian social welfare system would have broken down. Collectively, we don't produce enough children to replace ourselves. In Norway, there are a lot of Swedes working everywhere, not to mention people from almost everywhere else in the world.
I'm an immigrant myself, from Canada, where I grew up in a Scandinavian ghetto. Immigration is a cheap way for a country to get professionals. With specialist education, I feel I have made a contribution to Norwegian society, not just professionally, but because my insights are slightly different from those of the native population. I see problems not just through a Norwegian lens, but also through my Canadian lens.
Both my children are born in Norway, but are EU citizens through my wife, their mother. My daughter lived, worked and studied in Norway, Canada and Sweden, and worked in Denmark, before heading off to USA. Ditto my son in Germany and Poland, before returning to Norway.
Rather than complaining about immigrants, I would encourage you to immigrate, and to try living a life through a different lens. Hopefully, you will find the experience enriching.
I would also encourage you to have your DNA tested. Both my wife and I had surprising results with small amounts of Siberian and native American DNA, in addition to moderate quantities from southern Europe as well as the expected northern Europe. The world is a melting pot. At some point your genes emigrated from Africa, and took a long time coming to Sweden.
Direct democracy doesn't scale? Someone better tell Switzerland!
You do come of a bit obtuse, but assuming you really don't understand : all markets are regulated even in the USA. Things like health and safety regulations stop things like lead getting in our drinkwater.
Social democracy! = communism
Everything will make sense if you stop trying to make them mean the same way thing.
Except this is not what socialism meant up until 1989. How many socialist republics were there in eastern Europe in 1989 ?
Redefining words much ?
You are redefining words, this is not what socialism meant for 150 years....
" The definition of "pure" socialism-as-economics isn't really even worth discussing..." -- yet there have been thousands of books in the 19 and 20 century that did exactly this. Not to mention the practical applications in USSR, Venezuela, Cuba, Estern Europe, China etc etc etc.....
Basically you want to sweep under the rug ("not worth discussing") the failures of your religion...
While i love democracy and Switzerland...you make no point, Switzerland is a small country.
Meet the bolsheviks: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... (Russian Social Democratic Labour Party)
Meet the east germans: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... (Socialist Unity Party of Germany)
Meet the chekoslovaks: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... (Czechoslovak Socialist Republic)
Meet the north koreans: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/ind... Democratic People's Republic of Korea
Meet the romanians: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... (Socialist Republic of Romania)
And you think that by changing the name to "social democratic" you are changing the meaning ? Like the democratic republic of Germany i'm sure...
THAT IS NOT SOCIALISM !!!!!!
My country currently has: socialized medicine, socialized education, socialized welfare system, socialized retirement. AND YET WE NO LONGER ARE Socialists, thank god the food lines are gone.
Genocide is a good thing, because genocide means disneyland, because i said so.
Unlike shitty plutocratic schemes such as the US or - in parts - Germany, Norwegian law says the wealth collected by natural resources belong to all people of Norway and that companies mining those resources have to employ an official company philosopher that thinks about and then decides upon how the gained wealth is put to greater good. (Seriously.)
Seems to work, wouldn't you say?
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
What in the world are you on about?
There are private practices in all these countries. There isnâ€(TM)t even anything that says you have to be a government employed doctor after the country pays for your education. You donâ€(TM)t even have to stay in the country.
As for salary, some countries like Lithuania have very poor pay for doctors and dentists as part of their socialistic system. But the Nordic countries still have doctors and surgeons being paid very well for their time. And even better, you donâ€(TM)t have an army of idiot doctors checking each room just to add an hour to their billing because theyâ€(TM)re buried under student debt.
There is no indentured servitude or slavery. No serfs. Itâ€(TM)s a competitive market and doctors can job hop freely to increase their income just like anywhere else.
There are even things like serving as a doctor in backwoods places like Longyearbyen which pays very well and entirely tax free to make it so that you can be damn near rich within a few years of graduation and move back to civilization.
But Iâ€(TM)m guessing you have some picture in your mind which makes you think that socialism is some sort of forced work or labor. Soviet Socialism was not socialism. It was simply sold that way.
I was raised American and I am now in Norway. I am on a 5 week long vacation traveling first class by train with my wife, kids and a niece. We have been to Hamburg, Brussels, Paris and London and weâ€(TM)re continuing on tomorrow... and itâ€(TM)s thanks to socialism that I can market myself in a free market socialist economy and do this.
Oh and I happily pay 50% income tax on a BIG FAT salary and bonuses.
Though... you probably know better. You heard about it on Fox News.
