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Norway: The Ultimate Utopia. There's a welfare state so unrealistically generous that even Michael Moore wouldn't include in that one film. Bernie Sanders went on for some time about the wonders of a "Scandinavian-style" society. The fact that everything is expensive doesn't really matter, as all Norwegians are rich. Also, they all speak English. Sitting in Norway, it appears as if this is the general idea people have of the place. Some of it's pretty close, some of it really isn't. Sometimes, left-leaning Americans will come to visit for a few years, and develop some kind of Stockholm-Syndromesque fascination for it. And yes, it's really very cold sometimes, but the nature is really pretty. Do you want to know what your job would pay here? How the education system works? Curious about laws, food, dialects, names, healthcare, economy? Anything else? If I don't already know, I'll likely find out pretty easily. Dry facts:
Geographically, the country is long and narrow, some 1,100 miles from tip to toe as Google Maps flies. Mainland Norway covers about 125,000 square miles, making it just a little bit bigger than New Mexico (or a tad smaller than Germany, which is closer). Including some lovely ice-covered holdings far out to sea, the kingdom's total area is roughly 150,000 square miles; a tad larger than Montana. Much like New Mexico and Montana, there's not a whole lot of people on all that land. Farmland, roads and built-up area combined only make up some 6,300 square miles. The rest is wilderness. Norway touches on Russia and Finland in the north-east, has an eastern land border towards Sweden, and is otherwise surrounded by ocean (although Denmark and Germany are just a ferry away). Geopolitically, Norway is a founding member of NATO and the UN. While not a member of the EU, it does have access to the European Single Market through the EEA – think "EU Light". It is also a signatory to the Schengen agreement, meaning there are no real border controls in place between Norway and most of Europe (apart from customs; we don't want any cheap alcohol or tobacco entering the country). Economy is always fun, and amazingly, it's not just all about oil (or fish). The country also sports a thriving state-owned arms industry. Depending on whom you ask, it regularly appears in the top 10 largest arms exporters in the world, topping out as the 4th largest back in 2008 – and although a sizable chunk of this is ammunition, all of it is strictly military hardware. The more you know! The country's wealth does stem mainly from oil and gas, however, so that most Norwegians refer to its sovereign wealth fund (officially the Government Pension Fund of Norway) only as "the oil fund". These people ran away from Norway 1100 years ago to avoid death and taxes.
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Oct 25, 2016 19:32
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Only good can come from more Norwegians answering  Original_Z posted:I'm sure it's not the same for the entire population but the Norwegians I've met (admittedly not that many) have had super good English skill and accents, they sounded like native speakers, made no grammar mistakes at all, and probably could have easily passed for Americans yet had never lived abroad. They told me it's because they consume so much American media on TV, but a lot of countries also consume it and I've never met other Europeans that were that good, even the Danes and Swedes I've met have excellent English but still had a minor accent. Even the OP is in perfect English. I really wonder how they do it, and why other countries don't emulate it. Short answer: Nobody knows for sure, but like murphyslaw said, media exposure and education likely matters a lot. There could be some other cultural factors at play as well, though. Long answer: Back in medieval times (the answer won't be 700 years long, I promise), the Black Death took an especially heavy toll on Norway. To this day, you'll find the name "Ødegård" – literally "Desolate farm" – all around the country. In addition to killing about two thirds of the population, pretty much every single noble, priest and otherwise literate person just up and died from the plague. With most of the ruling class wiped out, it was simple enough for Sweden to waltz in and declare us as a junior partner in a personal union; before Denmark took the place as benevolent overlord some decades later. After a few more decades of jostling, Norway then entered what is commonly referred to as "the 400-year night" under Danish rule. Denmark ended up siding with the wrong guy in the Napoleonic wars, though, so on May 17th 1814 we were able to declare independence, and cook up a constitution. However, Sweden was on the winning side in the aforementioned wars, and so felt entitled to a prize. Norway was it, so voilà, new junior partnership of personal union for us. This lasted until 1905, when we finally achieved proper independence. There is a point to all this. Denmark and Sweden were both proper empires for quite some time. Norway, as we have seen, was an occupied backwater. Even after gaining independence, we only got 35 years of it before the Germans came knocking, and they stayed until 1945. In the meantime, lots of Norwegians got pretty good at speaking German, just as they had learned Swedish and Danish before that. It's telling that our main written language today – called "bokmål", roughly meaning "book words" – is remarkably similar to Danish. Now, after World War 2, English became the Proper Language To Know. The royal family and cabinet had, after all, sought refuge in London throughout the war, and the resistance kept in radio contact with Britain. I would suggest that, national romanticism of the late 1800's notwithstanding, as we had little to no history of National Pride™ in our language, as a nation we were more open to learning a new one. In addition to all that, you'll find English being taught in all schools from a reasonably young age, and it's been this way for at least a few decades. English is the working language of many major corporations, especially in the vital oil industry, meaning it's an important language to know for purely practical reasons. Original_Z posted:I've always wanted to go to Norway and just drive around in the country, but hearing how expensive everything is seems kind of scary, like you'd need to bring some serious cash with you to really enjoy yourself. How true do you think that is? It really depends on what you want to do, and where you want to go. As a rule, the farther you go from an airport, the more expensive things get. I know of pubs – actual, commonly used pubs which the locals visit – in the far north charging $12 for a can of store-bought beer. Go to an off-the-grid tourist destination, and prices will be even steeper. It's not all revoltingly bad, though.
