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Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich

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Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich

#151

Perhaps I read / skimmed too fast but I felt there wasn't enough mentioned about buying power. Income without context is meaningless. Making $100k in NYC or London is not the same as $100k in Costa Rica, etc. It's not what you make that matters. It's the ratio between income and living / life costs.

Post tax spendable income gives an indication on real income:

* http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/stats/Cost-of-livin...

* https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/disposable-income-map...

General cost of living data for Norway:

* http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/profiles/Norway/Cos...

As well as the Big Mac index as ball park cost indicator:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Mac_Index

Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich

#152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't get paid more for getting more students, or if more students pass. Normally people go to public universities, which are pretty good, and their teachers have more or less a fixed salary. In general university costs money, both to the Government/State and the student, and thus incentives are somewhat aligned for both parties. Also, student loans are NOT a common thing here... When I was at uni, the cost of t…

> They don't get paid more for getting more students, or if more students pass. Normally people go to public universities, which are pretty good, and their teachers have more or less a fixed salary. There's no way you can generalise about incentive structures like that for an entire continent. In my country, only public universities exist and the incentive structure is decided politically. Currently, universities get…

Do the professors on that university get paid more for having more students? Because in Germany for example, this is not the case.

The university departments get different amount of money depending on the amount of students they have, but this money cannot be spent freely (e.g. on increasing professor's salaries), but must be spent for education-related things like hiring more TAs, which is something that departments that get more students need to do anyways.

The professor salary is pretty much standardized (per the TVL), which does allows for sur-pluses in case that the responsibilities justify them, but university "students" do not play a role here. Things that affect these are, for example, having larger management-related responsibilities. For example, a professor with 4 PhD students and 2 postdocs gets less money than a professor with 30 PhD students, large experimental facilities, 10 mechanics, 5 middle management personell, ... adding up to 60 people under supervision.

So while I agree that the universities do have an incentive to grow the number of students in STEM degrees, the professors do not really have a big incentive to make the degrees easier.

The professors that "get rich" in Germany have large consulting companies on the side to which they try to attract the top talent, so if anything, the incentive is to produce more top talent. This can incentive them both ways, making things easier to attract more students to get more students in their companies, or making things harder to filter out the bulk from the top talent. But that's just supply and demand.

Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich

#153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks! Seems like a step between the US system and the Spanish system. What happens if you lose your job for example for a couple of months? Do you have to pay as a normal loan or is it more like taxes where you only pay relative to your earnings?

If you believe university rankings (a big if) then the UK’s universities are — on average — dramatically better than those in the rest of Europe.

And they were prior to student loans

Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich

#154

Perhaps I read / skimmed too fast but I felt there wasn't enough mentioned about buying power. Income without context is meaningless. Making $100k in NYC or London is not the same as $100k in Costa Rica, etc. It's not what you make that matters. It's the ratio between income and living / life costs.

I'd include quality of life in that too. Have earnt decent money in unpleasant places where the cost of living is cheap, it's not worth it at all.

Agreed. "Rich" is not only shallow, it's not accurate either.

Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich

#155
post #151

Perhaps I read / skimmed too fast but I felt there wasn't enough mentioned about buying power. Income without context is meaningless. Making $100k in NYC or London is not the same as $100k in Costa Rica, etc. It's not what you make that matters. It's the ratio between income and living / life costs.

Post tax spendable income gives an indication on real income: * http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/stats/Cost-of-livin... * https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/disposable-income-map... General cost of living data for Norway: * http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/profiles/Norway/Cos... As well as the Big Mac index as ball park cost indicator: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Mac_Index

Thanks. Much appreciated.

Shame the article lacked this context.

Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich

#156
post #9

While not as bad off as the US, we are still seeing similar trends. They still can't afford to buy apartments until their 30s if they have good jobs, while their parents bought houses at the age of 20 working as factory drones.

