My new book Debunking Utopia – Exposing the Myth of Nordic Socialism will shortly be released.
The Nordic countries are used by Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and many others as the shining examples of the benefits of democratic socialism. As I consistently show in the new book however, it is Nordic culture rather than Nordic politics that undergirds the success in this part of the world:
– As an example, Nordic Americans already have much higher prosperity, and even lower poverty, than their cousins in the Nordics.
– An often forgotten fact is that the Nordic countries had conservative small government policies until around 1960. Already at this time, the Nordic countries were leading the world in terms of prosperity, low poverty, low child mortality and long life spans.
– If anything, since introducing large welfare states, the Nordic countries have lost some of their social success. The reason is that a significant portion of the population have become dependent on welfare handouts, and thus trapped in social poverty.
– The combination of open borders, high taxes and generous welfare has been anything but a success in Sweden. The result is massive social tension and increasing poverty.
– I systematically show that the American Dream of social mobility is in fact more alive for immigrants to the United States than for any Nordic country.
– Lastly, while the idea of Nordic-style democratic socialism is all the rage among the left in the United States and other countries, in the Nordic countries themselves social democracy has never been weaker than today. In Denmark the social democrats themselves have introduced massive market reforms and called for a much slimmer welfare state.
If this sounds interesting, please take a look at the book.
Debunking Utopia is a continuation of a previous book Scandinavian Unexceptionalism that I published last year, for the Institute of Economic Affairs. Scandinavian Unexceptionalism has resulted in hundreds of media appearances around the world, and among others been translated to Spanish, Polish and Japanese.
Debunking Utopia can be ordered from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and the publisher WND books.