And now a little something from Finland for Thought and more Blog Zen

You who have read my blog may have seen me speak highly of the Irish economic recovery. Less restrictions, less welfare, less taxes, more education leading to more growth. However the unions in Ireland don't like that so they want a model more like that of Sweden. Well here we have a good set of reasons not to

“To the extent that the Nordic countries still have an extreme version of the European social model of a big state, it still creates great problems and should definitely not be copied. In fact, the Nordic Model has brought us lower growth, unemployment, dependency on the state and deteriorating welfare services. We should be more inspired to do like Ireland, with its low taxes and free markets.”

Mr Munkhammar notes that Mr Begg says the market economy concentrates wealth in the hands of the most powerful and tends towards ever-greater inequality. Wrong, points out Mr Munkhammar: “Inequality is not greater in market-oriented countries. In particular, poor people are better off in countries with a more free economy and a smaller state. Countries that pursue market-oriented reform get the quickest improvements for those who were worst off.”

“What Mr Begg seems to want, “says Mr Munkhammar, “is that the state takes care of all social matters – and not the people themselves by keeping their money. That may be an ideological standpoint, but countries that have gone down that path have created social problems, not better social conditions.”

I'll let y'all read the rest but I think the best version of this story is when the Norweigan Ambassador came on the O'reilly factor and poo poo'd Norway winning the Award for Best developed nation.

He said that the Norweigan system really wasn't better then the AMerican system... it was just more... well Norweigan.

Don't try to emulate other countries policies which reflect your national values, create policies that reflect your national values

thats the lesson for today