Fast Times in Norge
Here’s an interesting little factoid. The UN has ranked Norway as the best place to live in the world for the fifth year running. Having lived in Norway as a child, I can agree, it’s a great country. But that standard of living comes at a price.
Sometimes though, it can be hard to explain how we make our money last until pay day.
“How on earth can you afford to live here?” a colleague visiting from the UK spluttered once.
She had just paid £5 for a pint and was wondering whether she could afford to order a pizza.
I patiently tried to explain that the waiter probably made as much money as her and that the cost of producing that beer was higher than in any other European country.
It did little to ease her outrage.
I should have pointed out what people do not have to spend their money on here, money they can put into their pints if they want to.
Generally people do not have to pay for private pension schemes, private health insurance or private schooling.
For most people, the state pension will do. Public schooling is the norm and most public schools are as good as the few private ones.
For those of you who don’t know the exchange rate, £5 is about $8. For a pint of beer. And what of their free health care system?
Of course there is room for improvement. When it comes to our health care system, there are still queues and at times there are staffing problems.
So people are denied care, like they are in every other socialist health care system. But hey, it’s “free.” (I wonder what the taxes on that $8 pint of beer go towards.)
There is remarkably little difference between the amount of money a factory worker or bus driver takes home and the pay cheque of a medical doctor.
Both earn just over £2,000 a month.
That’s right, folks. The median income in Norway is about $36,000 a year. So how do they pay for all these free goodies? No society in history has ever been able to tax itself into prosperity. One word: oil.
We are the third largest oil exporter in the world, topped only by Saudi Arabia and Russia.
But the North Sea oil bonanza is not squandered on paying for people’s transport.
Most of it is saved and invested in a fund for the day when the oil eventually runs out. This nest egg is now worth £103bn ($189bn).
That works out at £22,000 each for me and every other citizen in Norway.
So, essentially, the oil trust fund only has enough money to provide roughly a year’s salary for every Norwegian citizen. Not a bad nest egg, to be sure, but what happens when the oil runs out? The author makes note of the “queues of baby prams belonging to mothers enjoying their 10-month, full-pay maternity leave.” As long as there is oil, Norway will be able to fund this egalitarian, monolithic nanny state. And for the forseeable future there is no end to the oil, at least not in our lifetimes. But what they are creating is a society where everyone expects the same level of government freebies, from the factory worker to the doctor, who both make the same salary. When the government’s ample oily teat is no longer there to supplement these goodies, do you think the doctor who spent seven or eight years in college is going to be satisfied making the same pittance as the high school dropout who drives a forklift? Do you think that this will not breed an immediate state of extreme resentment among the producers and consumers? Will the socialist utopia be able to withstand the pressures of the free market once the oil dries up?
Comments
I’ve lived in Norway. I have friends who live there today. There are two industries in Norway, oil and fishing. Norway’s government knows and has admitted that, one day, the oil is going to run out, which is exactly why they’re creating an oil trust fund.
This is not my first post on the subject of the folly of European socialism. Having lived in Europe and spent a great deal of time there over the past two decades, I’m just as qualified as you or anyone else to offer my opinions on it. I don’t need to be told by the BBC that Norway’s welfare state is propped up by their oil revenues, it’s as plan as the nose on my face.
You obviously posess some degree of (misguided) intelligence and talent - I suggest you learn a bit more about exactly what I know and don’t know before you go running your mouth.
Well let’s just think laterally for a moment and first assume that you are correct in stating that the Norweigian economy is propped up by oil (which by the way I remain unconvinced of). If that is the case, what is inherently wrong with with exploiting a resource as far as possible and creating an egalitarian state for the benefit of all the nation’s citizens? What is wrong with that model?
OK, if the oil wasn’t there, you wouldn’t be able to accomplish as much. But other European states also possess socialist welfare models, not to the extent of Norway of course - and they accomplish this through having big, developed economies, but without oil. What is actually wrong with redistribution of wealth, as far as a country can manage it? In the light of Katrina, don’t you see it as a moral obligation to fellow man?
dan if you can’t stop moonbat trolling you’ll be banned. Don’t make me tell you again.
Ah land of the free home of the rotting corpse.
You should kill yourself, dan. I’ll even pay for the body bag.
Why am I morally obligated to give *my* money to someone who may or may not have worked nearly as hard as I did to earn it?
The problem with supporting an egalitarian society is that they *NEVER* last. What you are essentially doing is setting up for a bigger and bigger fall the longer you breed people into the idea they are somehow owed the same amount of money for vastly different amounts of work.
