G20 meeting idiocy

[GothicGothicness]

And she'd be fully covered under medicare in the US, so how is that any different?

If she or her spouse has paid Medicare taxes for at least 10 years.......

Socialist/communistic economies are far worse on the environment than capitalistic. I'm not talking about the mixed systems of western Europe, I'm talking about the old Eastern Eurrope and China. While we do have an extremely high consumption per capita, the damage that we have done, and are doing, to the environment doesn't even begin to compare with with the Soviets or the Chinese have done. The problem comes down fundamentally to property rights. When the government (or 'the people') own the land, no one gives a shit if they screw it up, because it's not their problem. If private individuals own the land, they have a vested self-interest in taking care of it and making sure that neighbors (be they people or corporations) don't do anything to negatively impact the value of their land.

What is missing from this discussion is the CO2 emittance ( the currently most serious threat for the entire earth ) is NOT affecting the land... because of this reason the owner has no interest in stopping it... in fact it could instead be very favorable to have a factory on his land which pays handsomely and just emits CO2 which goes to the air rather than the land. US had much higher CO2 emittance than china inspite of it having so much fewer people. It is only after china changed to captailism ( it is freedom that everyone have a car down with public transportation BTW ) that they passed US in total value still much lower per capita though. So you got this wrong.. US is still by far the main reason the earth is being destroyed.... and Barack obama was promosing to make it better.... but he sure hasn't done much.

 

[Alrik Fassbauer]

This is kind of a "clash of the cultures", I fear. It's about systems.

Within the last months - looking at the financial crisis - I developed kind o a "universal law".

And it goes like this : From a certain point of complexity on, everything tends to accumulation, to aggregation.

When I was studying Geology many years ago, I had to visit Mineralogy and Crystallography as side-topics, too. There, I learned to know a professor in his last few years at university.

He held the opinion that during crystal growth, bigger crystals dissolve and thus "consume" smaller ones. Smaller crystals.
To him, this was a proven, purely scientific fact. AND he ported it towards economy !

He told us that bigger companies will "consume" smaller ones. And thus become bigger still.

We, as young students, were kind of ... well, we just didn't believe in this.
But not too man years later, own own German economical crisis began. We could see at hand, that were the big food chains like Aldi began to build shops, smaller "Aunt-Emma-shops" begann to disappear. And this has been happening since then. Our shopping malls are more or less dominated by chains.

We can see this very clearly now with the example of well-known Cologne shopping street.
It is well know because of its diversity. Lots and lots and lots of small, unique shops. And that's why people want to be there !
Now, chains got caught of that, and began to install their own shops there. It is a street were pople like to be, where people like to spend money. And they want to participte.
The result now is this : The rental fees of the shops increase. Because of the even more growing popularity of this street. Result : The small(er) hops have to close, or move out, into other streets, because they just can't pay these fees anymore. And the chains move in. Big "consumes" small.
Mybe one day this street will consist of nothing but chain shops. And the diversity is just gone. Which could result in lesser popularity.

This is in small what happens in big all over the world. We have one major commercial operating system, because the smaller ones are gone, closed, or moved out. OS/2, BeOS and the like. Linux is the only survivor (and other Unix derivates (I also put BSE into this group, wrongly, I know).

Recently I watched a TV documentation on the river Rhein (English Rhine).
Until the late 60s, chemical plants found it normal to pour their wastes into it. And into other rivers, too. They stank ! I learned through this documentation. It was just the least cost-intensive way for them to get rid of it. And they didn't bother that everything living in these rivers died out.

And only THEN environmental activists began to form !

And they stopped ONLY putting their wastes into the river when they were FORCED to do so by the state ! Not earlier !

The lesson I took from this was for me : Liberal economy is = putting your waste anywhere where it doesn't cost much. Unforced, compnies won't stop it. Because other ways of putting away wastes would mean = costs, and that would be avoided at all costs !

So, I thought, the state has to FORCE them to do things. Livberal economy won't do it alone,. They wouldn't even have the ideait might be wrong, because within the 50s and the 60s, yes, even until the 70s, it was NORMAL to them !

To put it rather cynical, the lesson I learned from all of this and of the financial crisis (where some bansters even got money DESPITE they had ruined a bank !)
that liberal economy is about nothing but greed.
The top positions will try to get as much money as possible for themselves meanwhile paying as little as possible to the actual workers.
And the companies they direct are nothing but convenient tools for them to accumulate. Money.