Saros posted:OP please tell me about the best places to go to see the Aurora, i'm planning a trip later this year. (P.s. as hard as it is to admit it your fjords are better than ours). Fjords rock (but they only show foreigners the very best ones). For Aurora, it's a little bit down to luck, and a lot down to location. There has been some immense solar activity lately, which normally translates into spectacular displays. Sitting in Oslo, however, you wouldn't notice. First, there's too much light pollution (city lights lighten the sky for miles and miles around, drowning it out). Second, the weather has been poo poo. Third, Oslo might just be a little bit too far south. In perfectly clear conditions, and if it's especially strong, it's possible to see it from Oslo, but your odds would improve dramatically by travelling a bit north. Lillehammer might be the easiest place to try – there's less light pollution, and the aurora itself generally shines stronger (as it's further north). If you go really far north, your odds improve even more – with a whole lot less daylight (if any), and a lot less people, light pollution is a minor problem even in Tromsø (the main northern city). If the weather is poo poo, though, none of that helps.
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Oct 26, 2016 18:58
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lizard_phunk posted:I'm a Norwegian too. I remember my mom telling me about school in the 50's-60's. She was born in 1949 and grew up at a farm in a tiny village in the South East part of Norway. My answer: Yes, absolutely. Our neighbor sort of confirms. Ish. Like Norway, Sweden declared neutrality when the war began. Unlike Norway, Sweden's neutrality was respected. While German battlecruisers sailed up Norwegian fjords, and German panzers rolled across Danish fields, German diplomats were likely having reasonably polite supper with Swedish government officials. I actually have a book somewhere called "Mein lieber Reichskanzler!" – the title quoting the opening phrase of a congratulatory 1941 letter from Gustav V of Sweden to, well, a certain Reichskanzler. Now, the fact that nobody invaded Sweden was more likely due to its strategic insignificance than to the friendship between its leaders, but Germany was certainly held in high esteem in the Nordics (until it started invading everyone). German had long been a language of polite and/or intellectual conversation in the region, much like French had been in the anglophone countries. After the war, of course, this changed; and from my experience, I think you're absolutely right that even today, British English is considered more "proper" than American. Alhazred posted:There's also the fact that there were a lot of germans working in norwegian mines in the 16th century. There were in fact so many that speaking german became s status symbol and the first non-german oberberghauptmann (director of the mines) changed his name from Mikkel Hellesen to Michael Heltzen in order to sound more german. Also, this. The "German as high society-language" phase goes waaaaay back. Germans (or at least germanics) were always expert craftsmen, so when we needed mines, smelters or anything else, that's who we got to make it happen – and they, in turn, wanted contracts, rules and regulations in German. Naturally, we acquiesced. Pursesnatcher fucked around with this message at 19:56 on Oct 26, 2016 |
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Oct 26, 2016 19:46
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Depending on where you shop, a large pizza is $15-40, sauce between $2-4, soda (50 oz) $4-6, and delivery $8-10. Your total comes out to $29-60. A surprising number of people prefer the most expensive option. JazzmasterCurious posted:Regular skis, yes. Roller skis, the ones you talk about, no. Pretty much only professionals, semi-pros or people who want to look like retards in summertime use those. Roller skis are actually magical devices. They are the One Thing capable of making bicyclists and motorists set aside their mutual hatred of each other for a moment, and uniting them in rollerskier-loathing.