When you're so retarded, you don't even know what was someone's platform, but you attribute his name to beliefs you don't like, because that's a last refuge of an ignorant extremist who got caught peddling garbage.
P.S. By your ridiculous redefinition of words, almost every state on the planet is socialist already, because they have all those things. Even in Africa, most states have some socialized medicine, some socialized education, some socialized welfare system, some socialized retirement and some highly regulated corporations.
Just like we do here.
So we have now established that your measuring stick of "socialism" doesn't actually measure anything that is relevant to socialism.
You do realise that Norway's oil sales are literally done through an oil company?
They have a massively positive balance. Not just on cabrohydrates either. They export everything from their famous salmon to things like nickel and aluminium.
Funniest part is, that Nordics have more net benefit from global warming than others. Better climate, more productive farming, opening of Arctic trade routes and resources. It would actually make sense for us to put as much CO2 in atmosphere as we possibly can.
Yet we're world leaders in reducing CO2 emissions. And still there are retards like you who just can't stop sitting on a bandwagon screaming idiocy.
I'm not sure how much you'd appreciate your grocery shopping choices (i.e., your personal exchange) to be regulated by the rest of your neighbors.
The product I buy off the shelf meets regulations for food standards so I don't get poisoned, packaging so I know what I'm buying, regulations for financial exchanges so one company can't dominate the shelf and build a monopoly, when I go to the checkout the financial transaction is again regulated which is why I can buy a stick of gum on my debit card without some stupid surcharge, even when I am asked how I want to take my goods home the process is regulated to discourage the use of a plastic bag which legally has to cost money and manages to reduce waste in the process.
I think the real differences is, my neighbours and I have a common interest. Maybe you just have bad neighbours.
I'm giving you the US right's definition of socialism which is offering any government support to "freeloaders" such as people who can't afford medical care. My previous post is 100% sarcastic.
I have no idea what you think you are talking about but no and also I have no kids.
Also there's a massive difference between immigrants and types of immigrants.
The shit we get to Sweden is shit.
1/4 of the Swedish population left for the US in a short time back in the 19th century but clearly not my ancestors. Anyway there was unlikely any 3/4 taxation on work income which provided for others in the US of that time so they weren't much of a burden.
Bernie Sanders held up "Scandinavian socialism" as a model that the U.S. should follow. Are you saying that he was holding up something that doesn't actually exist, and/or that he is a wannabe far leftist?
Just trying to understand, in the spirit of quelling class wars.
That that is is that that that that is not is not.
By your insane re-definition, US is socialist.
Because the immigration we get is shit.
America is a different country, Swedes emmigration to America was at a different time, Swedes effect as immigrants to America is different to the shit we get to Sweden. It's totally unrelated to Sweden. By law I'm not allowed to say talk in a negative way in whatever way about specific people groups but there's of course a massive difference with an American immigrant of Swiss immigrant or Norwegian immigrant on average and the shit we get the most of.
There wasn't much to leech of in America. Except plenty of newly conquered land. The average American didn't had to spend for that shit or accept to have his people raped and murdered.
Now we no longer have the best sides of America in Sweden. We don't have freedom. We don't have border control. We don't have a smallish government (American is also pretty large but of course a bit less into things than our.) and we no longer have low taxes. We don't get to carry weapons for protection.
The immigrants are shit. We could have good immigrants but we have shit immigrants. We could have a social system which made them less shit (lower taxes, lower welfare, less benefits) but we don't. Our social system is the most attractive for shit people and the least attractive for the best people. The system are shit and the kind of immigrants we get are shit. If we got well-educated obedient productive people then it would still hurt our people but be much better than the shit we get now. I could specify beyond "immigrants" but it's questionable if I'm allowed to and just because "immigrants" could provide benefits doesn't make the immigrants to Sweden any good.
We don't necessarily have to be as many and that could easily had been affected. We could had given couples who got a child 1-2 million SEK for getting one. Way cheaper than the asylum seekers and their families we don't want and would likely help people decide to get one. That people work the most in the EU and get very little from it makes it harder to have children too. How fucking shitty the society is with all the unwanted immigrants and how little one want to stay here is another one. That a lot of them are young men and that they throw the balance of the sexes out of the water and leave (both immigrant and native) men without women is another one. I don't know if you are aware but it takes two to make a baby and if you import men who occupy your women then it become harder to get children too. It's genocide in multiple ways. As (((planned.)))
The reason Norway have Swedes working there is mostly because it's less of a shit-hole than Sweden. Norwegians are of no obligation to like having Swedes there and some may even think they are taking their jobs which is a totally fair opinion. But the difference between those Swedes and a Somali mother is that they are there to work.