And the management of companies are to me like big crystals, too : They accumulate the money, meanwhile dissolving/"consuming" the money of their workers (by paying them as little as possible, cutting their jobs etc.).

 

[Zaleukos]

Europe and the US dont really have different economic systems. The difference is a matter of degree only.

I think most americans have a very aged look of socialism the liberal socialsim is not in this way. IMHO it is also far ahead of capitalism. If you look at the world top-list of best countries to live……. most of them are socialist and most of them happen to be nordic too. Even with our "right" current rule we're still a fairly socialist country in sweden.

That is false dichotomy and a nonsensical definition of "socialism". The nordic countries are about as "capitalist" as the US, or other western countries. The US has a welfare state too. Differences within the developed world are a matter of degree rather than particularly different economic systems. All first world countries are mixed economies with a heavy slant towards the "capitalist" end of the spectrum.

"Socialist" countries are shitholes like Cuba and North Korea…

Economic freedom rankings tend to put the entire western world in a fairly narrow range. The Nordic countries get scores around 7.5 and the US around 8. This surely represent radically different degrees of capitalism

Your claims about taxes are also nonsensical. You might want to recall that fear of raised taxes is a major reason of the Social democrats defeat in the recent election. You might also want to recall that the soc-dems only threatened to roll back 5% of the governments tax cuts out of (justified) fear of a voter backlash, which indicates that the local "socialists" dont really share your analysis… Your view of your countrymen is coloured by your own political preferences.

 

[blatantninja]

If she or her spouse has paid Medicare taxes for at least 10 years…….

So basically if she or her spouse worked for 10 years at any point she's covered. Sounds pretty good since I'm not sure how you could be over 65 and have lived in this country and not at least had 10 years of work, unless you are independently wealthy or disabled (which there is a waver for disability). Even if they weren't covered, she'd just have to pay a premium. And if she couldn't do that, there's medicaid. So basically she's covered.

What is missing from this discussion is the CO2 emittance ( the currently most serious threat for the entire earth ) is NOT affecting the land… because of this reason the owner has no interest in stopping it… in fact it could instead be very favorable to have a factory on his land which pays handsomely and just emits CO2 which goes to the air rather than the land. US had much higher CO2 emittance than china inspite of it having so much fewer people.

That's true. And I do support legislative action in that area. Reagardless, as damaging as C02 is, I'd take global warming over the toxic dumps that go over the former USSR and China.

It is only after china changed to captailism ( it is freedom that everyone have a car down with public transportation BTW ) that they passed US in total value still much lower per capita though. So you got this wrong..

Yes, because they became significantly more prosperous and significantly raised their standard of living. It's very easy for someone in a westernized country to say they should have stayed living in squaler when that person has never had to do so. Regardless, capitalism isn't the cause of this, they easily could have had the same output levels if they achieved the same prosperity under a socialist economic system. The cause is a significant increase an increase in economic activity, not the economic system that produced that activity.

US is still by far the main reason the earth is being destroyed…. and Barack obama was promosing to make it better…. but he sure hasn't done much.

We do use more than our share of resources, no doubt, but when anyone comes up with a solution that addresses the unique problems of geography we face, that doesn't seriously degrade our standard of living, it will be a first.

 

[Ubereil]

Your claims about taxes are also nonsensical. You might want to recall that fear of raised taxes is a major reason of the Social democrats defeat in the recent election.

According to who?

Übereil

 

[GothicGothicness]

"Socialist" countries are shitholes like Cuba and North Korea…

You are also stuck in the tradional definition of the word… only you even confused socialism with dictatorship….. to make such a connection really makes you look rather unknowledgeable and certainly extremly brain washed by your side.

Your claims about taxes are also nonsensical. You might want to recall that fear of raised taxes is a major reason of the Social democrats defeat in the recent election. You might also want to recall that the soc-dems only threatened to roll back 5% of the governments tax cuts out of (justified) fear of a voter backlash, which indicates that the local "socialists" dont really share your analysis… Your view of your countrymen is coloured by your own political preferences.