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Oct 27, 2016 06:37
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Pellisworth posted:Hi I'm an American of Norwegian descent who enjoys homemade lefse during the holidays but do you guys actually eat lutefisk, and why the gently caress did you export that cuisine? Norwegian, eh, I suppose we can call it "cuisine" if you want, is odd. Case in point: Lutefisk. You take a perfectly edible cod, hang it on a rack to dry, and then you leave it there until it's more reminiscent of a piece of wood than a fish. You then stick the thing in a vat of caustic soda for some time, before boiling it into some sort of horrible fish-jelly. And then you're supposed to eat it? I'll pass. However, lutefisk is considered a delicacy of sorts. Especially older folks claim to relish the taste and consistency. Lutefisk (literally "lye-fish") is commonly found as a dish for family Christmas dinners, alongside these classics:
As for exporting it, I suspect that wasn't really us. It strikes me more as a way for Norwegian emigrants to prank or punish future generations (which by the way is totally something a Norwegian would do). Pursesnatcher fucked around with this message at 12:47 on Oct 27, 2016 |
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Oct 27, 2016 12:45
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lizard_phunk posted:Very translatable! This is both horrific and curiously exciting. punk rebel ecks posted:How does having such a high quality of life work when they tax you such a high amount? Heh. As questions go, this is one of the more incendiary ones. But let's go! Looking at the Norwegian tax system, at first glance it really isn't so bad. Several countries, including the US, has a higher maximum income tax. Additionally, if you ask most Norwegians, they will tell you (in no uncertain terms) how great all the free stuff is; all the awesome stuff their taxes buy. You've seen it, if mildly, in this thread already. "Sure", they'll say, "alcohol and tobacco are expensive – but those things aren't good for you anyway". This argument in itself tells you much about the Norwegian mindset regarding taxes. "They might be high, but they are for your own good". Now, some of my fellow Norwegians have already provided excellent examples regarding prices and such, but I'd like to add to them, so as to flesh out how the tax system works. First, let's look at the income tax. Say an average Norwegian's gross salary is indeed $60,000. To simplify, we will assume this guy has no kids, no loans bearing interest, and is not a union member (all of which could affect taxes). His income tax would then come out to about $16,000 – about 27 percent. The reason is that the government deduces some $17,000 from his gross salary before calculating his taxable income, and that part is then taxed at about 38 percent (in this example). However, there's also payroll taxes to consider. While this varies from location to location, but sits at 14,1 percent in the most populous areas. For this average Norwegian of ours, that means another $8500 a year, paid by his employer. Thus, out of a total of $68,500 paid by his employer, our Norwegian ends up receiving $44,000. While still quite a bit of money, it's actually a little bit less than what an average American receives per year, while the government's share of $24,500 is significantly higher (as is the cost of his employer for keeping him on payroll, compared to the cost of employing an American in the US at the same net pay – competitive, high taxes are not). In real life, there would be more factors to consider. Deductible expenses, such as interest, pension savings or union fees, are not included. All in all, though, the average income and wealth tax combined comes to $14.500. While this all means your average Norwegian should have a roughly $125 higher monthly disposable income then your average American, there's two more bits of intricacy at work: Holiday Money and Christmas Tax Relief. Most Norwegians will tell you how nice it is that they only need to pay half their regular taxes in December. This is of course false. In reality, employers are required to withhold a higher sum every month than what the employee should actually pay in taxes – except in December, when everything is balanced out. This then translates into a higher net payout for employees before Christmas. The story goes that this is to ensure everyone can afford to buy presents for their loved ones; a scheme which has a totally incidental side effect of the government effectively receiving an interest-free loan from most of the population through the first 11 months of every year. "Holiday Money" works in a roughly similar fashion. Not only do Norwegians have the right to a vacation, they also have a duty to take a minimum of 21-25 working days off each year; at least 15 of which must be taken during the summer. Once more, many Norwegians believe that they have paid vacations – and better yet, the pay they get during their vacation is not taxed! Once more, both of these beliefs are false. What happens is employers are required to withhold 10,2-12 percent of their employees' wages throughout the whole year. This is still taxed, normally at the same time it is being set aside, but when you finally get this money back – on the last payday before your main vacation period the following