Canadian are likely also less shit. As long as they doesn't defend the Muslim invasion and plundering and African welfare migration. Which you obviously do. Any contribution you've done to Norwegian society is most likely taken away by many times if you make them take in one non-European immigrant. In Norway they estimate a western immigrant contribute ~one million NOK to the society whereas a non-european one cost ~4.5 million NOK. Some years ago at-least. So just for the coffers everything else being the Poles, The Swedes, The Canadians in Norway isn't a problem. The Syrians, the Afghans, The Somalis, .. are.
Whatever I emmigrate or not doesn't change the fact that they are shit. Economically, by enforcing change of society, for our people.
What I've read about those ancestor DNA tests is that they aren't flawless. I don't know how specific the changes are of it they use statistics (the claim that we've got more variation between a specific population/"race" than between two races (likely with very specific interpretation / the only parts which change beyond the first rather than all of it or whatever) has been made. Anyway I already know I
So Norwegian younguns are better off because they sell more fossil fuels.
OK, American Left, you have finally convinced me that we should be like Scandinavia. I surrender.
Let's fill our country with Scandinavians, and sell lots of fossil fuels. So we can be like them.
What ... I thought you'd be happy??
There is no such a thing as a completely free market that is a place where agents can handle as they please w/o any restrictions. This is not true in any of the country that has a rule of law and justice system as these make restrictions on agent's activities. There are different levels of freedom in different places this much is true. Communal ownership is just the way human societies work. I do not know one that does not have it except maybe ones like NK where everything belongs to Kim but even there he has to give some to some communities (generals and party members and some parts of the populace) or else he will be deposed. I am also old enough to remember living under communists in east of Europe. Even in Soviet Russia there were thing that were owned by private people as well as communities and the state. At the end it is the level of freedom that you grant agents which make a difference. In fact private exchange works everywhere. It is just differently limited in different places. There are of course ideas that drive some groups of extremists one or the other way but pragmatism eventually wins at least to the effect that biggest faults are corrected. In fact communal ownership is just a special case of private ownership.
And that my friend, is why California is most desirable state to live in, and we have a bigger population than any other state in the US. Because it's nice here.
I'm pretty sure the weather and geography play a large role as well...
No one cares what your captcha was
Houston TX, USA
Norwegians were just lucky to be in a right spot and to have homogeneous enough a society and to invest in a way it worked for them. This is probably impossible to replicate elsewhere w/o much effort in controlling population in some way and that does not work well. They or most of them) must want it that way and be ready to negotiate instead of building militias to get what they see as their own. Considering the world vision agenda 2030 this may change drastically in the future. I also tend to think it is really difficult to find the reasons beyond wealth of the nations. Not sure about Norway but Swedes were poor like hell at then end of 19th century or why otherwise so many migrated to US back then? US on the other hand is rich but not regularly - there are places where it looks like 3rd world country. I suspect US is just big enough and heterogeneous enough for huge variations and on top of it you have the ideology there or American Dream and that even the poorest are future millionaires, being poor only temporarily. This has not worked well for waves after wave of immigrants but does not work so well for established societies and communities. The final answer to the question what makes nations wealthy cannot even be answered because of the nature of the being called nation - Germans refuse to accept such thing ever exists and it is almost official ideology that all people are the same w/o any difference in genetics and culture. This works only so far and we will see how well their Merkel experiement of 2015 will go. Probably not very long as they are stupid enough to destroy own industry too. What I have seen in Sweden however is that they have different ideologies but they corrected them. Even open door policy has been suspended (w/o much talk about it) when they saw it is unmanageable. Similarly they have fixed their socialist experiment of 1970 after it produced huge deficits.
There was a book "Guns, Germs, and Steel" by Jared Diamond - it does not have to be correct in its claims but it is interesting because it shows that there are so many successful societies and yet we have no clue why they are so.
You are correct - it's "The Alberta government". I have never once heard one single person in Alberta refer to it as "The Albertan government" no matter what their socioeconomic background.
I use the dictionary definition:
Well, the income tax rate in Denmark is just over 60%, so it fits that definition, too.
Denmark. Denmark plays by those rules. More than 60% of income in Denmark goes to taxes. Last time I checked the definition of "most", 60 percent meets the definition.
Face it: The happiest countries in the world are the countries that have struck a balance between socialism and market economies.
Market economies are independent of socialist/capitalist governments. The market economy fails when a government puts it's ideologies above functional economics... I.E. under extremist governments. Both extreme socialism and extreme capitalism will lead to a collapse of a market economy, ironically due to the same issue, one party gaining too much power over the market, under socialism it's the government, under capitalism it'll be a corporation. End result is the same really.
