A very interesting, if long, article.
Norway is also full of entrepreneurs like Wiggo Dalmo. Rates of start-up creation here are among the highest in the developed world, and Norway has more entrepreneurs per capita than the United States, according to the latest report by the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, a Boston-based research consortium. A 2010 study released by the U.S. Small Business Administration reported a similar result: Although America remains near the top of the world in terms of entrepreneurial aspirations — that is, the percentage of people who want to start new things—in terms of actual start-up activity, our country has fallen behind not just Norway but also Canada, Denmark, and Switzerland.
Here’s an interesting point. The government is simply another supplier of services just like private/public companies. And if it can do it better and cheaper than a company…
Whereas most entrepreneurs in Dalmo’s position develop a retching distaste for paying taxes, Dalmo doesn’t mind them much. “The tax system is good—it’s fair,” he tells me. “What we’re doing when we are paying taxes is buying a product. So the question isn’t how you pay for the product; it’s the quality of the product.” Dalmo likes the government’s services, and he believes that he is paying a fair price.
This is particularly surprising, because the prices Dalmo pays for government services are among the highest in the world. He lives and works in the small city of Mo i Rana, which is about 17 miles south of the Arctic Circle in Norway. As a Norwegian, he pays nearly 50 percent of his income to the federal government, along with a substantial additional tax that works out to roughly 1 percent of his total net worth. And that’s just what he pays directly. Payroll taxes in Norway are double those in the U.S. Sales taxes, at 25 percent, are roughly triple.
Admittedly, this wouldn’t work in the US. Corruption and greed are too ingrained to create a fair system. Our religion is Capitalism, damn it, and we’re sticking with it no matter how fast our economy sinks!
“Our religion is Capitalism” //// I dunknow==seems to me our system is corporate welfare and kleptocracy rigged for systemic transfers of wealth from the poor, middle, and upper classes to the SUPER rich with everyone “happy” along the way as long as they think they are profiting from it AND can point to someone worse off than they are.
I don’t know which subset of dogma is worse:
1. Regulation is Bad ((there is no capitalism without a “fair” regulated predictable stable marketplace which is possible ONLY THRU REGULATION. ((Note: regulation does not exist if regulations are not actually enforced.)) – or –
2. Taxation is slavery. Without taxation to stablize the marketplace, again, capitalization cannot exist.
Simple. Which makes me wonder at the intellectual gravitas of those who argue against it.
Yea, Verily.
“Dalmo likes the government’s services, and he believes that he is paying a fair price.”
Can anyone say the same thing about the last time they used a government “service”?
Did you get your money’s worth at the DMV?
Did Sarah Palin’s constituents get a fair deal when she quit half-way through her term?
Did Senator Obama’s constituents feel properly represented when he spent most of his term as a senator running for President?
What do you suppose happens when said entrepreneurs make something that starts having success outside of Norway? Do they stay in Norway or do they move their operations? It took near blackmail to keep a Volvo plant in Sweden when both GM and China want to move the operation and I suspect that will happen soon. Corporations are not obligated to continue to manufacture products where the tax rates are high.
Let’s see:
Norway – 5,000,000 population
Chances are your representatives live next door
USA – 307,000,000 population
Chances are you don’t know who your representatives are
Norway – 150,000 sq mi
No place to go
USA – 3,700,000 sq mi
Huge transportation infrastructure
Norway – motto: Everything for Norway
EVERYTHING! Excellent taxation philosophy
USA – motto: In God We Trust
Uhhh – Not such a good taxation philosophy…
Let’s see, any other differences between the two nations?
Hmmm.. I’m sure has a huge military and many frenemies.
“Dalmo likes the government’s services, and he believes that he is paying a fair price.”
That’s lovely!
But unless he is free to choose his suppliers on an open market, how can he know that he’s paying a fair price?
FYI: the picture is labeled wrong.
The panel on the right should be labeled “Fascism”.
Or
Democrat on the left Republican on the right.
Remove the gun and you have “Libertarian”.
Betcha his government isn’t paying out trillions to fund foreign wars either. Maybe ALL that government money is used in their own country. Interesting concept, just not possible in a country where only the wealthy are important.
Please just shut this site down. No one listens to the pod casts and all the content is ripped off from The Drudge Report.
# 1 bobbo said:
“I dunknow”…
“Yea, Verily.”….
“I don’t know which subset of dogma is worse:”
“1. Regulation is Bad”….
“2. Taxation is slavery.”….
I really do know better, but here goes:
1) Now that the FED – a privately owned bank – has just been made the regulator of all banks, I should think that even an extraordinarily slow learner would finally “get it”. Regulation was never more than a ploy to avoid having to compete in a free market and truly earn every dollar of profit. All the “protect the consumer” rhetoric has always been mere pretext. But then, nobody ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of the American voter.
2) Taxation is theft. If there is any distinction to be made between taxation and slavery it is a difference of degree only.
The notion that a free market can’t function without taxation, while commonly held, is wrong.
Are you paying any sales tax on the crack you evidently smoke before you post here?