The business owner, doctor, or whatever highly skilled artisan you have, working 60-100 hours a week is going to rebel, perhaps violently, when the cudgel holding up the system is kicked out of place. They will simply stop working, or perhaps leave, as they have zero incentive to stay once the finances run out. And you are then left with an entire nation of ditch-diggers who seem to believe they deserve as much money as a neuro-surgeon for what they do.
The so-called “egalitarian” society almost seems designed to build resentment towards those who do not work as hard as often as others. Yes, it would be wonderful if we lived in the Bizarro world of everyone living in peaceful and brotherly harmony. That world doesn’t exist, however, and never will as long as people are people. This makes capitalism and free-market one of the only ways to stimulate a healthy competition, which time and time again has shown most often creates the biggest and fastest advancements in nearly every field of science, technology, and medicine.
Well let’s just think laterally for a moment and first assume that you are correct in stating that the Norweigian economy is propped up by oil (which by the way I remain unconvinced of).
That’s because you have no idea what you are talking about. Earlier you knocked my post as being limited to a Google search, but a simple Google search turned up this.
Norway’s substantial petroleum production relative to the size of its population and government spending needs has permitted the government to save a large portion of its net oil and gas revenues. The Government Petroleum Fund, which Norway established in 1991 in anticipation of the future decline in hydrocarbon revenue, ballooned to +Nkr 613 billion (equivalent to about US$70 billion) by year-end 2001. While other oil producing nations with national oil companies are using virtually all their current earnings to pay current government expenses, and must choose between oil-related investment to maintain or expand petroleum production and other government programs, Norway has been able to fund both high levels of investment to develop its petroleum resources and very generous social welfare programs for the population. In fact, one of the concerns in Norway has been avoiding the ‘Dutch disease,’ the deterioration of economic performance from social welfare-related disincentives in the labor market. So far, Norwegians have not lost their incentive to work as the labor force participation rate exceeds 80 percent. But, the large public sector with its generous pay and retirement benefits does make life difficult for private sector companies who must compete in world markets.
Gee, it’s almost as if they’re saying that Norway’s generous social welfare system is propped up by oil, which the government knows is eventually going to peak, which is why they created a trust fund to deal with that eventuality. And the last line shows that, gee, it’s almost like Norway’s oil revenues are protecting their socialist utopia from the ravages of the real, free-market world, and when forced to compete against nations which embrace the market to a larger degree, Norwegian corporations find it difficult.
Creating generations of egalitarian, socialist babies used to suckling at the ample government teat is going to play hell on Norwegian society when their oil revenue runs out and they’re shocked back into reality.
But don’t you think then that you need to find some balance, and that the scales perhaps have been tipped too much in favour of the individual in the US? Where primary health care is not available to the poor, nor is college education etc. It’s a self-perpetuating cycle in many ways. I’m not suggesting that a doctor be paid the same as a bin-man. But look at the abject poverty uncovered in New Orleans and how the people have come to suffer. Part of the problem of a ‘go it alone’ system is that it breeds selfishness, insularity, and contempt for our neighbours.
Surely you can’t suggest to the people of New Orleans that it’s all their own fault - part of the blame lies with a system that allows and indeed fosters such vast disparities in wealth.
Re: the figures you have produced.
OK well you can start arguing about the numbers if you want but you haven’t answered my first question. You have shown that Norway does rely on oil - my point is, so what? When the oil runs out, they won’t be able to continue such generous benefits but they will probably make do with what resources they have and still maintain some form of welfare state, as other European countries do. And it is benefiting the quality of life in those countries, people are happier that way. The rich in Europe probably aren’t as rich as the their counterparts in America but the disparity between rich and poor does not exist. There is no shame in that.
Or rather I should say the disparity in Europe is not as great in America, in case any one picks me up on that typo.
Surely you can’t suggest to the people of New Orleans that it’s all their own fault - part of the blame lies with a system that allows and indeed fosters such vast disparities in wealth.
Actually, it’s the exact opposite of what you suggest. It’s the soft racism of low expectations. It’s the fact that for the past 40 years the welfare system in this country has fostered generation after generation of poor blacks who are raised since birth to believe that it is the government’s responsibility to provide for them, that they can never make it on their own. The “black leadership” in this country is dependent on black America being a permanent underclass.
When whitey needs something, whitey goes out and earns it. When blackie needs something, he turns to his political leaders to get the government to disburse it to him. This is the way black citizens in this country are raised, to believe since birth that there are insurmountable obstacles in their path, and that they need to turn to the existing black power structure for protection.