No country operates a successful "pure" capitalist or socialist economy, they're all mixed in various amounts.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Now that technology is unlocking massive amounts of fossil fuels, it's unfortunate that other countries (I'm thinking of my country Canada) aren't following the example and planning for the future in the same way.
Exploiting fossil fuel reserves is selling out the future for profit today.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Well, on the other hand Norway gets 98% of its electricity from renewable sources, and only 2% from fossil fuels, and about half of cars sold there are fully electric or plug-in hybrid.
Who cares? Oil is fungible and pollution spreads, it doesn't matter who burns it or where. They're culpable.
Yes, others are much worse. I talk bad about that all day. But now we're on Norway.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
If you want to organize, understand that there is a difference between a Union and a Trade Union (Basically a Guild).
The first is for the people, the second is for the job. That is a huge difference.
Where I live (Belgium) everybody can join a union. There are several unions that you can join. There are also some trade unions that you can join. And even then there will be different options. If I wanted, I could even join several unions, although there is no reason to do that.
You can also join at any time. If you are a member of a union, you do not have more, nor less rights. (Elected Union members is a different discussion).
The reason I joined a Union was because I got let go at a job. The first I did was go to a union. Not to protest it, but because they took care of all the paperwork to get my unemployement benefits. Instead of doing all the paperwork myself and wait a few months before it starts coming, they will already give it to me on a monthly basis.
So even the fact that I was unemployed, ment that I could join a Union. And I care more about me than about the job I do. It also gives less power to the Unions. I do not want them to be too powerfull.
e.g. there was a strike with the trains a few days ago. There where fewer trains, but not no trains. I still was able to go to work and stil able to get home with minor delays. This because only one union of the trains was on strike, not 'The train Union'.
And nobody cares if you are Union or not. Every company above 50 people (or is it 49) has to have a 'social election' where a representative of the Unions need to be elected. Not sure how many. I also assume that it is more when the company is (much) larger.
So almost every company is 'unionized'. The smaller companies still could have people who are in a Union or not. Nobody cares.
I have never been asked if I was in a Union or not. With my friends the discussion has come up. It is nothing to be ashamed of, but also not something importand to bother people with.
None of the job interviews I have been present at, on both sides, anybody asked about a Union. There is no reason, because there is no difference and I could easily change my status from one day to the other.
Really: nobody cares. And again: you have a choice to go to any of the Unions you like to go to. Yes: some things they do I do not agree with and some things I do agree with. In the end what I like is that they have seen that there is an honest power distribution between myself and a large company.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
I'm not sure how much you'd appreciate your grocery shopping choices (i.e., your personal exchange) to be regulated by the rest of your neighbors. Do they get to pick what you're having for supper or what products can be sold at the grocery store?
What kind of ridiculous question is that? Yes, of course they do. In every developed country, that's how it works. Naturally they don't actually choose what you have for supper (thanks for the fallaciously ridiculous example there, sport) but they absolutely do choose what you can buy. The representatives of The People set standards for what kind of food can legally be sold. That's how it works there, and it's how it works here. Furthermore, that is a feature. I don't want non-food items to be sold as food. If I want to put non-food items in my mouth, that's my own business, and still not against the law, but I certainly don't want my supermarket to contain fake eggs or plastic rice.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Dumbshit.
Kid, go back and read what he C&P'd there. You actually quoted it right there, and then you referred back to the post where he pasted it the first time, where it says the same thing because it's the same thing you quoted: "owned OR REGULATED by the community as a whole"
Communism is a kind of socialism where the stuff is literally owned by the community, but it's not the only kind of socialism. And the text you're complaining about made that abundantly clear.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
HOWEVER, too often people want communal ownership AND communal control over those resources - and that breaks down quickly. Direct democratic operation really doesn't scale well at all; could you imagine having hundreds of thousands of people voting monthly on decisions made by your local utility?
Yes, yes I can. I think it would work a lot better than letting them manage themselves, since PGE is doing basically everything wrong; they're not maintaining gas lines, causing fires, and they're not maintaining clearances around power lines, causing fires. And they've knowingly and willingly polluted significant areas in ways that gave a lot of people cancer.
In any case, with modern technology, participatory democracy is easy. We only have so little of it here in the USA by design. If we actually got out and voted, things might change, so significant effort is spent dissuading us.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I guess we're socialist, too, comrade!