year – there are no taxes to withhold, as they were all paid the previous year. Once more, the government receives a sizable chunk of tax income from the entire population well in advance of the people actually receiving their money. Anyhow, that's income taxes. All in all, it's not so bad, apart from the government not trusting people to be able to set aside money for anything. Moving on, we see that apart from the summer payout and the "Christmas bonus", disposable income for an average Norwegian is about the same as for an average American. However, while sales taxes in the US are generally between 0 and 8 percent depending on what state you're in, Norwegians pay a value added tax of 25 percent on pretty much everything. As was stated previously in the thread, food you purchase to eat away from the place of purchase (meaning groceries and take-away only) has a VAT of 15 percent. The VAT on transportation services and certain other stuff is even lower. Books are exempt from VAT, but that really doesn't matter as Norwegian publishing houses has some sort of cartel setup going on, so even cheap paperback books are easily $25. Meanwhile, you do have to pay the full 25 percent even on most services, which is fun. I'm not sure at what point in the value chain a haircut earns taxation, but there you go. In practive, this means that Norwegians – while earning about as much as Americans – get about 15-25 percent less for each dollar they're paid than Americans, depending on which state they live in. But all this if before the fun stuff. Because the fun stuff, the really cool stuff; that's the special taxes. Now, the one tax which, in my experience, amuses Americans the most, is the horsepower tax. Sadly, it is being phased out next year (in favor of an eco-friendly bump in both the CO2- and NOX-taxes). For the longest time, though, a V6-powered Ford Mustang priced at $27,000 in the US would get a tax bill of – brace yourselves – $90,000 (and it used to be higher) slapped on it when crossing the border. This is the reason Norway is, for the most part, a country of Fiat Unos and Volkswagen Golfs, with the occasional Skoda Octavia thrown in by people who want to show off their wealth. If this is exaggeration, it's the mildest form. Alcohol is also ridiculously expensive, it's true. Taxes are higher than anywhere in the world – and the higher the ABV, the higher the tax. Beer is taxed at 49 percent, liqour at 78 percent. VAT, of course, comes on top of this. This means that while a 17 oz can of beer in a supermarket is a mere $4, a shot of liquor in a bar is easily three to four times that. Tobacco is almost as bad; I think a pack of 20 Luckies retails at about $13 these days. Moving on to a lighter kind of vice, there's also the sugar tariffs, which is currently levied at the same rate as that of light beer. Sugar, however, is taxed well ahead of goods reaching the shelves, and thus this tax is not something most people are aware of. Then we have import tariffs aplenty; many of which are at several hundred percent of the value of the good being imported. If you've travelled the world a bit, and ever visited Norway, you might wonder why you cannot seem to find any British cheddar, or Swiss chocolate, or really any non-domestic consumables of any kind in the shops. This is because Norwegian farmes, whose prices are ludicrous, need protection – and so, the government taxes imports so high that for most categories of foreign foodstuffs, the amounts of produce actually brought into the country are infinitesimal; available only through the most exclusive of delicatessen to the very wealthiest. So much for your vaunted egalitarianism. Then there's a special, if minor, environment- and packaging tax on most items, especially on electronics; there's a row of fuel and air fare taxes on plane tickets; we have a document tax on all legal documents; we have pesticide taxes and sulfur gas taxes; there's a special boat-engine tax as well if I'm not mistaken. And let's not forget the regular fuel taxes, mentioned briefly earlier, putting gasoline at $6 a gallon. There's more, of course, but these are the ones that sprung to mind. Anyway, that's the system itself. People are taxed pretty hard, but not unbearably so. Not on their income, anyways. Instead, consumption of goods is insanely expensive, making Norway a very special kind of socialist utopia; one where there's a sizable poll tax effectively being levied on the downtrodden proletariat. So why, oh why, would I say that this is an incendiary question? Norwegians, you see, are terribly proud of their taxes. They will tell you how they make a ton of money, and can afford it. They will tell you it's good to have high taxes, because taxes pay for all that stuff Americans cannot afford. Like healthcare. Never mind that Norwegians with the means are buying health insurance in ever-increasing numbers, as those who can afford it do not trust the public health system, what with its waiting time of up to 8 hours at the municipal emergency room. Never mind that the "free healthcare" is in shambles; the doctors striking for the right not to be forced to work 20-hour shifts at a moment's notice. Never mind that "free healthcare" does not cover anything remotely related to what happens in your oral cavity; to the point where the head of the main worker's union – beacon of solidarity indeed – a couple