Interestingly, black immigrants to this country have a higher per capita income and a higher standard of living than their American counterparts. This is because they see the limitless opportunities there are in America for self-advancement. Black Americans are raised to believe that this system is closed to them, and thus you end up with situations like New Orleans, where they sat around waiting for the gummint to fix all their problems for them.
It is your socialist mindset, not the free market, that instilled this attitude in these people.
Wow lee, I have been reading you for a while. I have a love hate relation with your views but that last one is just plaine bad.
“Whitey need something, whitey goes out and gets it”
I presume you like to genaralize, are rednecks mostly black? lol
I rarely, actually never post but that was just plaine bad, your always the first to go of the rail man.
I want to pick you up on that point because as I understand it a very high percentage of the population were stranded simply because they were UNABLE to leave, having no means of transport etc...and it can be argued that the black man’s poverty comes about by a system which doesn’t give him enough help to rise up, provides him with a poor education and poor opportunities etc.
Though at this stage both you and I have no empirical evidence to back up our assertions so the argument becomes meaningless and more about what view of the world one chooses to take. Anyhow I must go now because I need to sleep. Work in the morning. I will follow this blog from now on.
So everyone makes the same, no matter what they do? Sounds like it’s getting pretty close to being communism, which explains why it ranks higher than the other socialist nanny-states the UN could rank.
I’m not really blaming you, but this is one of the main problems with blogs in general. You follow the MSM rather than conducting any independent research or gaining new insights through investigation and contacts. Your “research” typically goes no further than a Google search...it’s quite sad in a way, but cute. Rather like a small child playing make-believe with their toys.
You do realise that the mainstream media rarely does research of their own, right? Most stories, I would wager, are either direct runs of the AP story (i don’t know how many times i’ve herad exact paragraphs from AP stories read on tv or radio news) or rehashes of them, without actually finding out the truth themselves.
This is a trival comparison compared to anything political, but its the one that I can best bring up because it was relativly recent, relativly well covered, and I can say for sure that the media was not bothering to to do even the most simple research.
Back in April/May most media did at least one story about the people that were protesting Star Wars Episode III not showing at Grauman’s by camping outside the theatre even though it wasn’t going to show there. However, that was not the reason that anyone was outside of Grauman’s and this ignored a website with information, a phoneline that was well publicised and could have been called, or going to the location itself. One story made assumptions and numerous other stories just used that as reference rather than research it themselves. Point is that the media too often just relies on itself rather than actual research.
If that is the case, what is inherently wrong with with exploiting a resource as far as possible and creating an egalitarian state for the benefit of all the nation’s citizens? What is wrong with that model?
heres the additional problem to that model, is that the reliance on oil can be ignored or forgotten. It may work there, but you can’t try to take that model and put it into place in any country because not all countries have the resources available for such exploitation. Capitalism, on the other hand, has as a key element that it’ll adapt to whatever resources are present, and this includes the resource of a population.
I want to pick you up on that point because as I understand it a very high percentage of the population were stranded simply because they were UNABLE to leave, having no means of transport etc..
Absolutely, and I’m not disputing that at all. But a white man with a car and a black man with a car and a Chinese guy without a car are all equally stranded. You are making a blanket assumption that the only reason that black people were stranded was because eeeeevil kapitalism kept them downtrodden, when the reasoning is a hell of a lot more complex than that.
and it can be argued that the black man’s poverty comes about by a system which doesn’t give him enough help to rise up, provides him with a poor education and poor opportunities etc.
Provides him with a poor education? You know absolutely nothing about how things work here. If you are black colleges will bend over backwards to lower their admissions standards to admit you. The more impoverished your background, the greater the educational freebies (in terms of grants, subsidies, loans, and scholarships) that are available to you. Oh, sure, you might have to pay back your student loans, but they’re guaranteed by the government. Hell, I had student loans to pay back and I never even finished college, I got half way through and dropped out due to sheer boredom.
I work two jobs, often putting in 70+ hours a week. The idea that because I have white skin I have everything handed to me on a silver platter is just as preposterous an idea as saying that the only reason blacks in this country are poor is because they have black skin. Work hard, get an education, and you will be a success in the United States. We have millions and millions of immigrants in this country who can attest to that, who come here to take advantage of the opportunities, not to piss and moan about how the white man conspires to keep them down.
The more impoverished your background, the greater the educational freebies (in terms of grants, subsidies, loans, and scholarships) that are available to you. Oh, sure, you might have to pay back your student loans, but they’re guaranteed by the government. Hell, I had student loans to pay back and I never even finished college, I got half way through and dropped out due to sheer boredom.
Through Cal Grants alone I’m having my entire education covered, and I believe that that is a grant that is financial need only, and doens’t even look at grades.