All democratic government is socialist, unless only the people at the top benefit and all the people below are slaves. The only real question is to what degree they are socialist. A government that doesn't do anything for The People fails; a government that does things for The People is engaging in socialism. To be fair, the USA is not very democratic, but then, it's not very socialist either. We have some half-assed, inefficient health care which is only given to the very poor. Whoopeeshit!
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Not really. The social safety nets were first introduced by von Bismarck, a very conservative monarchist. There were meant to suppress socialism
You can't suppress socialism (by and for the people) by doing things by and for the people. That's not how it works.
and because it was a christian thing to do.
You mean it was meant to pacify and delude?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The nordic states (and most of the nations in the western world) aren't properly called socialist. They're social democracies:
"Social democracy is a political, social and economic ideology that supports economic and social interventions to promote social justice within the framework of a liberal democratic polity and capitalist economy." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_democracy)
You are, and have been for a long time. Which makes it very strange that you fight so hard against more universal socialization (45% -> ~100%) in areas like health care that have proven so successful in other places.
In the US social democracy seems to have been successfully conflated with Soviet-style totalitarian communism.
Alberta shares tar sands (and conventional oil) revenue already. The federal government doesn't really have a good system of saving and reinvesting windfall revenue, they mostly just give it back to provinces in equalization payments.
Alberta itself used to have something called the Heritage Trust Fund where oil revenues were saved and some was used to fund things like technology sector development, scholarships, etc. (my PhD was partly paid for by heritage funds). After forty years of power the conservative government apparently got cocky and raided the fund. That's part of what got them kicked out and the NDP elected.
I don't think I've ever heard a Canadian refer to a provincial government that way. It's always Alberta, Ontario, Quebec, Saskatchewan etc. government. Then Canadian government.
I should be able to buy my unpasteurized milk from a farmer down the road. I am not a fan of unpasteurized milk, but its not anyone elses business. I want freedom, not slavery.
I agree, you should be able to do that. And if people stayed involved in government, then they'd be able to. Here in California, you still can buy raw milk from the farmer down the road... or in a supermarket, if they choose to sell it to you. They do have to label it clearly, though, and there are still standards the product has to meet.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Actually yes, this is ultimately what killed socialism in Germany, although it took about a century to achieve. In order to have actual socialism the workers have to struggle and they generally do that when they don't have much to lose, which was the case back in the day. With all the social safety nets and the compulsory single payer medical insurance the workers seldom bother, especially since the amount of actual industrial workers has fallen sharply after the whole deindustrialisation thing.
This is why social democracy in Germany is in its death throes, which is a shame.
Well, that too. Look, apparently, for some reason, you seem to think that I am some christian conservative, which couldn't be further from the truth. But in the case of social safety nets, credit where credit is due, von Bismarck did the right thing back then, even if it was for all the wrong reasons.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
don't call them centrists. They're right wing. Calling them centrists makes them sound reasonable when they're not. Call a spade a spade and a right wing Democrat right wing.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
from public Universities. I was in college in the 90s when this crap started and remember the school paper talking to the economics professors who pointed out that without the subsidies tuition would hit $12k+/yr by 2020. They were wrong, we hit that in 2016 when my kid hit college.
College was _always_ this expensive. It didn't go up in price any more than inflation. The federal government was subsidizing education. They stopped doing that so they could give tax cuts to billionaires.
Trump is very much a member of the ruling class. He's a billionaire who sites on golden thrones. Swing states haven't changed since I was a kid. I'm 40.
You're twisting the logic. This is a common right wing tactic pioneered by Karl Rove in the United States and the Soviets before him. Why should somebody in Montana be able to force their politics on the more populace California? How the hell is that Democracy?
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
While you're at it, you should learn about Switzerland's political system. It's not direct democratic; it's semi-direct, it's a Federal system like the US is supposed to have. Direct at the local level, indirect at higher levels. And it helps when you have just 8 million people (about the size of the Bay area, or 1/3rd of the Los Angeles area) in your entire Country; you can manage "democratic" operation a bit higher up.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
PG&E should not be exempted from prosecution, and the executives of the utility should be brought to Court. Of course, when PG&E is basically a Government entity (due to massive regulations and funding - it's essentially a 'fascist corporation" for the State of California), it's going to get preferential treatment...
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
So you make over $380K a year?
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
OR. You seem to know know what that word means.. When someone says "OK, here in this case we're talking "owned", how does that work?" and you ignore the OR... Time for remedial reading!
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Those wage scales only apply to employers who have agreed to them, either directly (through negotiations with unions) or indirectly (through membership in an employers' organization).
For both of us, if you include capital gains.