Yeah, as you know I vote blue…. and it is a bit coloured by that. This election it was also the social democrats which offered the biggest tax cuts, and I think they lost a lot of votes because of this… they certainly lost mine. On top of that they were not planning to raise taxes. However each time they do a questionary the majority of people don't want lower taxes, and they are satisfied for what they get for the tax money. There are other reasons to vote aside from tax.

Europe and the US dont really have different economic systems. The difference is a matter of degree only.

So that's why the US are scared as hell of social secutiry such as the health reform… or social secutiry nets. It sounds like you have gotten the US scare of socialism, and there are very liberal forms of it. Also nordic countries still have quite some state owned companies…. and I don't mind that.. some companies are better state owned. In fact several of swedens largest and best companies were started as state owned SAAB / SKF / Volvo and so on.

We do use more than our share of resources, no doubt, but when anyone comes up with a solution that addresses the unique problems of geography we face, that doesn't seriously degrade our standard of living, it will be a first.

The reaserchers are in agreement, research alone cannot solve this… we also have to change our attitude? with this system our standard of living keeps increasing and increasing and increasing…. this more than counters any green research scientist comes up with….. you can never get a high standard of living from nothing. Thus we have to change… at the very least to be satisfied with the standard of living we have and not keep going for higher and higher standard if we do.. we'll never suceed. In fact with todays technology if we was happy with the standard of living of 40 years ago we would have made a HUGE decrease in CO2 emittance.

Yes, because they became significantly more prosperous and significantly raised their standard of living. It's very easy for someone in a westernized country to say they should have stayed living in squaler when that person has never had to do so.

I am not saying they should…. but do you know what happend, a large part of the population is still doing that while a part of the popularion has had extreme increase of standards? the US is not far off in this respect. That is another major capitalism problem. Hope you are reading Zaleukos because sweden had the most even wealth distribution in the world last time they measured it…… china has one of the biggest but US is also big on this which is a major difference. In china you have a small amount of the people which are standing for an enormous part of the consumption and pollution….. and the values are still too high….. now how do you lower the standard of the rich and the powerful? you ussually can't, but you can make the standard higher for the poor people…….. but the environment of china is already extrmely taxed and destroyed… it would have needed to raise in a way were a lot of people got it a little better, instead of fewer people getting it 1000 times better.

 

[Zaleukos]

According to who?

Übereil

For starters:

Thomas Östros, social democrat shadow minister of finance. (I can also dig up a few old quotes of him saying that it would be politically impossible to roll back most of the tax cuts well before the election)
Morgan Johansson, head of the social democratic election defeat analysis comission and apparently sworn enemy of Östros
Ilija Batljan, head of the social democrats in the Stockholm region

It is of course not the only reason, but still a significant factor in the "workers party" going from 40% of the employed vote to 20% of the same.

Scandinavians aren't much keener on taxes than others. Our societies do enjoy a high degree of trust though, and that also means that we generally trust the government to not waste tax dollars. That, rather than a like of taxes, makes a Swede less likely to question a tax burden than an American (who naturally assumes that the state is all-incompetent).

 

[Zaleukos]

You are also stuck in the tradional definition of the word… only you even confused socialism with dictatorship….. to make such a connection really makes you look rather unknowledgeable and certainly extremly brain washed by your side.

Nope. A "socialist" economy means public ownership of the means of production. Using it as a label to describe a subset of first world economies that really arent particularly different from other first world economies makes the term useless. You could say that Scandinavia has a "more socialist" health care system than the US, but then you should also acknowledge that the US has a "more socialist" pension system etc. Differences that on the whole are nuances.

Socialising the entire economy is usually only done by authoritarian regimes or during wartime (you could argue that even democracies socialised their economies during WW2 with rationing and government direction of production).

Yeah, as you know I vote blue…. and it is a bit coloured by that. This election it was also the social democrats which offered the biggest tax cuts, and I think they lost a lot of votes because of this… they certainly lost mine. On top of that they were not planning to raise taxes. However each time they do a questionary the majority of people don't want lower taxes, and they are satisfied for what they get for the tax money. There are other reasons to vote aside from tax.

We've discussed this before. The surveys (usually sponsored by interest groups with ties either to the high-tax parties or the public sector) usually ask "Do you want lower taxes or good healthcare?". This is quite a different question compared to "do you want lower taxes?" and obviously gets a different response.