My friend in Sweden had these observations.
“Over here in some of the pubs and restaurants, the Swedish people can be heard calling the NOLA disaster “Bush’s ethnic cleansing” ... I’m not joking.
Yeah, and a guy in a pub over here told me he fucked Madonna.
No wonder they let the city flood and delayed the rescue operations. Just a cynical exercise in increasing the level of damage so Cheney’s companies can profit from the misery of others.
Halliburton
So the delay in Louisiana was to increase the bill in Mississippi.
And finally,
My Swedish bartender lastnight speculated that NOLA will be the site of the largest eminent domain land grab in American history once the water is pumped out. “They will just turn that valuable land into some very high price houses.”
Is alcohol involved in all your theories?
Keep in mind that I believe the emminent domain decision was from the more leftward leaning justices...not the ones Bush would plan with. Though someone could confirm or deny that?
And last I checked, Halliburton is one of the few companies that is able to handle a task this big.
And last I checked, Halliburton is one of the few companies that is able to handle a task this big.
Actually, they submitted the lowest bid for a contract that was signed in 2004. It’s all in dan’s article.
HE ACTUALLY BLAMED HALLIBURTON?!?!?!
Good lord, I thought that was just something we were mocking the moonbats with because they -always- blame Halliburton. They’re actually coming out and saying Halliburton engineered it all?!
... They all need to die. Seriously. We can’t resist people who are THAT BATSHIT INSANE reproducing.
Apparently the gig is up in Sweden too:
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/publicservices/story/0,11032,1309874,00.html
The headline:
‘For decades we’ve been told Sweden is a great place to be a working parent. But we’ve been duped’
I hate the way how Lee pick ups all these negative little news about free health care. The only big problem, that can be seen is the infamous queues. I live in Finland (which has the same system like they do in Norway). If I would to this “reporting” the same way as Lee does, I could bet that I could find 10 000x more negative little news about the health care system in USA.
My mother was diognosed to have a cancer in the summer of 2004. She was also diagnosed to have a metastasis in the liver. For example, in the year 2004 she was one week in intensive care unit after she had had 2 operations. She only paid 20 euros per day. If she would have had to pay everything herself, it would have been ten thousands of euros. Also the operations were free.
Now she’s going thru a cytotoxin care. One dose of this medicine normally costs over 500 euros. She only pays 6 euros per dose. She will get 12 doses of this in one year.
So if she would have been living in under your system. It would have been very difficult to pay all these things.
And as you might now. Finland is very poor when it comes to OIL. We dont have any oil production. So it’s not only that in Norway. And for the queues. The queues are only sometimes when you are waiting for something not so urgent to be fixed. If you are in urgent need of health care, you will ALWAYS get it. No matter if you are poor or rich.
Betsq, you’re formulating your opinion of American healthcare based primarily on Michael Moore and people like him. There are many, many problems with the US healthcare system, and not one time have I ever claimed our system was perfect. It is deeply flawed. My point with these type of posts is to show that the great socialist utopia also has many, many flaws, and that before we in the US adopt that type of system we need to accurately show the problems with the alternative.
You discuss paying for healthcare. You pay for yours too in the form of higher taxes. You have no choice in the type and level of care that is provided. I buy my own health care. I have an excellent, top-of-the-line plan, which costs me roughly $300 per month. I make more than $300 a day, so paying 1/30 of my income towards health care (much of the cost of which is tax-deductible) hardly seems like a bad deal. If I decided that I wanted to pay less for my health insurance I could choose a lesser plan with lesser coverage. You, on the other hand, are stuck paying whatever income tax rate your government dictates. You have waiting times for routine procedures. I do not. Ever. If I need an MRI I can get one that same day, and it costs me nothing. In Canada and Britain, people routinely wait six months to a year for access to an MRI for a non-life threatening issue. Is this compassionate? Is it superior? I don’t think so.
There are good points and bad points to each system. Our media in this country continually points out the flaws in our system, and praised the socialist model, without ever pointing out its deep flaws. These posts are my way of cataloging the problems with your way of doing things.
And, for what it’s worth, in 1993 my father was working in Siberia and had a heart attack. He was airlifted to Helsinki and had a quadruple bypass done there as well. He said that the care he received was absolutely first rate, though the hospital was rather spartan and the food was terrible. :)
How come, please explain?Betsq, you’re formulating your opinion of American healthcare based primarily on Michael Moore and people like him.
