How to take back America in 12 Steps

The US State Department probably just accepted whatever the Swedish government fed them as far as statistics go. Sure looks that way to me.

Sweden has achieved an enviable standard of living under a mixed system of high-tech capitalism and extensive welfare benefits. It has a modern distribution system, excellent internal and external communications, and a skilled labor force. [..] The government's commitment to fiscal discipline resulted in a substantial budgetary surplus in 2001, which was cut by more than half in 2002, due to the global economic slowdown, declining revenue, and increased spending. The Swedish central bank (the Riksbank) focuses on price stability with its inflation target of 2%. Growth remained sluggish in 2003, but picked up in 2004 and 2005.

You'll notice we aren't exactly rushing to follow the Swedish example since we know the reality is that high taxes equal low growth. Sweden is in a state of general stagnation caused by their crushing tax burden. We know this. The Swedes know this. Everyone knows this. They just won't admit it.

There is triumphalism in the Wall Street Journal's editorial of June 18 about "a growing split between the U.S. and Europe." The WSJ draws on a recent report from the Swedish think tank Timbro that notes the much lower level of income per capita in Europe than in the United States. As the report frames it, average income in most European countries place them well down among the states of the United States: Belgium is comparable to Alabama, Germany to Arkansas, and Spain is poorer than Mississippi. The WSJ attributes Europe's backwardness to its choice of "the welfare state road to decline."

The pieces do not fit quite as neatly in the Economist's June 19th comparison of Europe and America. First, if we exclude Germany [..] GDP per person grew at essentially the same rate in Europe and the United States between 1994 and 2003. Employment grew only a hair slower in Europe, and productivity per worker hour grew slightly faster in Europe. Germany aside, aggregate growth in Europe and the United States over the last decade has been essentially equal.

Still, European income per capita is only about 70 percent of the U.S. average. But here too, there is an important wrinkle. As discussed recently by Harvard economist Olivier Blanchard, income is lower in Europe not because workers are less productive - output per worker hour in Europe and the United States are almost the same - but because Europeans work fewer hours. This is not due primarily to higher unemployment or lower labor market participation, but to a shorter work-week, longer vacations, and earlier retirement. Altogether, Americans work 40 percent more hours over their lives than Europeans. [..]

Between 1970 and 2000, GDP per person rose by 64% in the United States and by 60% in France. In America, this came about because productivity per worker rose by 38% and hours worked per worker rose by 26%. In France, it came about because productivity rose by 83% while hours worked fell by 23%.

Where did the quality of life increase more? Maybe you should take your next hurried vacation in France, to find out.

detano inipo wrote:

ebrown:

But I am with mysterman on this one.
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The twelve points are just musings, I think. Since we chat about other countries all the time, why not chat about the US. It is not 'verboten', yet.
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I find the Swiss interesting and well organized. It does not hurt to check them out.

They are silly and anti-American. And I speak as an American Liberal who disagrees with the right (I think I can safely call mysteryman right without offending him) on most issues. On these points (with the exception of #11) I will agree with him. If you can unite a leftist and a righty on an issue... it is simply a unAmerican idea (and probably a bad one).

I wouldn't mind us doint #11 (although I think it is politically unfeasable). Mysterman and I certainly agree with #2. The rest are dumb or dangerous or both (tell me if you don't agree MM).

Actually, you might not know it, but "the Swedish model" or "the Scandinavian model" is being widely talked about in Germany and Holland as an example of how the old welfare state can be reformed into competitiveness, without losing its benefit of social cohesion. Mind you, they're no longer talking of the old Sweden of Olaf Palme when they use those labels; they're talking about the way its been reformed and revigorated.

If Germany and Holland want to imitate the failed, stagnant economic policies of one of the most heavily taxed countries in the world, then they're welcome to it. We have a saying here in Texas, "misery loves company".

Official figures hide youth unemployment

Published: 10th April 2006 10:42 CET

The level of youth unemployment in Sweden is wildly underestimated in official figures, according to a report presented on Monday by the New Welfare Foundation, an independent think tank.

Statistics Sweden says that 'open unemployment' among young people aged 16-24 stands at 11%. But according to the report 'Ole, dole, arbetslös', the true figure is closer to 30%.
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In the run-up to the election in 2002, Prime Minister Göran Persson promised to halve youth unemployment. Instead, says the author of the report, Esra Karakaya, joblessness has increased by 30%.

"Unemployment among the young is far worse than the impression given by the official statistics. It's not 10% who are without jobs, it's almost 30%," she said.

Karakaya argues that the official figures present a narrow definition of unemployment which excludes key groups of job seekers.

"The most important group is people who become full time students while they are looking for jobs," she told The Local.

"Pretty much every other country includes these people in unemployment figures - except Sweden."