Have you thought about prison? The gubment takes care of all your needs and you don’t even need to pay taxes! You don’t have to think, they tell you when to sleep, when to eat, even when you can take a shower. Sounds like Utopia, right?
I am a frequent listener of the “No Agenda” podcast even though I’m a douche-bag and a “vile commenter” according to John C Dvorak.
Somebody, the free floating LIEberTARD==I can see you are attempting to challenge my post, but you make no sense. You have a confusing array of word/concept substitutions handed out to you by your underground fellow conspiracists. EVERY group of two or more people in society has “regulations” by fiat or by practice.
In fairness ((some free edumactation coming your way in sharp contract to the dogma you are cursed with)) the opposite/correction to the bad regulations you don’t like is NOT less regulation or no regulation but rather BETTER regulation.
Taxation as slavery. Really? Once again the opposition/correction to over taxation/bad tax policy is NOT the shit-for-brains position of taxation-is-slavery but rather “less taxation” and taxation reform. SHIT FOR BRAINS SILLY to equate taxation with slavery. Your alternative is what? Say it plain? And you can’t because societies that don’t offer a social safety net for the failures in a capitalistic system soon find themselves in anarchy/turmoil/revolution/lawlessness/chaos. You think you can starve a man to death in your pure capitalistic system and not have him mounting your castle walls for the food/women/big screen tv contained therein? Dream on simpleton.
The SUPER RICH buy personal security/stability/a good life for their kiddies by giving up some of their stolen excess profit to society. Too many super rich wannabe’s have completely lost touch with this reality.
Reality: its what bites you in the ass when you drive blindly with only audible signals coming from your dogma.
Silly repugnant LIEberTARDS. Cutting their own throats with every gesticulation.
This straw man argument reminds me of the same tendered during the single payer health care fascism debacle. “Hey, let’s compare the US to some tiny country to make our point that slavery is better then freedom by confusing simple minded folks with convoluted arguments of how the grass is greener on the other side!” Those same people will praise China and Russia when you’re not looking…
Oh, and FTR: the red guy is ANY gubmemt, the blue guy is ANY citizen, and the $ in communism is worthless, while the one in “capitalism” (really corporatism but numbskulls like bobbo don’t know the difference) is inflating at alarming rates.
#11,
There WAS an old trick to save money, which was REMOVED, then BURIED..
YOU COULD go direct to the maker and get a BETTER PRICE. You could buy almost WHOLE SALE at the makers price.
Then some strange things happened, the MARKET CLOSED, and CONTRACTS were signed, that they could ONLY deal with 1-2 corps, companies, buyers.
THEN over 2/3 of the major corps SHIPPED the making out of the country. AND so went the jobs. All we have is a FEW IMPORTERS, with BIG salaries. The ONLY job left is MONEY LAUNDERING.
Gee Black Sheep–I’d like to respond to whatever your disagreement is, but I can’t tell what it is. Best I can make out is you think I think communism is the same as corporatism? I never mentions “communism” and my point about corporate theft/welfare makes no equation although I do agree “both” are bad.
You make no sense. Dolt.
CAPITALISM VS PROFITEERING..
Whats happening NOW isnt capitalism.
#19 bobbo
If you read my statement plainly it would be obvious that I meant you don’t know the difference between capitalism and corporatism. No matter. Hurl all the insults you want. That’s all you’re good at. Actually making a valid argument besides, “I’m right, you’re wrong, nanny nanny boo boo” is beyond your scope.
The concept of taxation being theft is simple. (actually, it’s extortion, but I don’t want to confuse you even further) It’s so simple you can’t grasp it. If I don’t want to pay for a service, I have the right to withdraw my funds. If I don’t want jeans from Walmart, I don’t have to give Walmart my money, and I don’t have to take their jeans. The gubment, on the other hand, will shove their foreign wars and fascist crap healthcare down my throat, and will throw me in jail if I don’t pay up. How is that not theft???!?!?!???!?!?!? Answer that simple question, neanderthal.
There is nothing wrong with capitalism.
In fact, I think all corporations should be coerced, by government regulation, into participating in capitalism.
Unfortunately, trans-national corporations own and operate most national governments and they spend a lot of time, effort and treasure, ensuring they will never have to compete with anyone, thereby avoiding the most basic tenant of capitalism, the system that actually makes it work properly, which would be free and fair competition.
By their very nature, these capitalists-in-name-only hate competition and go to great effort and expense to ensure they never have to compete with anyone for anything.
Then they tell us that is capitalism. WTF?
If you tell a big lie often enough, a majority of people will believe it and as Uncle Dave points out, make it their religion.
We are all so very stupid.
So now Norway is the shining city on a hill for the Left, replacing Russia, China, Cuba, and so many others. What happened to Sweden? Or is this an ongoing rivalry like Patriots-Colts?
# 23 TTHor said, “By the way, there are more Norwegians in the US than in Norway…”
You know what, TT – we call them Americans.
#22–BS==your complaint is straightforward as you say. I got discombobulated trying to make sense our of your FTR comment and it obviously had a residual effect. I picked a bad week to stop smoking salvia.