Ofcourse both systems have problems. I know that. And I’m not saying our system is perfect or superior. But the difference between you and I is that, when you’re talkin about health care, you are just talking about yourself (how good deals you can fix and all that). But when I’m talkin about health care, I realize that there are lots of people who aren’t as smart (or comfortably welloff) like you are. So if you zoom out, from your little view of your life, you can see that overall the people in free health care system are happier. And I dont know the situation in Canada or Britain, but in Finland the queues arent so long (if there even is). The free health care in Britain is shit, that I’ve heard. But please, try to understand that there is also differences when you compare different “free health care” systems. In Finland I think the free health care is working superbly.
And please do not compare our system to commusism. We have
cleaners working with very shitty pay compared to people who are working in IT-companies. There is a huge different between peoples income levels. But STILL they get the same good quality health care. And if you’re rich in finland you can always go to a private healthcare, we have those too. But even majority of the super rich use the free health care becouse the quality is so good.
And what comes to the terrible food.. everybody knows that finnish food is shit, even the French president Chirac has said that ;)
A few comments that sprang to mind having read this thread…
1. Lee’s comments regarding Black people in the US being raised to believe that the govmn’t will provide for them. This being proved by the immigrant black people doing better. To be honest the reason why the immigrants are doing better is probably cause they were all doing well in their own countries. Have you ever looked at the immigration laws of the US? As far as I could see it was nigh on impossible unless you were doing well already and had a job to goto to get a visa. I’m a well educated British guy and there was no way I was ever going to get one unless I had an employer to sponsor me. So don’t go giving me that ‘American Dream’ stuff… The only ones likely to be living that are the illegals. (Not all of them by the way before you start regaling me with tales of mexicans only in the US for the healthcare… blah blah)
2. I’ve noticed that people have been blaming the breakdown in NOLA on people’s expectations of the government saving them rather than helping themselves, and that this is all the liberal’s fault. Well lets face it people aint been helping each other in NOLA and that looks like it has more to do with the ‘me me me’ attitude prevalent in a lot of America. This shows up as soon as healthcare is mentioned… As soon as someone mentions that with state sponsored healthcare helps out the poorest of society the response tends to come back ‘Yeah but it will effect MY heathcare, why should I pay for others? If they are too poor to get proper healthcare they should get another job, and if they can’t or are too stupid then fuck em’, so it becomes a survival of the fittest, hardly conducive to the strong society is it? So when order breaks down, as in NOLA, then it becomes each man for himself.
I’m not saying it’s wholly the ‘evil capitalist’s’ fault, but I think some sort of balance and social responsibility is important. To blame it all on ‘liberalism’ is just blinkered.
Lee, may I ask why you were in Norway (if you don’t mind my asking)?
Governments fall and resources dry up. People have to learn how to survive without Big Brother. Realistically, there must be a safety net. However, if the safety net is made expansive and given to absolutely anyone that system will dry up very fast and those who may truly need assistance will never get it.
As for healthcare, there are never easy answers. But what will happen if the system collapses? Look at the former Soviet Union. Praised by some for its “egalitarian” ways (everyone had a job, the State ran day-cares and hospitals, ect.), when the system collapses people lost everything. The system in Canada is close to collapse. People are seeing the value of the private system. Why wait for MRIs or any other necessary treatments? We pay into a system that is, in reality, a gigantic HMO and get little out of it. And who do you complain to if it doesn’t work?
This is but one part of the problem of socialised medicine in Canada (it is NOT universal).
Just some thoughts.
betsq, your story of your mother is a good one. Immediately what popped into my mind was if your mother got such treatment very quickly, that means she “jumped ahead” of others who were not as seriously ill, which I think is the inherent problem with socialized medicine.
It works for those who are very well or very sick, but for those who fall in the very large area in between, it doesn’t work well at all.
I’m Swedish and i can just say that norway and sweden are great countries,it also depends on where you live ofc,i mean lee says he lived in norway for three years but where? and also where in that city or town did he live for ex.
I mean if i lived in the slums of new orleans or in malibu in usa i would not get the right picture of your country now would i?!
Compare our healthcare in sweden with your in usa lee,feel free to do so its much better and its like that finish guy said we can go to private healthcare if we want.
You talk about your income etc,well my dad’s cousin is working with EU and make tons of money ofc for him it would be best not to tax at all,but then again what kind of country would we have? he would not have the options to get into free school that also give u money to studying later in life for free.(no parents doesnt pay like in college here)
His mom that was singel would never had the chance to raise him either if she did not get some extra money from the gov.
But anyway my dad lost his job because of a sickness(he got a weak heart and so did his dad that died in the army helicopter divsions for smoking when flying) im glad people pay high taxes so he could still keep our house and car etc and still live on and make us have a great life.
