Why Are Finland, Denmark, Norway, Iceland and Sweden So Wealthy?
November 1, 2017
Alex Henderson, Periodista and Technical Writer
The Nordic countries have achieved a healthy balance of capitalist/free market productivity and social safety net protections. Scandinavians, like the United States, were smart enough to reject communism. But while the modern-day U.S. has, much to its detriment, been undermining the protections of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal and embracing the worst of crony capitalism, Scandinavia is not run exclusive for the 1%. The U.S. has been destroying its middle class, which is a bad from a capitalist/free market standpoint because companies need consumers who can afford to buy their products.
When Sen. Bernie Sanders describes himself as a “socialist,” context is crucial. He identifies with “socialism” as practiced in Denmark, Sweden or Norway, not the failed Marxist-Leninist model that has ceased to exist except for a small handful of countries. Scandinavians ask me why Sanders isn’t president of the U.S.; my response is, “Because unlike you guys, big chucks of the U.S. population are devoid of common sense.”
I don’t judge a country by how it treats its 1%. I want to know, “How does a bus driver live? How are schoolteachers treated? Do plumbers, bricklayers and electricians have good access to preventative healthcare?” And when a bus driver in Reykjavik assures me that he has a much better life in Iceland than he would have in most U.S. cities, I have to say that all things considered, Iceland is a raging success.
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