The social-democratic tax cut was extremely obvious targeted pork for retirees. Hardly applicable to the entirety of the population, and fairly inefficient when it comes to helping growth. I dont think the proposal made much of a difference to the election result compared to the looming threat of a reintroduced real estate tax. The electorate somewhat unfairly believed that the red-greens would raise taxes for a lot of home owners

At the same time only the center-right had any ambition to lower income taxes for the employed. As the prime minister said the opposition's tax cuts were very carefully targeted to NOT go to those working I wonder if there could be any connection between that and the social democrats going to a record low of 22% of the working population vote?

So that's why the US are scared as hell of social secutiry such as the health reform… or social secutiry nets. It sounds like you have gotten the US scare of socialism, and there are very liberal forms of it.

I am scared of socialism according to the classical definition because it is a shitty system that has messed up any place where it was tried I'm also annoyed when that term is applied where it doesnt belong. I am however not scared of European social democracy.

Socialism has been a dirty word in the US for a century. That is why the us (social-)Democrat party is labelled liberal while liberal means something completely different (and much closer to the original definition of the word) in the rest of the world.

Still, the US has a social safety net and is a welfare state, albeit on the lighter end of the spectrum. You might want to read up on reforms under Roosevelt and Johnson.

It has subsidised healthcare for the poorest and the elderly, subsidised higher education for the poorest and whatnot. The difference compared to our system is that these are needs-based (and here we ARE different from most western countries with our welfare systems that cover the wealthy as well).

Anyway the point stands that the systems within the first world arent different enough to warrant different labels. If the US is at 0.8, Sweden at 0.75, and Cuba at 0.2, why on earth would you label Sweden and Cuba as belonging to the same cathegory? It just doesnt make sense.

Also nordic countries still have quite some state owned companies…. and I don't mind that.. some companies are better state owned.

You will find current or historical state-owned US counterparts to pretty much any of our state-owned companies except for systembolaget (alcohol retail monopoly for public health reasons) and Svenska spel (gambling monopoly for the same reason).

As for the competence within these companies it seems like the distribution is about the same as within the private sector, with the added factor that there is an inverse correlation between political micro-management and competence. In the early 90s banking crisis the worst run bank was the state owned one

In fact several of swedens largest and best companies were started as state owned SAAB / SKF / Volvo and so on.

SAAB, SKF, and Volvo started out as private companies and have as far as I know always been private (but at times taken advantage of contracts with the state for airplanes and whatnot). This is not particularly different from Boeing's experience in the US.

 

[Pladio]

@ Zaleukos:
One slight correction to.
I know you said mostly, but I would just like to point out that the socialist system has been fairly well used in small scale operations such as Kibbutzim, albeit for only medium-terms and most of them have now either dissipated or become socialist-capitalist systems.

 

[Ubereil]

Thomas Östros, social democrat shadow minister of finance. (I can also dig up a few old quotes of him saying that it would be politically impossible to roll back most of the tax cuts well before the election)

That's got nothing to do with why pepole voted for them or not, since they wouldn't re-raise those taxes anyway. Definently not all of them in a four year period, because they've been lowered so much rerolling them would hit pepole too hard.

"Pepole didn't want raised taxes" doesn't strike me as a very good explanation to why the Social Democrats lost the election. As you said yourself:

Scandinavians aren't much keener on taxes than others. Our societies do enjoy a high degree of trust though, and that also means that we generally trust the government to not waste tax dollars. That, rather than a like of taxes, makes a Swede less likely to question a tax burden than an American.

Pepole wouldn't really have cared (all that much) about an increased tax burden because there are other things they want more than lowered taxes. They also trust that goverment can deliever these things. If they'd felt confident that the Social Democrats would have used the extra money they payed each month to increase the quality of our state services (like schools, healthcare etc) they wouldn't have minded raised taxes all that much at all.

That's where the problem for the Social Democrats was. Pepole didn't feel like they knew what they were doing. What did they think was the problem with Sweden and what did they want to do about it? In what area would they improve Sweden? The Social Democrats failed to answer both those questions (even close to) adequately for pepole to trust them to govern well. The Social Democrats seemed lost, like they didn't know what they wanted.

If Anders Borg were to go out and say "we need a slight increase in taxes to increase our payment on our debt/ensure the quality of our schools/health care" nobody would care, because pepole trust that the righties knows what they're doing.

