In Norway, The State is Still Grandpa

[dumpster_baby]

Socialism still reigns in Norway, despite neoliberal attempts to encroach:
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Almost half of Norway's GDP is produced by the public sector, the highest proportion in western Europe. The state owns majority shareholdings in the two largest companies - Norsk Hydro and Statoil. A universal, tax-financed health service is used by almost all Norway's 4.5 million people. The welfare system provides peace of mind from cradle to grave: not for Norwegian pensioners the indignity of having to surrender a lifetime's savings to get into a privately owned old people's home. State education is excellent; only a small minority are educated privately. Nearly a quarter of the adult population takes advantage of the numerous continuing education courses offered by the local authorities, among others.

Taxation is steeply and heroically progressive. Marginal tax rates on wages rise to 64.7 per cent (or 55.3 per cent, excluding social security contributions). Other sources of income, from capital, shares and so on, are taxed at a standard 28 per cent, with surtaxes of 13.5 per cent on incomes above roughly £29,000 and 19.5 per cent on those above roughly £74,000.

...

Revenues from North Sea oil and gas have helped enormously, but Norway followed a quite different route from the UK, which made similar discoveries at the same time. It followed the much-maligned Bennite path: it formed a state-owned oil company, to guarantee that the nation and not foreign multinationals derived the lion's share of the benefit, and established a Petroleum Fund (now worth roughly $145bn) to pay for future health and pension expenses. Oil and gas income has also been used to pay for reindustrialisation and subsidies to small-scale, ecologically friendly agriculture. And it has enabled Norway to be, per capita, the largest donor of overseas aid in the world. Margaret Thatcher's Britain, by contrast, used its cash windfall to grant tax cuts to the rich and pay three million people not to work.


Anybody who thinks Norwegian socialism is an example of the Blairite "Third Way" ought to get out more. Throughout Norway, Britain's Prime Minister is regarded as a figure of fun, and is the subject of unremitting ridicule. For decades, Norwegians, with their policies of tax-and-spend and maintaining a large state-owned sector, have done exactly the opposite to the orthodox neoliberal prescription that Blair embraces - and have been rewarded with one of the most successful economies and fairest societies in the world.
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more here:
http://www.newstatesman.com/site.php3?newTemplate=NSArticle_Economy&newDisplayURN=200409060021

[Union Thug]

1. Gawd I love Norway! /eom

[Briar]

2. Me too!

"Anybody who thinks Norwegian socialism is an example of the Blairite "Third Way" ought to get out more. Throughout Norway, Britain's Prime Minister is regarded as a figure of fun, and is the subject of unremitting ridicule. For decades, Norwegians, with their policies of tax-and-spend and maintaining a large state-owned sector, have done exactly the opposite to the orthodox neoliberal prescription that Blair embraces - and have been rewarded with one of the most successful economies and fairest societies in the world."

[hansolsen]

3. From one old "Norwegian" to DU: you should listen to me. Hans N/T

[dumpster_baby]

4. what are you going to tell us?

?

[hansolsen]

5. Vote Kerry. Support Kerry. Tell your neighbors that you see a dark and

evil side to George Bush. Don't be afraid to oppose the unjust war in Iraq. It is the right thing to do.

This election will turn on Bush's character, not his competence. So say I.

[Union Thug]

6. So in the off chance that the microcephalic chimp should win..

...is it hard to get Norwegian citizenship?

Just asking...

[shrike]

7. Norway is one damn fine place

Visited in the '80s. I thought at the time, "If this is socialism, I'm a socialist."

[DaveSZ]

8. I like their state owned oil company

That's a great idea.