of years back was decided to go to Hungary to get her teeth fixed; it was too expensive for her to get it done in Norway itself. And never mind that the poor generally avoid going to the doctor if they can help it, as there's still a $30-40 charge per visit. This isn't Britain NHS, to put it mildly. And besides, our glorious public health system only occupies a paltry 17 percent of the government's expense sheet. Now, of course, taxes aren't all bad. They pay for our armed forces (3 percent of government expenses) and public services like police, fire brigades, courts of law and prisons (2 percent, all combined). Even more importantly, they pay for our education (11 percent of expenses), where preschools, kindergartens, elementary schools and high schools are the main expense posts. Higher education, like universities, are indeed free. So that's nice. Of course, all the posts mentioned in this paragraph plus healthcare only comes to NOK 505 billion; a third of the total expenses. A large chunk of the remainder is spent on keeping the bureaucrats fed, along with international emergency aid, protecting the environment, and of course building infrastructure. Let's just for a moment ignore that Albania has a more sophisticated road network that we do, and that half the country is still screaming for railroads, 140 years on. A tiny little bit is spent on research, funding theaters and churches account for a bit of it all. But the main part, the single largest expense post, is the NOK 605 billion spent on social security. Nearly 15 percent of all government expenses go into pensions alone; disease and disability pension are another 14 percent. For some mysterious reason, Norway has one of the sickest and most disabled populations in the world, so naturally it's expensive to care for them all. And then there's the NOK 110 billion spent on, uh, well, mainly just cash payouts to people who have children, on account of them having children. So as Alhazred said, it's nice not having to go bankrupt when you get sick or injured. But all in all, it's a bit more complicated than that. And we really can't afford more stuff than Americans can, and it's not really helping ordinary people much. But we really, really, really like to think it does, and we like to think we have more spending power than Americans even more.
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Oct 28, 2016 22:00
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Svartvit posted:This explanation is a little misleading. When you negotiate pay you add the holiday compensation onto the agreed salary. It isn't taken from the wages, it's added to the wages. If you sign a contract for €3000 a month, you're not getting flaked for 10 percent, the employer is adding it. You could argue that the distinction really is philisophical or whatever, but in practice it means something. Not really. You'll get your €3000 gross each month, but come June (or July, or whatever), you'll get nothing, except the Holiday Money from the previous year. If you start this job January 1st, your new employer will shell out just short of €33,000 through the whole year, while Holiday Money from your previous employer will fill the gap in that one month your new employer is not paying you for not working.
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Oct 29, 2016 00:39
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Jeza posted:For a country with a high level of education, GDP per capita and standard of English, I've always thought modern Norway punched rather below its weight in terms of recognisable world figures. Most of the ones the person on the street has heard of will be from over 100 years ago. Like Finland it feels like Norway has a bit of a navel gazing attitude when it comes to culture, and a lot of it doesn't escape past the borders. This view – that all the best and brightest Norwegians are long dead – is one you share with a lot of Norwegians. We used to have the likes of Munch, Grieg, Ibsen, Henie, Sandemose, Holberg, Amundsen, Birkeland and Heyerdahl. Now we only have Breivik and Carlsen? How the mighty have fallen! I'm not entirely sure it's an accurate view, though. People in every era have always looked to the past with a sort of longing; wondering why the present culture is such utter poo poo in comparison. But is it a fair comparison to make? The past covers so many more years; while some of the people I listed just now were about to die as the 20th century dawned, at least one was long dead, others were not even born, while others still were in the prime of their production. Now, at this moment, there are still a number of Norwegians who are rather well known. Liv Ullmann is still going strong, even if it's been a few decades since her prime red carpet time. Kygo is apparently a thing, even if he's only had a couple of years of activity, but at least those guys in Röyksopp gained a bit of fame. Apart from crime fiction authors, Knausgård, I'm told, also sells books. We have a spate of people winning far too many gold medals at winter sports, like Koss, Dæhlie and Ulvang, who have all retired from sporting just in the past decade or two. Then there are the scientists and inventors, whose names we for some reason rarely learn until long after they're dead. Oh, and there's a ton of metalheads. The question is: Will any of these be considered the equals of those people I listed initially? I don't know. In my personal view, they probably shouldn't, but history will be the final judge. On the other hand... lizard_phunk posted:
This is also a very important factor. Apart from weather and paid holidays, the "Law of Jante" is guaranteed to pop up in every discussion about Norway. The "law" was formulated by the aforementioned writer, Aksel Sandemose, to sum up the general attitude Norwegians (and other Scandinavians) display in the face of exceptionalism. In short, "no matter what, you are worthless compared to us, and don't you dare tell us otherwise". You have to be something of a rebel to want to stand out; this is also evident in many of Ibsen's plays. I suppose you could call Grieg a good example of early Norwegian punk, simply in that he was actually a very gifted composer. Additionally, this is not restricted to social settings. Gifted children are indeed asked to keep their skills down; the schools are also extremely focused on helping the weakest students, to the point where the better students are neglected or even penalized. Did your homework ahead of time? That's nice, now go sit in the corner and do them all over again. Not the best way to breed exceptional people at an exceptional rate. lizard_phunk posted:
Adding to this, the vast majority of jobs pay within the range of $40,000 to $80,000, regardless of education and responsibilities, with most somewhere at the lower end. Your pay is primarily tied to your age, not your skills. Working overtime, a good way for hard workers to make some more, is forbidden by law in most cases. Add to this a tax system designed to "level the field" as detailed earlier, and you find that social mobility is, in general, not that great after all. For some perspective, if you're an executive in a successful company, or the prime minister of Norway, your gross pay won't be much more than $140,000. Of course certain individuals make heaps more, but they are hardly representative. Oh, and let's not forget that everyone can look up the taxes of anyone else – even anonymously until a couple of years ago. What you make, in Norway, is a matter of public record, so as to make sure nobody gets too successful without everyone knowing about it. The newspapers actually throw a small party every year when the lists are updated and distributed, and they compile lists of the 100 wealthiest, the 100 best paid, and the top 100 taxpayers in each of our 428 municipalities. lizard_phunk posted:
All of this is very true. As mentioned, regarding social mobility: If you come from a rich family, and you drop out of school to be an unskilled, menial laborer, that's fine. You'll still get a net pay in the same general area as everyone else; maybe a tad lower. However, you won't pay much for housing, as your family will aid you in this. Later, your children can go on to do whatever they want, because the family fortune – like that of most Norwegians – is bound up in property. You have to gently caress up pretty bad to go from rich to poor, and even then you're entitled to all sorts of benefits – so you'll hardly be poor like the American homeless. On the opposite end of the scale, someone from a poor family can display a terrifying intellectual capacity, zoom through basic and higher education (while receiving little but scorn along the way), and end up on the higher end of the pay scale. After taxes, however, net pay is in the same area as the unskilled rich kid, and without the backing of a well-off family, this person would be very hard pressed to buy a home. When the next generation comes along, they have a parent with higher education, a good pay relative to the general population, but their family's economy will still be worse off than that of the rich dropout. In short, being extremely talented, gifted, intelligent, and so on, only gets you so far. You will be told quite explicitly to avoid standing out, even from a very young age. The fact that few Norwegians rise to true brilliance is a good reflection on this. Alhazred posted:Soon we will begin to discuss the weather. Peak Norway. Bollock Monkey posted:Actually, this sounds a lot like the NHS in its current state. We are having a whol host of issues with funding being cut left, right and centre, and junior doctors striking to protest unsafe and unfair contracts. NHS dentists charge a minimum of ~$23 for a basic appointment, going up to ~$290 for crowns and suchlike. So, solidarity I suppose... Ah, but dentistry is covered by the NHS. That's not the case in Norway. If you want a basic appointment, that's about £120. A crown or root canal, depending on the number of treatments required, can be as low as £800 – but is often several times that. Pursesnatcher fucked around with this message at 11:10 on Oct 29, 2016 |
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Oct 29, 2016 11:06