I am scared of socialism according to the classical definition because it is a shitty system that has messed up any place where it was tried

There are countries who's managed to reach socialism? Where?

Übereil

 

[Zaleukos]

Pladio: True. But it is much easier to get any system to work in a small group of people. My gf and I have a shared economy along the old Marx lines of "from each according to ability, to each according to need".

The centralisation that usually goes with socialism tends to become unwieldy once you have to consider the population of a large city or so. Socialism can have a use in a war economy when the government wants to direct what people produce, and the economy focuses on producing large series of standardised tanks or whatnot, but it is stifling in the long term. You get stagnation, black markets and lose out on innovation. In the end all that is left is a corrupt husk along the lines of 80s Soviet Union.

That's got nothing to do with why pepole voted for them or not, since they wouldn't re-raise those taxes anyway. Definently not all of them in a four year period, because they've been lowered so much rerolling them would hit pepole too hard.

"Pepole didn't want raised taxes" doesn't strike me as a very good explanation to why the Social Democrats lost the election. As you said yourself:

Not the only explanation, but one factor (and a significant one at the tactical level).

You've missed out on the post-election analysis of the proposed reintroduction of the real estate tax. I'm not saying it is the only reason for the defeat, but it is one factor. My main point is that the tired old meme that Swedes like to pay taxes (usually repeated by GG) is wrong. If we did then it wouldnt have hurt the opposition to propose a reinstated real estate tax.

It should also be noted that people are quite selfish. I dug up some polls on these things. It turns out there is a significant "as long as it isnt me" factor in the willingness to raise taxes. Taxes that are perceived to hit others are fine:

Real estate tax: Even the threat of it is seen as bad (as we have 3-4 million home owners), and even the modest soc-dem proposal was seen as extremely negative.
Wealth tax: Fine since most people dont cathegorise themselves as "wealthy"
Alcohol tax: Bad, since most people drink alcohol.
Extra margin tax on "high" income earners over 4000 euros per month: Fine as most people know that they make less than that.

Ironically the unpopular taxes are precisely the ones that economists see as less harmful to the economy

Pepole wouldn't really have cared (all that much) about an increased tax burden because there are other things they want more than lowered taxes. They also trust that goverment can deliever these things. If they'd felt confident that the Social Democrats would have used the extra money they payed each month to increase the quality of our state services (like schools, healthcare etc) they wouldn't have minded raised taxes all that much at all.

Seriously, the social democrats themselves admitted that it would be impossible to roll back the government's tax cuts WITHOUT qualifiers. This was as early as 2008, when the social democrats polled around 40% (compared to the election results of around 30%) and the government was doing extremely badly in the polls. Raising taxes is psychologically difficult as it tends to deprive people of margins that they've gotten used to. Saying no to lower taxes is easier as you arent perceived as "taking" anything from the taxpapers. That is why the social democrats have said no to practically every tax cut, but not campaigned on rolling them back once they are in place.

That's where the problem for the Social Democrats was. Pepole didn't feel like they knew what they were doing. What did they think was the problem with Sweden and what did they want to do about it? In what area would they improve Sweden? The Social Democrats failed to answer both those questions (even close to) adequately for pepole to trust them to govern well. The Social Democrats seemed lost, like they didn't know what they wanted.

I agree that these are significant challenges for the social democrats. It is really unclear what they want. I'd add that they seemed incredibly defensive. On one hand they claimed the government was extremely heartless, neoliberal, and unfair, on the other all they offered was minor changes to parts of the welfare system.

It is very amusing that the governments comeback in the polls coincide with the opposition finally presenting a policy

If Anders Borg were to go out and say "we need a slight increase in taxes to increase our payment on our debt/ensure the quality of our schools/health care" nobody would care, because pepole trust that the righties knows what they're doing.

I believe that only works under duress. Göran Persson essentially did that in the 90s, but the public finances were in a mess back then. That's a bit like the rationing during WW2.

There are countries who's managed to reach socialism? Where?