I have a ton of friends who have bought apartments in Oslo who are under 30. And I mean Oslo too, not out at Lillestrøm or anywhere on the outskirts.

how many of them did it entirely with their own salaries, rather than using their parents' money for the cash deposit?

Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich

#157
post #11

Affordable education is probably a big part of how they do this. In northern Europe it is a clear political decision to invest in education. You'll politicians argue that we can't afford not to educate our teenagers, as it would make the welfare state unsustainable. Also, huge credit to Norway for how it handled it's olie money :)

In my not so humble opinion, it all comes down to a short- vs. farsighted culture and the resulting fundamental attitude towards kids. In the US, kids are seen at worst a nuisance and at best a personal luxury. In most of the northern/western EU, kids are seen as the future workers, decision makers and keepers of the whole economy 30 years into the future. All of the symptoms you are seeing, be it maternal / paternal…

Often it's framed as: if you want the welfare state to exist when you retire we must invest in education to stay competitive in a world where masses of the 3rd world are increasingly able to do our jobs cheaper.

The welfare system is in many ways the ultimate index fund, as it earns back it's investment via. taxes :)

Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich

#158
post #127
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If everyone can finish University, then having a university title becomes pointless! Only if the value of a degree is having an edge over others, not if it's value is learning - primary school isn't pointless even though most people master it. This feels like it links back to the same problem as everything else - as time goes on automation removes less skilled jobs, and more and more people will need to do more ski…

> This means that at some point, university levels of education will probably become necessary for any employment My father had been the safety laboratory lead at a Hungarian pharmeutical company from 1989 till his retirement about ten years ago (could be a little less). What he told me about has stuck with me: when he started, he could hire people from vocational high schools but by the end, everything they used bec…

If that is the case, I think revamping the high school requirements would be a better investment.

Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich

#159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a ton of reasons. - Adolescence lasts longer (until mid-20s) which means that people don't grow up so fast anymore. Why? Because of the wealth of the societies they live in. - More people study. Many are around 25-27 when they finally start to work. - Real wages didn't increase although inflation did. - The workforce is divided: Too many marketing experts, but a shortage of craftsmen. Too many people want j…

These are some good points, but people still compare themselves to the prior generation and notice, that while they have a whole bunch of luxuries their parents never had [1], that they also can't afford other luxuries . Like housing. My parents had a huge house and property by the time they turned 30. While some people still buy houses in their 20s, they're usually small shit houses with tiny properties. [1] The who…

> My parents had a huge house and property by the time they turned 30.

How much was it? You can make 3500€ pre-tax with a bachelors degree in many fields. That's around 2200€ after taxes. Two people can live comfortably with ~2500€ and lay away 1900€ a month. You will not be able to buy a property in a big city, but after 10 years you'll be able to pay for a small house. And you even get a tax break for it.

Today it's uncommon to be a couple that takes a mortgage together - young people don't really trust relationships in the same way anymore. This halves their net worth to buy a house.

I think stable relationships are extremely important for the wealth of our parents. Many older people are now broke because they've split up with their partners. So if you want to have the same wealth, you also have to find a partner who's up for this challenge.

Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich

#160
post #127
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If everyone can finish University, then having a university title becomes pointless! Only if the value of a degree is having an edge over others, not if it's value is learning - primary school isn't pointless even though most people master it. This feels like it links back to the same problem as everything else - as time goes on automation removes less skilled jobs, and more and more people will need to do more ski…

> This means that at some point, university levels of education will probably become necessary for any employment My father had been the safety laboratory lead at a Hungarian pharmeutical company from 1989 till his retirement about ten years ago (could be a little less). What he told me about has stuck with me: when he started, he could hire people from vocational high schools but by the end, everything they used bec…

This rings so true, everything today is super specialized.

Previous generations sometimes had a chance to learn on the job as a company was specializing. But current generations needs a lengthy education because they are joining companies that are already highly specialized - am working to specialized even more...

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