I mean i have more things in my home then other families,but i also gotta admit that my mom makes very good income and that is something u guys miss in usa for ex a women working and even make more income then some guys here.
Ofc mayby it would have been more fun if he had kept more money in his vault with lower taxes when he was working on a company selling drugs to the goverment.
But as in this case you never know what happends,he was a liberal,and then when he get sick he was lucky the social parties was in control.
Ofc Im myself are liberal and i want a rightwing gov,so they can start create more work,because a social gov will only make ... i forgot the english word for it,but they just give money for people without work,and give so much money to them that they are stimultaing companies and people not working to not get a job or start hiring,so in the future what is gonna pay our healthcare and other things when H&m;Ikea ericsson etc and the biggest companies here cant help us out...No we need to lower taxes to get more work so we get more people working to get more taxes.
And lower the tax in small buisness and take away the richtax so small buisness can invest and hire.
But anyway,as i said me an my family would almost been screwed if those taxes did not save us...so its a bad cirle,we need to get out of socialism..but its hard without making many people here suffering.
Remember that UN also remember and took in their measure on how well womens are doing.
In sweden they almost have the same salary everywhere.
Its a very nice country indeed,and im sure in usa you have like that too in some companies,but as a whole?
I doubt that very much.
There is more things that you need to understand then to say norway is just best country in the world for the oil,because thats not how it is.
Everything is not about money,healthcare for older people,givin everyone a chance to school and college for free etc,enviorment im sure norway have a better one for the animals and wilderness etc then usa has together.
Just admit norway is number1,im not gonna cry that sweden become on the 6th place.
I mean if i lived in the slums of new orleans or in malibu in usa i would not get the right picture of your country now would i?!
What about if you lived in Sweden? Oh, you do.
Sorry for spam,but couldn’t find the edit button O_o
But my dad cousin make almost 600 dollars a day or 145.000 kronor a month,and you lee said you made 300,do you really think that is a average income?
Or even above average?
I can understand that you feel like i should be able to keep my money and dont pay to others when i dont know most of them,or because usa is a country of people from every corner of the world,but people from europe arn’t that and we want everyons best here.
I know you cant understand that but we do here.
What about if you lived in Sweden? Oh, you do.
yes im swedish and ronnie sounds very swedish too ^^
ofc my internet name is “quez”,but no im not some spanish guy living in Sweden.
Im as Swedish as you can get.
yes im swedish and ronnie sounds very swedish too ^^
ofc my internet name is “quez”,but no im not some spanish guy living in Sweden.
Im as Swedish as you can get.
Don’t get me wrong. I can appreciate your insights into Swedish life, but in your attempt to correct what you see as misconceptions about Sweden, you tossed around a few misonceptions about America. I get the sense that you feel that people who don’t live in Sweden can’t really offer much insight into Sweden. Personally, the only Swedish culture I’ve been directly exposed to came from the Muppet Show, so perhaps you’re right. I just thought I’d mention that the feeling is mutual regarding your insights into America.
I hope you understand that i love usa and bush,or else i wouldn’t be here.
I just doesnt think this list trash usa or anything,i just think its LEE who cant accept it.
USA is a great country if you got money,a lot better then sweden,but for those who doesnt make like LEE 300 dollars a month mayby its not the best?!
Ofc oslo is the most expensive city in the world,even more expensive then tokyo...so ofc the people with not much money will not have a wal-amrt to go to there and i guess it hurts them,but they get money from the goverment if their income is not good enough.
lol 300 dollars a month a day,where is that edit button when i need it ^^
I look at the approximately 10,000 people who still refuse to leave New Orleans. They’re not still there because they’re poor. They’re not stuck because no one fired up the school buses. They just don’t want to leave. It’s the same thing with economics. No matter how many opportunities you offer people to “rescue” themselves from poverty, if it calls for even a little bit of effort, they’re not interested. So, excluding those who are poor through no absolutely fault of their own, why should my country force me to waste my resources helping people who decided to commit economic suicide?
no absolutely fault, absolutely no fault. Let me know if you find the edit button.
Quez,
I know English is a second language for you, and I appreciate the fact that you’ve tried to learn it- so I know it’s not your fault at all that I have such an incredibly hard time trying to follow your point.
There are a couple of things I was able to understand, here, though, that I take some issue with. They are, as follows;
Its a very nice country indeed,and im sure in usa you have like that too in some companies,but as a whole?
As a whole, for emplyoment matters, the US is quite simply a better place to be for anyone who believes in the ideology that intelligence and hard work are valuable commodities that should be rewarded.
There’s a reason… a good reason… why the US enjoys the power and influence that it does. It’s the spirit of individual achievement that has pushed us into the seat of power.
