The stunned outrage that Norwegians feel over the deaths of four of their servicemen in a roadside bomb blast in Afghanistan yesterday is about what you would expect in the United States if 260 or so American soldiers were killed in a single attack. That's the equivalent scale of loss when population is taken into account. And that makes yesterday's explosion a bigger event, for Norway, than the 1983 Beirut barracks bombing that killed 241 American marines, leading then-President Reagan to pull all U.S. troops out of war-torn Lebanon.
The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, or SIPRI, has added up all the military spending on earth and concluded that the swooning of financial markets had no effect on the world's appetite for missiles and tanks and bombers and AK-47s. Global military spending shot to $1.5 trillion in 2009, six percent higher in real terms than in 2008. The United States accounted for more than half of that, but 14 of the top 15 spenders boosted their military budgets. It's a long-term trend. Military spending worldwide rose almost 50 percent from 2000 to 2009. International weapons sales rose, too. Boom times for Lockheed Martin, but also for some Scandinavian defense contractors. Shares in Norway's Kongsberg Group have more than quintupled the past five years. Saab AB of Sweden, which can't seem to sell its Gripen fighter, has had a harder time of it.
Katrin Bennhold of the International Herald Tribune is deeply impressed by Sweden's policy promoting lengthy male parental leave after childbirth, a state-funded benefit that 85 percent of fathers now take advantage of. The takeaway from her 3,400-word opus with slide show yesterday has to be that a taxation level almost twice as high as that of the United States is not only sustainable but sexy: "Machos with dinosaur values don't make the top-10 lists of attractive men in women's magazines anymore," said Sweden's European Affairs Minister, Birgitta Ohlsson.
Kjell Nordtröm, the Swedish business affairs philosopher, is bullish on capitalism. He says the financial crisis of the past few years will be seen historically as a necessary course correction, after which successful businesses will reorient their product lines to capitalize on three global developments: the continued rise of women, reduction in family size and urbanization. Nordström told Norway’s Dagens Næringsliv that a reborn finance sector will better serve the economy: “I’m not sure Lehmann Sisters would have run their bank the way the Brothers did.”
On the Freakonomics blog over at The New York Times we are told that, all things considered, the United States and the Nordic countries spend about the same on social welfare services. According to Price Fishback, an economics professor, the Nordic system of redistributing the wealth is so inefficient that it seems more generous when in fact it's just more obtrusive. When you consider that Nordic welfare recipients pay more in taxes (including that regressive 25% VAT) and live in a higher cost environment, they're supposedly no better off than the poor in Detroit. One problem with the analysis is that so many poor Americans fall through the net completely and don't get what the statistics suggest.
NATO's hope of stabilizing Afghanistan fortunately does not depend the Nordic countries, but their armed forces have made an impact. The Danes have been a spearhead in hazardous Helmand province, while the Norwegians and Swedes have shown their flags in the north. That solidarity may crumble if Sweden's center-right government loses in this fall's election to the formidable "red-green" coalition, two of whose members gave called for a pullout. Foreign Minister Carl Bildt, of the Moderates, wants Swedes instead to prepare for long years of continued engagement. Yesterday in Kabul he told Svenska Dagbladet: "I find it difficult to set an end date for the Swedish effort, but in five years we'll definitely still be here in some form."
Everyone knows Greece's beggarly status. But the EU Commission says Denmark is among four other countries that have run up unsustainable deficits. That has the famously self-doubting Danes ( ". . . that is the question") wondering if their luxuriant social policies are doomed. Under the headline "Farewell Welfare State," Berlingske Tidende's Poul Høi writes today: "It's not just the warm countries that have to cut back on their pensions and social services. The cold countries, too, have to make some cold calculations and reconsider their social model."
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Swedish adventurer Tony Berglund set a new world record today for the fastest vertical run -- 100 meters down the front of a building in Vasteras, Sweden. Berglund cut more than a second from the previous record of 36.25 seconds, held by Britain's Steve Jones. "I defeated the forces of nature and my own fears", Berglund said of his feat, which naturally involved rappelling gear.
The southern European debt crisis, caused by uncontrolled government spending and accounting tricks, could undermine the progressive social agenda of Europe's far north even though political leaders here are better at math. Germany, the EU bailer-in-chief, has lashed out at Greek excess, and now it's Scandinavia's turn. "Swedish taxpayers and other taxpayers should not have to pay so the Greeks can retire with a pension in their 40s,” said Anders Borg, the Swedish finance minister, as quoted by Svenska Dagbladet. Jens Stoltenberg, the Norwegian prime minister, added, “The welfare model we’ve known in Europe for several decades is under pressure because many countries can’t pay for it."
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