You are welcome on my lawn.
if your population rate grows through combination of a high birth rate, high life expectancy, or immigration. Then either your standard of living must decrease, or your GDP must increase. I believe Norway's new generation are benefiting from egalitarianism and high tax rate of Nordic socialism. Norway's population rate is increasing by about 1%, while the U.S. is 0.81% (source). What is extremely interesting is that the GDP growth rate for the US is better (2.20%) than Norway (1.40%). What I left out in my second sentence is that the final factor is if your society suffers from a growing wealth gap. It should be obvious now that millennials are suffering in the US because they have high costs compared to income than previous generations. Costs for housing and student loans, as well as lower wages conspire to reduce the standard of living for the new generation.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
No.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Cap gains, which are taxed at 0% to 20%? That's how you get to 60%? Again - you're full of BS.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Their GDP growth rate is slower than the US's. But Norway has a larger middle class than the US (lower wealth inequality). I think the article would be more interesting if Norway and Sweden were compared, because Sweden has the second worst wealth inequality by some metrics (the US is the first). And regionally, culturally, and economically Sweden is more similar to Norway than the US or UK.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
They estimate that 40% of the work force is not actually needed as of right now. It would require some restructure and a change to the belief that everyone needs a job, but we could maintain our production, while reducing the number of people working without increasing the number of hours the working population has to work while making them happier at work. The data, according to some, is showing that there's some combination of people adding less value than the administrative overhead they create by just existing and others who can technically do a job, but not well enough to be of positive value.
This issue does exist, how much is up for debate, but it will get worse and worse over time. What's the end game for when 99% of people are negative value to no fault of their own?
Union Power was more than balanced by the Citizens United ruling, where corporations could be considered persons for the sake of contributing to a political campaigns.
Power can not and should not be this lopsided in America, or you end up in a cut throat race to the bottom for anyone that is not at the C-level in a company.
I want to live in a country where people can be dealt with fairly and not just at a "sector competitive" or "industry competitive" rate of compensation and benefits. "Industry Competitive" is code for our competitor figured out a way to cheat their employees, so we are going to cheat you in the same way.
Do we really want to live in the hunger games?
Do we want to continually "dummy down" and have the "race to the bottom".
Walmart has already achieved this feat and I recommend spending a few hours there just to get a feel for the bottom. Look at store quality, talk to the employees, ask for help, maybe have lunch at the local restaurant.
Socialism as a word is like capitalism, you can range from being slightly socialist to being overwhelming socialist. Most countries have some amount of socialism. Ignore the modern redefinition of socialism as used in recent US presidential elections which seems to equate socialism with communism. If there are tax moneys that go to welfare, health care, education, or job loss protection, then there's a some socialism involved whether or not the economy is based on capitalist principles. Socialism doesn't require direct worker ownership of companies.
The US has had this huge anti-communist political trend for a long time, which morphed also into an anti socialist and anti union political stance as well. Which is why for some strange reason, "socialist" has become a new insult because it's a trigger word for those who were around in the anti-commie era and another way to divide people into "us" versus "them".
All good and well. And you do get a point for it being semi-direct at some levels. However: the claim was that no system existed where a hundred thousand people have direct democratic influence. I point to a counter example of it working right now. Who cares how many people Switzerland has? That's movig the goal post
Not so much destroying unions, only the unions that give money to the opposition. The Police and Fire Unions get special carve-outs and opt-outs for Right to Work laws. Teacher unions, no so much. The process is very similar to gerrymandering.
You don't know how percentages work.
I assure you, that when my federal, state and local taxes (including real estate taxes) are factored together, it is within 10% of the Danish tax rate. And worth it.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Despite the fact that you got modded several times above +3 in your answers to PopeRatzo: you are just an idiot. And so are your moderators.
Can't be so expensive to fly to Denmark and check for your self, or use google earth.
E.g. I'm not sure how much you'd appreciate your grocery shopping choices
Hae? What? What kind of choices are you talking about? The fact that alcohol is expensive (relatively)? Or the fact that the girl at the cashier is most likely an immigrant and black or brown or asian?
Moron ...
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
As we say in the religious South, "Preach it brother!"
Another key point to remember is that Alberta would likely not just go independent. It would join US. Because its oil needs US shale for proper refining, and its economy is actually more integrated into US than Canada because of it.
Not in some distant future. Right now. The hard part of independence/joining another state is already done. And because of it, being in Canada on a different currency makes Albertan economy less efficient. Which is why confederate leadership will never antagonise Alberta beyond the minimum necessary amount. They know the outcome should the push come to shove. It's far too risky.
Sadly, the UK didn't do the same.