Is that the old red herring of "there was never true socialism/communism/whatever"? If a system is unreachable then it is unworkable by definition

But I dont buy that. I rather take the word of self-proclaimed socialist leaders. If a country has made huge moves towards the traditional definition "public ownership of the means of production" (that is nationalised much of the economy) and claims to be socialist that is good enough for me. Cuba (which is trying to reintroduce a private sector) is there, Venezuela is heading in that direction. The old Eastern bloc consisted of socialist countries. China before Deng's reforms had a socialist economy. North Korea does.

Either way it is nonsensical to say that the Nordic countries are socialist countries. We have mixed economies just like the entire developed world.

 

[akarthis]

What i know from my studies, capitalism is a failed system, as all the other. There are no pure capitalism models practised enywhere. And that because in capitalism there is no intervention from the state.
Today, we have a mixed system, where some vital productive elements are being used from the state and others by the private sector. At least in theory !

But for sure there is no pure capitalism,socialism or communism

 

[Zaleukos]

What i know from my studies, capitalism is a failed system, as all the other. There are no pure capitalism models practised enywhere. And that because in capitalism there is no intervention from the state.
Today, we have a mixed system, where some vital productive elements are being used from the state and others by the private sector. At least in theory !

But for sure there is no pure capitalism,socialism or communism

Capitalism is not an ideology (unlike communism and socialism), but yeah, we live in mixed systems and I guess you could say that Cuba is mixed as well. There is however a spectrum and we sure as heck have more capitalism and less socialism than Cuba, and also are a tad more successful

EDIT: Not sure I'd talk about failed systems though. They have different uses. Very few countries run their military and law enforcement along any sort of "capitalist" lines, and all (reasonably successful) countries let the free market provide consumer goods. The philosophies have different costs and benefits, and depending on the sector one will make more sense than the other.

 

[Ubereil]

Is that the old red herring of "there was never true socialism/communism/whatever"?

Red herring? There never WAS any true communist countries. And for all I know socialism (which isn't the same as communism) hasn't even been claimed to have been implemented. Since it's supposed to be communism reached by peaceful means (social reform and the likes) I kinda don't think that's been implemented either.

Communism is an anarcistic ideology, you know (meaning: no state). Was/are The Soviet Union, Cuba and the other supposedly Communist countries even close to anarchies?

Note that this does not mean the system you claim is socialist isn't bad systems. They're just not what most self proclaimed socialists/communists in Sweden wants to implement.

But I dont buy that. I rather take the word of self-proclaimed socialist leaders.

Of course you do, if you do that you can demonize the politics of Lars Ohly and the Left Party, claim they're extremists who wants to turn Sweden into the Soviet Union and that way avoid meeting their actual arguments. And that way you don't have to think about whether what the Swedish left says might actually work or not.

Capitalism is not an ideology (unlike communism and socialism), but yeah, we live in mixed systems and I guess you could say that Cuba is mixed as well. There is however a spectrum and we sure as heck have more capitalism and less socialism than Cuba, and also are a tad more successful

The economical scale doesn't have capitalism on one end and socialism on the other. Socialism isn't an economic system, it's a political ideology. The scale goes from capitalism to planned economy. Socialism isn't synonymous with planned economy either (nor is planned economy a requirement for socialism).

Übereil

 

[Zaleukos]

Red herring? There never WAS any true communist countries. And for all I know socialism (which isn't the same as communism) hasn't even been claimed to have been implemented. Since it's supposed to be communism reached by peaceful means (social reform and the likes) I kinda don't think that's been implemented either.

Eh? The soviet union claimed to be in some transitory socialist state of development while on the way to the merry communist utopia. I am fairly sure that the USSR's (really, what do you think those S's stand for??) satellites followed suit. That gives you 20 countries or so. Chaves calls his system socialist, as does Castro.

EDIT: Another definition of socialism from the dictionary:
a stage of society in Marxist theory transitional between capitalism and communism and distinguished by unequal distribution of goods and pay according to work done

Your definition of socialism is closer to early 1900s social democratic reformism. After the Russian revolution there was a split between communists and reformists. The former wanted violent revolution, the latter wanted to reach the classless society through gradual reform, working within the bounds of parliamentary democracy. The second group contains the ancestors of our modern social democratic parties.

Note that this does not mean the system you claim is socialist isn't bad systems. They're just not what most self proclaimed socialists/communists in Sweden wants to implement.