When individual worth is not a factor, individuals tend to become worthless.
When everyone is special, nobody is.
Secondly;
There is more things that you need to understand then to say norway is just best country in the world for the oil,because thats not how it is.
Actually, that is how it is. It’s a little more complicated than that.
Norway’s quality of life rating is based upon the socialized lifestyle. That lifestyle is the result of a socialized government that supports itself primarily with oil revenue. Therefore, Norway “is just best country in world” because of oil, and that is exactly how it is.
By the way… Norway is not rated the “best country in the world”. It was rated best coutry to live in.. There’s a difference.
A lot of factors are included that that are not accounted for. Not the least of which is it’s military and financial isolation. They rarely mobilize any military personnel, or contribute fiscally to world relief.
This may be nice for the citizens of Norway, but it also means they have contributed very little to the overall
well-being of the world.
You don’t have terrorists blowing things up in Norway… but you also don’t have Norway protecting the weaker citizens of the world.
It’s simply much cheaper and easier to be a follower than a leader.
Everything is not about money
Yes, it is. That’s why they prop thier socialized government up with oil funds and outrageous taxation.
Or did you think that nobody actually pays for any of the benefits they recieve?
That’s sweet.
healthcare for older people,givin everyone a chance to school and college for free etc
You guys really need to learn a little more about the USA before you spout off.
You know we do have all of that, here, too, right?
Yes. All of it.
im sure norway have a better one for the animals and wilderness etc then usa has together.
I bet they don’t.
You do know that about 11% of the United States’ land mass is reserved as state parks, wildlife preserves and protected wilderness, right?
Oh, you didn’t?
Well.. like I said before. Maybe you should learn a bit more, before commenting on a subject.
Just admit norway is number1
Umm… no. I’ll admit that they were rated “best place to live”, but again, there’s a big difference between that and being “number 1”.
Would I consider the USA to be “number 1” in the world? Yeah, probably. But then, I’ll admit I’m biased on that subject.
But I’ll tell you one thing for sure.. even if I had to pick a country other than the US, it most certainly wouldn’t be Norway. It would be a country that has added to the advancement and shaping of the world. Norway has done nothing of the sort.
Well,i just need to look on how some animals are treated in USA to get my point right.
And about those 11% of stateparks hm...And how much does that help the anmials and the enviorment?!
Are we talking about some desert that some indian guy got as some national park that doesnt help or benefit in some way but is just good pr to show he got his land?
I dont know,do you? if so tell me.
And also like i said,everyone in norway and sweden goes to school,we doesnt have to pay to get into college instead we get paid,so yes many poor have a chance to become something.
You said you had that too,but on tv i always see parents saving for college why is that? is it so that only the bad colleges are free and the good ones cost a lot of money? because that is not how its here.
Its very importent that everyone get a chanhce for a good education and even the best no matter what status or money in his family espcially for girls so they can make a good income when they become older,because we often see singel moms having to do a lot of work.
And that class and status and money has nothing to do with it.
You can claim what you want about the taxes and so on,but just look how the norwegien people have it over there,they got a very great life much better then average american or swedish.
They got almost everything.
Yes im sure some states and some places in usa has it equal or better,but in average nope.
And i think that is a good sign that the average person i norway can have a great life so can the poor.
And the sexual (gender) equality is much better here in sweden and norway in USA,that is a fact and you know it and i know it.
USA is a better country if you got money or if you live in a great place,but for the average person?
no,then Sweden and norway is better.
But lastly i would like to thank you for not trashing my 3rd language after Swedish and german.
I should have done that more often,so with this post,but its to long to even bother with now…
And also it would be nice if the mods cound implant edit button,so us(europeans) can rewrite and change our miss spelling etc.
wtf?! some of my text did not show up in the post...wtf,for ex at the end i meant:"i should have rechecked the spellings and the sentance to make more sense.”
Sorry for the confusion,i wont write again untill i post a comment with a lot better spelling,i need to stop posting before i check and recheck the grammar and well… the whole post out.
Sorry.
I kinda came in on the tale end of this discussion s maybe I missed it. Isn’t and hasn’t Sweden been a much,much smaller country than the US? Hasn’t it been a very much homogeneous population for the most part? Is it the melting pot that the US has been with the influx of ambitious albeit uneducated and language challenged immigrants? No slave trade history that I know of. That doesn’t mean it couldn’t be a model for possible good points of govt. that the US could study but the dynamics are vastly different and almost impossible to duplicate in the US so they may be virtually useless to try and implement here. So comparing Sweden or even Canada (population ~32 million)to the US population and set of difficulties is somewhat unproductive except in the sense of microcosms.