So, you think I don’t know the difference between capitalism and corporatism? Well, I DID mention those two things in relationships to the still confusing symbolic representations. Capitalism is an theory about allocation between capital and labor than emphasizes individual as opposed to state directed efforts. Willing buyers and sellers free to go elsewhere is one common expression of this. Corporatism as I used it is what we have too much of in the USA today where the “freedom” of buyers to go elsewhere is limited by government to its favored few. This results mainly from pure capitalism’s tendency to consolidate the market into bigger and bigger monopolies that can only occur when the government fails to regulate competition/fairness/choice by application of the anti-trust rules. Add to that in the USA the Corps are also our largest welfare recipients in the grossly advantageous tax breaks/reductions they get for all sorts of things to the effect that Standard Oil is now paying zero income tax while being its most profitable just as the Investment Banks are having their most profitable years ever while they would be technically bankrupt if not for the zero interest “loans” they were getting from the government.
So lets see, I made the point we didn’t really have a capitalist system but rather a corporatist system so that means you think the government support the corps are getting is what the theory of capitalism allows for?
Well, I don’t mean to get all hostile on you or anything, but I think you are definitionally WRONG.
Shorter on taxation being slavery: OJSTFU LIEberTARD. Theft is illegal, taxation is legal. Theft is not required to maintain and operation ANY society you can imagine, taxation is. I agree it is a simple concept, simple enough to put on a bumper sticker but you really do need to read more about it the subject and not get stuck in traffic.
I’ve got mine, screw you.
I remember visiting my Mom in Florida one winter and listening to some folks at the pool.
I asked, “What is that strange language?”
Norwegian!
Almost everyone there was from either Norway or Canada.
I know that has nothing to do with economics, but when a gov’t becomes a supplier of goods and services isn’t is all just a big version of capitalism??
They just have a unique way of acquiring ‘capitol’…
#29 bobbo
Capitalism is an economic system in which the means of production are privately owned and operated for a private profit; decisions regarding supply, demand, price, distribution, and investments are made by private actors in the free market; profit is distributed to owners who choose to invest in businesses, and wages are paid to workers employed by businesses and companies.
I lifted that from Wikipedia. Nowhere do you see government involvement. When taxes come into play, you no longer have capitalism. When regulations come into play, you no longer have capitalism. Your definition is more convoluted than the web of lies you weave trying to defend taxation and gubment regulation. The gubment is a monopoly, and without it no business could ever become a monopoly without providing the best product or service for the lowest price. That kind of monopoly would be great! But the gubment uses force to maintain its monopoly. Hence no competition even though its services suck!
I believe in INDIVIDUAL FREEDOM, not government tyranny.
Just because taxation is legal, it doesn’t make it right. It is still theft. Slavery was legal. That didn’t make it any less wrong. Use your brain bobbo!
Yes I got mine. As long as I get it without stealing or fraud, what’s wrong with that? If you want to sit on your fat lazy ass while I work hard, and beseech a criminal organization to steal from me to fund your lifestyle, SCREW YOU indeed!
Well BS==what are you 18 years old? You can have your own philosophy, but you can’t have your own facts. You can’t change words whatever you wish to fit your argument. Make the dictionary your friend–it will sharpen your ideas tremendously.
You have defined capitalism as a system that cannot exist.
Describe how a society can exist without government. Describe how a government can exist without taxation?
Words have meaning and when you disregard those meanings, you make yourself irrelevant and boring. Silly boy. Grow up. Buy a dictionary, read it, form your arguments within its restrictions.
Norway has an _efficiently run_ Nanny state. Part of this is the culture and part of this the size. The population is less than some cities. As shocking as this may be to Americans a fair number of their laws are actually business friendly and the total tax burden is less than in many parts of the US.
The Fed gov and many state govs are a zillion miles from being efficient. At a guess at least three out of every four dollars the Fed Gov and many state Govs collects is simply squandered.
And no the US is no more a capitalist country than we are democracy. We are a Republic being converted into a very poorly run, extremely corrupt nanny state. The role modal of the US gov. is CA not Norway.
CA is a once thriving location with a very high standard of living rapidly being converted into a third world bleep hole by the people living there. It has a regulation and a tax for almost everything possible.
So far as I know nobody in that great state has as yet suggested legalizing and taxing child prostitution but if they haven’t it’s one of the very few things to miss the list.
#32 bobbo
You are truly a mental midget. That is why you cannot see a world without government. At one time, people couldn’t see a world without monarchs, gods or slaves. Yet, somehow, humans have evolved. Hopefully, one day, enough humans will evolve beyond needing a political class to rule the proletariat. Hey, fear not bobbo, if you still want a ruler when that day comes, in a free society, you can still have one. That would be your choice as a free human being.
Society: The totality of social relationships among humans.
Who says you need government for a society to exist?
#35
Anarchy + Free Enterprise = Freedom and Liberty
US = Fascism + Representative Democracy (which is bull crap because how can 1 person represent the interests of a diverse many?)
Bobbo,
My, my, such vitriol!
If I hit a nerve with that crack about crack, it was accidental. I was kidding. I’ve always assumed your psychotropic drugs were legitimately prescribed.
But re-read your rejoinder.
You’ve only disputed my post not refuted it.