I'm not really sure what they want to implement in the long term. I do know that some of our self-proclaimed socialists (Göran Greider should be quoatable for this) dream of a planned economy. I do also know that the Left party, as well as the more radical far-lefties, see private property and private enterprise as great evils. And I also know that since the active politicians are constrained by acting in a real world they arent pushing for those ideals in the near term

Of course you do, if you do that you can demonize the politics of Lars Ohly and the Left Party, claim they're extremists who wants to turn Sweden into the Soviet Union and that way avoid meeting their actual arguments. And that way you don't have to think about whether what the Swedish left says might actually work or not.

I think Ohly is a despicable person (worse than his party), but I dont think he wants to turn our country into a Soviet state. His positions on policy are fairly predictable:

There is no need for fiscal responsibility.
There is no reason for the state to prioritise among it's duties.
There is no practical upper limit to taxation (this is what makes the first two points feasible in left party lala-land).
Private enterprise is evil and can be covered in red tape and paperwork at zero loss to society
It is too easy to become rich in Sweden
USA is the great Satan and should be contained

That policy is enough for me to not listen to those reckless populists. They fail to understand basic concepts such as marginal utility and personal incentives, or maybe they envision an ideal human to whom these concepts dont apply.

That aside I do find their leader particularly despicable, with his history as the Moscow mouthpiece during the 80s. When more open-minded lefties pointed out that unions were suppressed in East Germany he wrote a lovely article along the lines of:

"We should counter the bourgeois lies about the socialist countries rather than spread them"

Yet he finds his membership in the liberal youth organisation in the 70s more embarassing than his role during the 80s

The economical scale doesn't have capitalism on one end and socialism on the other. Socialism isn't an economic system, it's a political ideology. The scale goes from capitalism to planned economy. Socialism isn't synonymous with planned economy either (nor is planned economy a requirement for socialism).

Socialism is both.
On the political side it an umbrella ideology of which social democracy (a workable ideology), communism (a useless and unfortunately pretty dangerous ideology as it promotes an unreachable goal), and a few others are subsets. These ideologies have common roots in 19th century marxism, and tend to focus on various degrees of redistribution as the solution to societal problems.

On the economic side it does mean (to quote the link I provided)

any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods

Or collective ownership of the means of production. This tends to mean central planning as a decentralised collective is pretty rare A bunch of collectives collaborating via bartering would be closer to actors on a market

 

[GothicGothicness]

Nope. A "socialist" economy means public ownership of the means of production. Using it as a label to describe a subset of first world economies that really arent particularly different from other first world economies makes the term useless. You could say that Scandinavia has a "more socialist" health care system than the US, but then you should also acknowledge that the US has a "more socialist" pension system etc. Differences that on the whole are nuances.

I had made clear that I was not talking about the old traditional meaning but rather a more liberal form. Either way you're going strictly by the economical definition of socialism, and even with that definition you haven't got it right, because what these countries are is not related to socialism… because the main idea with it is that people should be as equal as possible and a way to achieve that is state owned companies ( if the companies are state owned but wealth distribution not equal than it is not socialism )… thus Sweden is the most socialist country in the world since the last research that showed we have the least different between people. US is far from it….. so is Cuba and a lot of other countries were a small % of the population are extremely rich.. while the others are dirt poor, which goes against all that socialism stands for.


About SAAB, SKF, and volvo yes you are right.. it is the same scenario as Boeing, supported by but not owned by which makes a large difference so I take that back.

We've discussed this before. The surveys (usually sponsored by interest groups with ties either to the high-tax parties or the public sector) usually ask "Do you want lower taxes or good healthcare?". This is quite a different question compared to "do you want lower taxes?" and obviously gets a different response.

Well, you can declare that SIFO sucks and that their questions are not good or whatever… but they are good at predicting election resulsts either way, and each time they ask do you want to raises taxes 2/3 of the swedes are against it while 1/3 are for it. If you look at the "why I voted as I did" top reasons tax are not in there. I think you are really focused with tax and especially lowering them, I wish for the sake of sweden not many people will become like you and we get a US here. With huge gaps between rich and poor.

 

[Alrik Fassbauer]

Eh? The soviet union claimed to be in some transitory socialist state of development while on the way to the merry communist utopia.

Claiming and doing are two entirely different things. Read George Orwell's "Animal Farm" for that.

Most famous quote out of it : "Some are more equal than others."