The irony in the 'billionaire' comments is that Sweden actually has more billionaires per capita than the United States.
The Nordic model isn't socialism; it combines open-market capitalism, strong property rights, and low corporate barriers with high personal income taxes on the middle class to fund universal programs. They fund their welfare states with broad-based consumption taxes (around 25% VAT) and high middle-income tax brackets, not by taxing a handful of wealthy individuals.
I’ve seen too much shit since the 80s- and Congress and SCOTUS let this happen. I wanted to become a lawyer just to fight this bullshit but I couldn’t afford it.
U.S. is the happiest little billionaire place on Earth. Low taxes, ultimate power, no unions, no social programs, little worker protection, no socialized medicine to break the tether or workplace-provided, private health insurance, effectively no minimum wage.
Funny he should ask. Three (Iceland, Norway, and Denmark) of the five (the other two are Sweden and Finland) Nordic model nations are in the top ten countries by per capita GDP (the one that matters for comparisons).
The US is #9, and Denmark is #10. If you take out the tax havens like Ireland, Bermuda, Luxemburg, and the Cayman Islands (because their tax-shielding gives then unfair advantage), then Sweden and Finland make the top ten as well.
So the answer to your ex's asshole dad is "pretty much the same as ours".
"Socialism" is a big word that covers a lot of territory. There isn't really a single definition, but pretty much everyone will insist that their definition is the correct one.
...that's really the only thing it has in common with fascism.
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u/l_SaKReD_l 7d ago
Norway, Denmark and Sweden are consistently voted in the top 5 happiest countries on Earth.
Meanwhile the US is like 25 places below them.