One of the other issues with the UK's North Sea reserves is that they peaked much sooner than expected. It was originally forecast that it would be around 2010, but it happened in 2001. The government of the day had, to some extent, notionally spent that additional tax revenue already, so had to roll back on things, somewhat (e.g. public sector employment peaked in 2005).
Archangel Michael protested:
The moment you conscript (yes) a doctor or teacher, and Require society to pay them a set wage, you'll find that they become in short supply, especially when considering the rest of the market is more or less open and free. Nobody goes through ten years of prescribed education to be told they can only charge so much for their services, and are otherwise required to give said services away.
You're as out of touch with 21st-Century reality as a person can be.
The vast majority of doctors in the USA work for HMO/HMA/group practice organizations. They are paid a salary - and possibly a bonus, depending on the organization and the amount of income they generate for it - while the individual organization sets the actual price of their services. Which is to say they work for wages, and don't get to set the terms of their own employment. Likewise, primary and secondary-school teachers in the USA are almost entirely union members, and therefore are paid whatever the (typically quite small) salary the union's contract with the local and/or state school board stipulates, as determined by their seniority. There's seldom even any incentive pay. College profs, likewise, work for wages.
You're doing exactly what I cautioned against: insisting on trying to shoehorn messy, complicated reality into your tidy, simple economic model that willfully ignores practical, quotidian, everyday facts of life in favor of supposedly-stirring rhetoric and pronouncements ex cathedra from your boyhood fascination with Ayn Rand's comic book Atlas Shrugged.
But, by all means, tell me more about these so-called "failed socialist economies" - because I don't see any of those here in 2018 ...
Check out my novel.
It's not tax and spend, it's 'pump it out of the ground and spend'. At most, it's taxing the earth.
It's easy to sell petroleum products real cheap when you don't have to burn it for lights and cooking
sounds prudent
I stated:
Communal ownership of some basic resources (infrastructure, for instance) is baked into western democratic practice. That's the case because it makes sense that those resources be held in common.
Prompting LynnwoodRooster to respond:
For some things - such as utilities and public parks, I agree it makes sense. HOWEVER, too often people want communal ownership AND communal control over those resources - and that breaks down quickly. Direct democratic operation really doesn't scale well at all; could you imagine having hundreds of thousands of people voting monthly on decisions made by your local utility? Best to think of it as a corporate model - the corporation (utility/park) is owned by the people (the shareholders) who empower control over the corporation to a small group. And review the performance of the group every few years. In other words - a republic model of control, rather than a democratic (mob rule) method.
I can actually see a system of direct democracy that could work pretty well, assuming proper authentication technology is developed:
Every adult has a vote witch he/she is required to cast on every legislative decision, be it local, regional, or national. Every voter has the option of appointing a surrogate to cast that vote in his/her place. Voters are free to employ a professional, non-partisan surrogate, who is contractually bound to follow the guidelines the voter sets out, or they may entrust their votes to a volunteer whose decisions and positions appeal to them. Surrogacy may be revoked at any time, for any reason, by either party to the agreement.
So, effectively, you actually have a representative democracy (because only a small percentage of voters will choose to wield their votes personally, even if almost everyone is unemployed, and theoretically has the leisure to fully participate in the legislative process). It has the advantage of essentially the equivalent of snap elections, where, when a volunteer surrogate casts a vote that most of the voters who have awarded him surrogacy disagree with, he/she woould abruptly find him/herself reduced to a single vote - or a mere handful.
It'd sure make professional politicians a helluva lot more directly responsive to their constituents, don't you think ... ?
Check out my novel.
It is socialism, and many Americans would love to see it happen here. And it will.
Unless being mostly Nordic has something to do with it.
But science never has confounding factors, so I guess that's not possible.
Are you suggesting that people of Nordic ethnicity have an extra bone in the foot that makes them more suitable for socialism?
I mean, as long as we're throwing stuff out there...
You are welcome on my lawn.
Clearly you're not a Canadian, eh. It's aboot time you admit it, eh? You forgot the "Eh" at the end of Alberta Government, eh..
Just a little ribbing for our brothers in Canuckistan from a displaced Tropical Hippy from Seattle...:)
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So you mean in Switzerland, every citizen's input is required for every decision? When there's a question about whether to paint the East-bound lanes or the West-bound lanes, all citizens vote on it? Or do they have a representative whom they elected make that decision for them? In a direct democracy, the people make the decision. In a democratic Representative Government, the people directly elect Representatives (Governors, mayors, Federal levels) to make decisions for them.
