Norway To Start Hiding Its Standard Of Living To Make Other Countries Feel Better About Themselves
Norway To Start Hiding Its Standard Of Living To Make Other Countries Feel Better About Themselves
OSLO, NORWAY—Not wanting reports of the happy, healthy lives of its citizens to demoralize people living outside the Scandinavian nation, Norway announced Monday that it would start hiding its standard of living to make other countries feel better about themselves. “In an effort to not lord it over ...
I've got a friend from Uruguay who lives in Finland (very similar standard of living compared with Norway) and who recently visited me in America. I can confirm that this article is not satire. He was absolutely shocked to see the amount of homelessness and poverty in New York city and he tried very hard not to talk about the rock-solid financial security available to every citizen in Finland.
The famous science fiction author Robert Heinlein wanted to tour the world with his wife Virginia. They had no interest in the northern hemisphere, they wanted to see the southern half.
Everywhere they went Robert wanted to get eyeballs on the economy, see what was really going on. He would always ask the cab drivers to take him to the worst part of town, where the poorest of the poor lived.
In Uruguay the driver took him to a modest neighborhood. The houses were very tiny, but well built, well taken care of. Flower beds out front, all that. Heinlein was a bit upset.
"I clearly asked you to take me to the poorest neighborhoods."
"Oh no senior! These are the poorest people! They are on government welfare and are very ashamed to live like this."
That was in the 80's. Imagine that.
As an American who has visited Finland and has Finnish friends, I wish we could live there so bad. We just felt like we fit in with culture better too.
As a child, I remember seeing Uruguay after most of South America. We had just gone through Argentina and Brazil, and then we saw this huge hydro-dam. It apparently supplies a big chunk of the county, and I just remember it being so clean. It wasn't quite as advanced as Brazil (I don't know why their traffic lights with a countdown aren't everywhere), but it seemed so nice and well thought out, if small. It was modest and well maintained... Not primitive in any way, clean and basic, but well cared for
The insanity here in the US is intense. The other day a coworker was trying to say health care in Europe is worse "because you have to wait". No nuance or acknowledgement that in the US you often have to wait AND pay.
I had to wait 3 months in the US to get wound care for a staph infection. I now have permanent vein damage in my leg. I live in the US and have fancy, tech worker insurance. It's totally fucked. Unbelievable until you see it first hand.
Healthcare in the US is amazing IF you have amazing insurance. Unfortunately that's the exception so it's absolute dog shit for most people.
Back in the 90's I popped a lung. Excellent care, about wouldn't let me leave the hospital. Couple of years later I shattered my femur with no insurance. "Here's some charity crutches. GTFO."
In the US you pay, wait, pay, possibly don't even get the healthcare because some uneducated shit-for-brains says "lol nah", pay, and then pay.
Norwegian healthcare is remarkably shit for allegedly having infinite money or whatever people ITT think, but at least it ain't murica.
Sadly our politicians are slowly privatizing public services and making public services worse.
Police and medical services are getting reduced on a yearly basis.
We are selling our independence to the EU by letting other markets control the price of our electricity. Starting new industries relying on cheap electricity was a unique feature for us. We are making aluminium in small towns far away from large cities. Starting new plant will not be possible in the future.
Corruption and nepotism between politicians and industries are being exposed more often than before.
It's nice living in Norway. But our politicians and capitalists have decided that this should come to an end. Norway's peak has been reached.
The race to the bottom has begun years ago.
You could also say that they are instead together with the rest of Europe. United. There's no reason Norway would have super cheap power and Germany should struggle even more without Russian gas.
I disagree.
Germany dismantled their electric infrastructure by shutting down their nuclear plants. Only because boomers were afraid of hot metal in a pool. They replaced the green energy with coal and gas.
Most of Europe use gas for heating and cooking. In Norway we use electricity for those purposes. It's also very cold in most parts during the winter. So cheap electricity is a vital part of our infrastructure.
Transporting electricity from Norway to Germany and GB is not efficient as there is a loss of power on the grid to heat during transport.
France is a great opposite to Germany in this discussion. They are invested in their nuclear energy and has an export industry. France was the biggest exporter of electricity in Europe before Capitalists sold out the Norwegian people for some fat paychecks.
Fully agree. The Norway I moved to was very egalitarian and people were much more socially minded. But lately things have been getting worse the gap between rich and poor is absurd and the government is putting in a lot of not so subtle poor taxes.
“It’s terrible in Norway, don’t come here!”
My third great grandfather left there and came to the US. WHAT WAS HE THINKING!? lol
Depends on how old he was. Things were less rosy before the oil. The Norwegian-American "exodus" is still part of Norwegian cultural memory (if nothing else there are children's songs about it) and apparently there's some remnants of Norwegian-influenced culture around Minnesota or something like that.
At the time, maybe it was a great idea.
He was probably thinking that he was hungry due to a shortage of potatoes and that his older brother would get the farm, so he'd better come up with a different plan. I hear the US was real socialist back then, giving away land left and right.
The modern day dumbasses who come here either got a high paying tech job, fell in love with an American, or possibly both.
Norway is a country built on oil, oil and lots and lots of oil. While I love Norwegians, everything is easy when you have one of the largest sovereign wealth funds literally funding the country (I know, I know, it isn’t because it’s well managed. But pretty easy for the state to borrow against it and what not).
If you want an example of a Nordic country that’s just built on taxes, strong work ethic, unions and corporate success, visit another Nordic country, like Sweden, Finland or Denmark.
Just because your have large natural reserves does not mean you will manage it well.
It's easy to dismiss Norway and say that oh well they have all this money. But remember that it's not that long ago that Norway was a very poor country. And then culture that was built up remained through the economic growth.
All Nordic countries are built on that, Norway included. The Norwegian oil fund is rarely tapped into beyond a small fraction of the capital gains, although it did smooth out some 2008 financial crisis pains which hit Sweden harder.
Denmark has had some oil, but nowhere near what Norway did. Sweden has hardly had any oil reserves, nor Finland.
I’m aware that Norway manages its oil wealth extremely well. Probably better than any other country, which should be no surprise given it’s Norway.
But having an ENORMOUS bank balance does mean Norway can invest in projects and take up loans with extremely favourable rates.
Canada could have had the same amount of wealth but instead of socializing the profits, individuals pissed it all away and now there is nothing left
Funny thing is that we Americans always make fun of Europe, while eating absolute shit in our "best country in the world".
It's not very effective!
America used Blame Socialism!
It's not very effective!
Jethro-Bob used Tax Complaint! He hurt himself in his confusion!
It is satire after all
You know who also has high taxes...
Norwegian income taxes are barely higher than California, and you get way more in return. And before you start ranting about California, Texas has a higher effective tax rate than California.
Taxes basically become extortion when they don't return to 99% of the citizens in any way. That's what it rightfully feels like in many parts of the world.
Where taxes return to you as service in both good times and bad times, they become an easy way to solve your problems compared to the alternative being pocketing untaxed money but having its service and product value way lower.