Just a few notes on Norway.
Regarding the portion of Norway’s economy that relies on oil:
The Kingdom of Norway enjoys one of the highest standards of living in the world.
Its prosperity is due in large part to the discovery in the late 1960s of off-shore oil and gas deposits.
More than half of Norway’s exports come from this sector.
and regarding to the treatment of animals:
[quoteThe Norwegian government has decided to kill five of the country’s grey wolves - a quarter of the entire population.Norway registered objections to the 1986 International Whaling Commission (IWC) ban on whaling and resumed the practice on a commercal basis in 1993.
...
“The cull is meant to protect sheep. Sheep farming occupies 90% of Norway’s territory.”
Finally, regarding the idea of state parks being nothing but deserts: The deserts in the United States are found only in the southwest, however state parks are located throughout the country. Because our land is diverse, our state parks are diverse, and therefore, the animals protected in the parks range from those found in the coldest climates to those found in the hottest. Moreover, I don’t find it particularly noble to insinuate that among the reasons Norway is superior is that none of the state parks there are deserts.
Oops,Norway,Sweden whatever.
But I forgot on this site we never let the framing of a discussion get in the way of a good argument.
Quez, I know the edit functions here are a little lacking.
I have problems with that, myself. Your best bet is simply to reread everything before hitting “submit”.
As for the land/parks issue; No, this does not count Indian reservations, with the exception of Grand Canyon National Park, which is partially set aside for Navajo use.
But even in this area, the wildlife is protected and abundant.
By the way, you do know that even desert land is teeming with wildlife, right?
There is as much wildlife in the deserts of the US as there is in the forests. People just don’t generally realize that.
As for colleges, there are two routes one can travel to get free college.
For the poor, there are government subsodies, grants, scholarships, etc. that allow many to attend some of the better colleges here. For the rest there are public, or community colleges.
Yes, there is a disparity in the quality of education between the two. The private schools, of course, are staffed with more qualified professors and better facilities.
That does not mean, however, that the community schools are worthless, or even bad. Many are wonderful schools.
Not to mention that the overall academic quality of schools in the US is better than those of most other nations.
I don’t know how Norway’s academics are ranked, but I do know that I don’t hear much about students from around the world hustling to enroll in Norweigian colleges, as they do in the US.
Not to sound arrogant, but doesn’t that say something of the quality of our schools compared to Norway, right there?
As for the quality of life for the average Norwiegian… Okay, I can accept that the average citizen there has it better than the average citizen here. No problem.
My problem is that there is no reward for being an above average citizen.
That is, there are no mechanisms in a socialist society to better yourself, or advance yourself, by working harder or being smarter.
In short, the average citizen in Norway may be more comfortable… but that may be because everyone in Norway is an average citizen. That’s not the case, here. Here, there are rewards for extraordinary people.
It is precisely this spirit of individualism that has rocketed the US to the position it is in, globally.
In fact, it’s precisely this reason that there is a US. Our forefathers, being rugged individualists, could no longer take the overtaxation and oppression of individualism that are the hallmarks of socialist societies.
USA is a better country if you got money or if you live in a great place,but for the average person?
As I’ve said… the US is a better place for the average person to get a lot of money or live in a great place. We are not tied down to average, mundane lives that way the Norwiegians are. We have opportunities for the poor to become wealthy. It happens every single day.
And the sexual (gender) equality is much better here in sweden and norway in USA,that is a fact and you know it and i know it.
I don’t knwo any such thing, and I don’t think you do, either.
I know you hear a lot of bitching and moaning about gender gaps and glass cielings and such… but you have to understand the, due to the freedoms of speech we have here, and the way the private political movements operate, it’s generally the smallest, but loudest minorities that get news time.
That is to say, the problem is not nearly as large, or even as existant, as you might think, not being here.
But lastly i would like to thank you for not trashing my 3rd language after Swedish and german.
On the contrary, I commend it. English is not an easy language to master.
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Dude, you can’t critically analyse one BBC article and spin it in such a way as to indict an entire form of government. Specifically, the article DOES NOT state that Norway’s economy is propped up by oil. This is an erroneous connection you have made to conform to your existing views.
I’m not really blaming you, but this is one of the main problems with blogs in general. You follow the MSM rather than conducting any independent research or gaining new insights through investigation and contacts. Your “research” typically goes no further than a Google search...it’s quite sad in a way, but cute. Rather like a small child playing make-believe with their toys.
You obviously posess some degree of (misguided) intelligence and talent - I suggest you put it to use and become a reporter.