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"Its public debt fell from 70% of GDP in 1993 to 37% in 2010" Talk about selection bias. For those interested in the real stats (using a not so great but still

by sebcat 14y ago

"Its public debt fell from 70% of GDP in 1993 to 37% in 2010" Talk about selection bias. For those interested in the real stats (using a not so great but still functional UI), check out http://www.scb.se/Pages/SSD/SSD_TreeView____340506.aspx?ExpandNode=OE/OE0202 http://www.scb.se/Pages/SSD/SSD_TreeView____340506.aspx?Expa... In the early nineties, financial hardship hit Sweden. It was mostly because of irresponsible loan policies and having a fixed exchange rate to the best of my understanding. One can make analogies to the sub-zero mortgages here. "Sweden has also put its pension system on a sound foundation, replacing a defined-benefit system with a defined-contribution one and making automatic adjustments for longer life expectancy." Right. Ask my grand-parents who has paid high taxes for most of their life to finance their pension how much they enjoy their cut pensions. And ask them what they feel about going to an elderly home run by an off-shore investment firm that receives a fixed amount of tax money per senior citizen in their care, thus having a reason to lower the expenses as much as possible to maximize profit. It's a company after all. "the country was demoted from being the world’s fourth-richest in 1970 to 14th-richest in 1993, when the average Swede was poorer than the average Briton or Italian" Yeah, but you really didn't have to pay for much back then, or pay much for something. Wealth is relative. Also, again with the early nineties... IMO, some things in a society should be public. Health-care and infrastructure shouldn't really be run for profit. I've got some stories regarding that, but it's Friday evening so CYA.

subsystem 14y ago
I've found the Economist to be surprisingly biased and uninformed when it comes to the Nordic countries. Makes me question if their reputation really is well deserved.
- notahacker 14y ago
  I think the Economist is pretty consistent in advocating its deregulated, trade-based neoliberal stance in more or less any article: it's just more obvious when it comes to Scandinavian and East Asian Tiger states whose economic performance glaringly conflicts with its theories than when it justifiably credits US success with a pro-business attitude and failures with regulatory capture and protectionism, blames regulation for European slowdown and accuses the slowly-developing world of being ridiculously corrupt.
martinced 14y ago
All GDP hollywood-accounting aside, the reason why they went up to public debt of 70% was because the nanny state was spending too much. I know it's hard to understand for socialo-commies, but it's a fact. Contrarily to France, they realized it and worked hard to reduce the public debt and it worked. Yes, cut in pensions for older people do suck. But it works. It allows the nanny state to be a bit less of a nanny state and hence to escape from the public debt trap. I'm not disagreeing with you that health-care and infrastructure shouldn't be run for profit. But then comes the problem of... COST! Where do you draw the line? Socialo-commies are always going to use intellectual terrorism like: "What, you don't want to contribute $X so that grandmas have their life expectancy probability augmented a bit?" But it makes no sense. Let me tell you: what if, for 1 000 000 000 000 $ per person I can create a better healthcare system. Are you going to allow me to do it? No, because there wouldn't be any economy anymore. It wouldn't work. So I return your your argument: you sebcat insensitive clod, how comes you're not willing to spend $ 1 000 000 000 000 per person per year so that everyone has a better health-care, you really have no heart!? So any discussion about "health-care" is pointless: it's not about no health-care at all or a super-good healthcare. The question is which % of the GDP can be used to provide with level of health-care without ruining the entire economy. And that's the big problem of the socialo-commies and their nanny states: they cannot count. It's all words and intellectual terrorism. But as soon as you use their own arguments against themselves, they're dodging the question. Now every single time I discuss with a socialo-commie I use that $1 000 000 000 per person per year example and I ask him if it's sustainable or not. And he says no. So I tell him he really has no heart and he's a bad person for letting all these grandmas die. And then the expression on their face are priceless because their entire belief system is shred to pieces.
- willholloway 14y ago
  Is your belief system shred to pieces when you learn that the US spends twice the percentage of GDP on health care as nations like France with worse health outcomes?

by sebcat 14y ago

subsystem 14y ago

I've found the Economist to be surprisingly biased and uninformed when it comes to the Nordic countries. Makes me question if their reputation really is well deserved.

notahacker 14y ago
I think the Economist is pretty consistent in advocating its deregulated, trade-based neoliberal stance in more or less any article: it's just more obvious when it comes to Scandinavian and East Asian Tiger states whose economic performance glaringly conflicts with its theories than when it justifiably credits US success with a pro-business attitude and failures with regulatory capture and protectionism, blames regulation for European slowdown and accuses the slowly-developing world of being ridiculously corrupt.

martinced 14y ago

All GDP hollywood-accounting aside, the reason why they went up to public debt of 70% was because the nanny state was spending too much. I know it's hard to understand for socialo-commies, but it's a fact. Contrarily to France, they realized it and worked hard to reduce the public debt and it worked. Yes, cut in pensions for older people do suck. But it works. It allows the nanny state to be a bit less of a nanny state and hence to escape from the public debt trap. I'm not disagreeing with you that health-care and infrastructure shouldn't be run for profit. But then comes the problem of... COST! Where do you draw the line? Socialo-commies are always going to use intellectual terrorism like: "What, you don't want to contribute $X so that grandmas have their life expectancy probability augmented a bit?" But it makes no sense. Let me tell you: what if, for 1 000 000 000 000 $ per person I can create a better healthcare system. Are you going to allow me to do it? No, because there wouldn't be any economy anymore. It wouldn't work. So I return your your argument: you sebcat insensitive clod, how comes you're not willing to spend $ 1 000 000 000 000 per person per year so that everyone has a better health-care, you really have no heart!? So any discussion about "health-care" is pointless: it's not about no health-care at all or a super-good healthcare. The question is which % of the GDP can be used to provide with level of health-care without ruining the entire economy. And that's the big problem of the socialo-commies and their nanny states: they cannot count. It's all words and intellectual terrorism. But as soon as you use their own arguments against themselves, they're dodging the question. Now every single time I discuss with a socialo-commie I use that $1 000 000 000 per person per year example and I ask him if it's sustainable or not. And he says no. So I tell him he really has no heart and he's a bad person for letting all these grandmas die. And then the expression on their face are priceless because their entire belief system is shred to pieces.

willholloway 14y ago
Is your belief system shred to pieces when you learn that the US spends twice the percentage of GDP on health care as nations like France with worse health outcomes?