Norway is the only oil economy that has managed to avoid the resource curse.
The U.S. might be another, no?
Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich
221–230 of 291 posts
Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich
#222The success of Norway lies with the intelligence of of it's population. People attribute it to this or that, some institution or policy. But in reality policies and institutions are concievee of, built, and maintained by the sentiment of the people. They are smart people and they will always be well off considering their circumstances as long as that is true. Furthermore, the intelligence and well-being of the popula…
Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich
#223The success of Norway lies with the intelligence of of it's population. People attribute it to this or that, some institution or policy. But in reality policies and institutions are concievee of, built, and maintained by the sentiment of the people. They are smart people and they will always be well off considering their circumstances as long as that is true. Furthermore, the intelligence and well-being of the popula…
Refuted: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17530819
This is not even indirectly a refutation of what I said. It has nothing to do with what I said. See my comment below.
Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich
#224As a Spaniard who has discussed this in lenght with many other Europeans[1], it really seems like the US is the main country with the University debt issue. I also really believe that "score inflation" is a big issue mainly in the US. If everyone can finish University, then having a university title becomes pointless! [2] In Spain, Germany, France, Italy, etc if you get a degree in STEM it means you put a lot of effo…
I would recommend this book:
> The Case against Education: Why the Education System Is a Waste of Time and Money
The title is a bit much but it explains in great detail the problem with 'inflation' and what you lose by this process.
Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich
#225Earlier quoted context omitted.
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'…
In what country ? 2200 euros is less than £20k. For what its worth a couple of weeks ago I got a pitch to work in Portugal @100K euros or almost £90k.
What a lot of people don't realise that some eu countries where before they joined the eu - developing countries
Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich
#226Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's true, but it feels like the HS curriculum has gotten easier, too, and that might be part of the reason that a high school diploma isn't valued by employers. My perception (anecdata!) is that helicopter parenting has badgered the faculty such that my niece and nephew have a lower bar than I did for any given letter grade (and that I had it easier than some of my much older cousins). Another point is that HS gra…
> That's true, but it feels like the HS curriculum has gotten easier, too, and that might be part of the reason that a high school diploma isn't valued by employers. Since the early 1990s, what was then a fairly advanced college prep track for math seems to have become the baseline standard, and graduation requirements have increased in other ways. Compared to comparably-named classes, grading or presentation may hav…
I'd have to disagree. My niece attends one of the top-rated high schools in the country. I recently perused her summer reading list and was astonished that the vast majority of them were books for children. Reading comprehension and writing proficiency are much, much lower than they were just a few decades ago, across all levels of schooling.
Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich
#227Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sorry if I wasn't clear, I'm not talking about zero-sum (which should be similar everywhere), I'm talking about Universities becoming easier in USA much faster than in Europe. Example: https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/01/same-p...
How do European professors and universities avoid grade inflation? Are their incentives very different?
One way this is done is to grade on a curve (a practice still carried out in many medical schools here in the US).
Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich
#228Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why do you think STEM can't be automated?
Do you think AI will think by itself, invent new things, and write software in the next 50 years? I don't.
Writing software seems less intimidating than the millions of artists brute forcing for thousands of years the problem space of what humanity considers Art.
I'm just slightly worried that STEM's problems are too close to their base of physics and math to be that hard for a computer compared to the layers of abstraction that go into the rest of our works.
Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich
#229As the article points out, the economic miracle of Norway is fueled by oil and gas, just like Spain economic miracle was fueled by cheap industrial labour and construction decades ago. Unlike Spain, they have been wise enough to use their money to diversify their economy, aware that this won't last forever. Sadly there are few lessons we can learn and apply here to other countries, as not everyone has a tiny populati…
"the economic miracle of Norway is fueled by oil and gas" It can't be that simple. Plenty of other countries have lots of oil and gas (Russia, Venezuela, the US) and they aren't necessarily having economic miracles.
The difference is in the political system. Read The Dictator's Handbook for more on that (but also, just read that book, it's an awesome book).
Re: Unlike most millennials, Norway's are rich
#230Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Two people can Like many, they did this on a single income.
Society can't expect the value of labor to remain the same if you double the supply by adding women to it. Plus automation and globalization means no way Americans could continue consuming so much per capita more than the rest of the world. Unless via the use of force, usually military, which the US does but it's not as effective as before.
While I don't think the supply was doubled (at least not here), yeah, that seems about right. What this meant is the middle class got nuked. You can't have a middle class family any more with only one parent working; as a mother you're pretty much coerced to work to make ends meet (or take a drastic standard of living and social cut). As an added bonus, people will tell you that you have a bad character and you are morally wrong if you want to look after your own kids yourself.