Sweden has excluded this group from the official unemployment rate since the 1980s.

Karakaya said that two other groups who are "in reality unemployed" are those in labour market initiatives and many on long term sick leave.

"According to the Social Insurance Administration, 60% of those on sick leave say they would be able to work if their workplace conditions changed. But the rigidity of the labour market is a big obstacle," she said.

While the report focused on the youth unemployment, the problem of under-reporting is true at all age levels of the labour market, according to Karakaya:

"It's absolutely the case throughout the job market. The real rate of unemployment is about 16.5% rather than the 5.3% which is reported. But it's worse among the young."

AN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Newborns in the United States have the second lowest survival rate in the industrialized world, according to a report released this week.
Babies in their first month of life have the best odds in Japan, which boasts the lowest newborn mortality rate of 1.8 deaths per 1,000 live births, according to a report from the nonprofit group Save the Children. Latvia had the highest mortality rate among the 33 industrialized nations surveyed, at six newborn deaths per 1,000 live births.
The U.S. ranked next to last and tied with Hungary, Malta, Poland and Slovakia, which all averaged five deaths per 1,000 live births. The U.S. newborn mortality rate is nearly three times higher than that of Finland, Iceland, Norway and Japan, the study found.
Minorities had disproportionately high rates. Black Americans had a newborn mortality rate nearly twice the national average, at 9.3 deaths per 1,000 live births. African American babies are twice as likely as white babies to be born prematurely, have low-birth weight and to die at birth, according to Save the Children.
A growing number of people without health insurance, a lack of education in some areas and underlying factors such as poor maternal nutrition, uncontrolled chronic conditions and risky behaviors all play a role in the low U.S. standing, said David Oot, director of the office of health for Save the Children U.S., a member of the global Save the Children Alliance.
"There are real issues around access and use of health services," Oot said.
Education and access to universal health care contribute to the success of nations such as Norway and Finland that ranked near the top for newborn survival, he said.
"There are high levels of education pretty uniformly across the populations of those countries," Oot said. "That has a lot to do with whether mothers seek and use care before, during and after pregnancy. It also has to do with how they care for themselves with nutritional and other practices that might otherwise put them at risk."
Broader focus on maternal health
The study may overstate the problem in the U.S. because what's counted as a newborn death here -- such as a baby born 23 weeks into pregnancy who dies soon thereafter -- may be counted as a fetal death in other nations, said Dr. Nancy Green, medical director for the March of Dimes.
"We are not as good as we should be, but maybe we're not as bad as the numbers would suggest," she said.
Still, the U.S. should be doing more to help women take care of their health before they start families, Green said. Increased attention to family planning and maintaining adequate time between births also reduces the risk of newborn deaths, she said.
"We have not as a nation reached a point of optimizing maternal health, and that's what you're seeing with these sort of mediocre standings in terms of neonatal mortality," Green said.
Maternal health shouldn't focus exclusively on prenatal care but health care in general, she said. "For example, women who are extremely underweight or extremely obese have higher rates of prematurity/low birth weight. There is some rough correlation with overall health and well-being in those issues."
Last month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released recommendations for improving women's health before conception. Among the highlights, the CDC recommends women who want to get pregnant stop smoking and drinking alcohol and take daily supplements of folic acid, which reduces the risk of neural tube defects by two-thirds.
The infant mortality rate, defined as death before the first birthday, was flat in 2003, with 6.8 deaths for every 1,000 live births, according to data from the National Center for Health Statistics. Two-thirds of all infant deaths occurred within the first month of life.
In 2002, about 25% of U.S. newborn deaths were caused by prematurity and low birth weight, and 20% were caused by birth defects, Green said. The rest were due to other problems such as maternal, placental and umbilical cord complications.
Even the lowest-ranking industrialized nations have substantially better infant mortality rates than in sub-Saharan Africa, which has the highest newborn death rates, the report said. One in five mothers there has lost at least one baby in childbirth, and Liberia had the highest mortality rate of all surveyed nations at 65 deaths per 1,000 live births.
Western countries, including the U.S., account for only about 1% of the annual 4 million newborn deaths worldwide, according to Save the Children.
"It's important to remember, while it is an issue certainly in the U.S. and in certain groups in the U.S., globally 99% of deaths in the first month of life occur in the developing world," Oot said. "The tragedy ... is that 70% of those deaths could be prevented with low-cost, low-tech interventions if they were made more available."
Routine childhood vaccines, promotion of immediate and exclusive breastfeeding, warming of the infant and care of a newborn by a skilled birth attendant would raise the survival rate considerably, he said

Gross national product is also a good way to judge a country. Perhaps you can post those numbers?

I still have to ask why in the world anyone would advocate imitating the policies of a country that hasn't been able to create jobs in decades and has the highest taxes on the planet.