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The thing not understood by Fundamentalist Libertarians (yes, it's a religion) and other's who believe Capitalism is the only answer is that socialists (socialist has many meanings, I will unapologetically stick to mine) are not against ownership of property, they are for finding a system where MORE people have property and ownership and control of their lives. Capitalists make most of their money by virtue of what they own. I believe we could convert all renters into home owners, for example. That would require new laws making it impossible to rent a property to a person as their primary residence. And it would require replacing for-profit banks by nationalized distribute-profits-back-to-the-tax-base banks that, over a few decades buy out all current land lords (lords being a feudal concept), and replace that system by a system of much more equitably distributed ownership. Same goes for companies. Fine that a top notch PHP programmer was able to become a billionaire by being in the right place at the right time and making the right moves. In a socialist economy he would still be very well rewarded but laws requiring all employees to own part of the company along with much more progressive taxation would also help level the playing field.
Systems like in Denmark, Norwayt, and Germany just go a small step toward my above-hinted-at concept of socialism, but they are a start. Germany is a net exporting industrialized country with tax-base paid education for all and health insurance for all. If they can do it, the U.S. could do it.
See: http://oceanpark.com/blog/2013/10/no-rent-and-distributed-ownership/
Dennis Allard
Santa Monica
July 16, 2018
"WTF are you talking about. The US military has not relied on conscription since the Vietnam era."
Do you even read? The US military is as much conscription-based as doctors in any socialized health-care first world country.
"The socialist systems are failing hard"
Thank you for letting me know. Let me think about it for a while...
Nope, even after your enlightment, I prefer my country's socialized health-care system -and its statistical output regarding not only life expectancy and population health variance, death rates at birth, etc. but also its per capita costs, to USA's any day of the week, twice on Sundays.
So, why is it okay when Norway does it, but the height of evil when we do it?
It's one level of evil when they do it and at least their citizens get something other than fucked, it's another level of evil when we do it and all we get is this lousy environment.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
People from flyover states sure have a funny idea about what California's like.
You are welcome on my lawn.
As noted several times above, we're not socialist.
What we are however is more collectivist, and we run high trust societies. This is because of the culture that came out of the unique challenges of living this far north. If you tried resolution methods that put you in conflict with your neighbour, neither of you would likely survive to the next spring. Winters around here are that punishing. All while having almost no population, so relatively little need to competition for land. It's far more important to work than to conquer, because conquerors just can't gather enough resources to effectively survive the winter, something Swedish Crusaders discovered in Finland.
That means that co-operation and societal support of the weakest, as you will need everyone to work the land just to survive. All while maintaining the basic principles of elites' right to ownership of most things formed the core of the culture as you cannot afford to waste any talent - something that is visible to this day in the fact that we all but worship meritocracy in education systems.
And it's why this model is in free fall in Sweden, where MENA cultures that are the exact opposite of our cultures are now taking hold, and finding just how easy it is to abuse the high trust society now that technology prevents environment punishing such behaviour with death. Because MENA cultures are the exact opposite - grown in climate where you can have a massive conflict with your neighbour, and there's still enough food around to survive the winter. All while having enough production to support large population groups, that can feud within and between each other.
Please read history, the word socialism meant communism, and still does. Read Marx please.
There is no conscription for doctors anywhere else, either.
Of course social welfare programs are part of socialist systems.
Firstly, OP didn't write that they weren't or couldn't be, OP wrote "Welfare is not socialism," which is to say it's possible to distinguish between socialising the means of production (socialism) and wealth redistribution via taxation (social welfare). Plainly social welfare can exist in modern capitalist democracies.
Secondly, while it is true that social-democratic parties have eventually come to be seen as its champions, the modern welfare state was initially the creature of conservatives deployed explicitly as an anti-socialist measure. This was already so in the C19th, but took on increased significance after the Russian Revolution.
If social-democrats increasingly saw the value in pursuing the "crumbs off the capitalist's table" --and to be fair, redistribution via high taxation had seemed more effectively to provide the larger part of society with a better life than violent revolution --in the early post-war period most conservative parties around the world were more than willing accomplices. It was really only towards the end of the 1970s, as the Soviet Union was increasingly understood to be spent force and especially as any talk of "Revolution" in the West became increasingly fanciful, that conservatives began the move to call their welfare state back in. The modern welfare state, from that perspective, had amply served its purpose in protecting Western liberal-democracies [in which use, for the benefit esp. of our American friends, 'liberal' refers to private ownership and free markets] from the threat of socialism, and had thus outlived its purpose.
Welfare is not Socialism!
Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions, than ruined by too confident a security. --Edmund Burke