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Kopijeger posted:That seems a bit high. The last time I had a basic appointment it cost a bit less than 800 NOK, a bit less than £80. Still, the fact that dentistry is not covered by the national health care system if you are older than 20 is a serious flaw. Some people avoid going to the dentist for years at a time owing to it costing so much. It's around 8-900 NOK for the actual appointment itself, but I've always had to add at least another 400 or so due to X-rays and "supplies", whatever that is. Alhazred posted:Yeah, no: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xH7eGFuSYI Uhm, yes. The Q&A from the national tax administration provides the following answer to the question "Why are these lists public?": "Parliament has decided that taxes paid should be public. This in order to enable society as a whole to control the taxation work in general, and the taxation rates set for individuals and groups of taxpayers." Now, sure, you could look up your coworkers and find out if you make more or less than they do. But this has nothing to do with the reason for publicizing these lists. Pursesnatcher fucked around with this message at 13:21 on Oct 29, 2016 |
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Oct 29, 2016 13:18
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Alhazred posted:Ensuring that the taxation process is transparent is pretty loving far from "make sure nobody gets too successful without everyone knowing about it". Oh, all right then. Let me rephrase: "What you make, in Norway, is a matter of public record, so as to make sure that people whom you have reason to believe are very successful – based on their visible assets, spending habits or lifestyle in general – can be reported to the tax authorities for potentially having found some clever and illegal way to avoid taxation, if it turns out that their reported income is lower than what you might suspect is actually the case". Edit: While this strikes me as being a convoluted way of saying "If you seem successful, everyone should have the right to check your pay", don't just take my word for it. When the current administration started the process of removing the option to search through the list anonymously, there were quite a few annoyed responses; the main labor union states explicitly in their official response that "having information regarding personal income available can weaken the forces which would increase income disparities, and thus contribute to a more uniform distribution of wealth". Is that, too, pretty loving far from making sure nobody gets too successful without everyone knowing about it? Note that this union sits on the central committee of the Labour Party, which has recently started signalling that they want to reintroduce anonymous searches when they get back into power. Pursesnatcher fucked around with this message at 14:38 on Oct 29, 2016 |
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Oct 29, 2016 14:13
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punk rebel ecks posted:I'm getting vibes that Pursesnatcher is firmly plotted in one spectrum of Norwegian politics. I honestly try to stay out of all that, personally. One side lies and cheats, the other lies and steals. There's a host of silly misunderstandings about the how's and why's of our tax system though, and I don't like how people are smiling when they're getting screwed just because they have been led to believe the screwing is in their own best interest. Also "snitch on your neighbor if he seems too rich" is both a peculiar cultural trait which fits nicely into what lizard_phunk described, and a nice scheme for keeping people in line. Mercrom posted:Another clear case of discrimination against "the forces which would increase income disparities". We should not rest until "the forces which would increase income disparities" get the same rights and responsibilities as "the invisible hand of the market".
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Oct 29, 2016 17:17
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Regarding tax lists, I'm not against them, I was just trying to point out what they're for :PJeza posted:When somewhere is so sparsely populated, people know pretty much everyone I guess. My guess: A certain bus driver had a nice big cup of "You ain't fram 'round dese parts naw, are ya", and tried figuring out who this "forriner to dese here parts" might be. If you've seen the movie Deliverance, you've incidentally gotten a pretty good impression of rural Norway in the bargain.
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Oct 29, 2016 21:10
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Osama Dozen-Dongs posted:OP how angry does it make you that rich people pay bigger fines than poor people? I think you're confusing us with Finland. It would be nice to have that system here, though. Josef K. Sourdust posted:I definitely want to turn this thread all DnD (I hate DnD with a the fiery intensity of a thousand suns), but...what is the Norwegian view on recent immigration? As there are no border controls is the matter of where migrants settle in SE/NO a matter of where accommodation/jobs/benefits/fellow migrants' location is? Has there been any friction between NO and SE regarding SE's pro-migration stance (which I know has recently been revised to a more cautious approach)? If tax questions are incendiary, this one is a thermonuclear cake with napalm icing. But that's cool! Immigration is one of those huge polarizing issues today. I'd guess about a third of the population think it would be nice if we could help some more people, while about a third think we should perhaps not accommodate any new immigrants until the ones we have are integrated. These are the normals, the moderates. Since only a very small proportion does not care either way, the remaining chunk is still pretty large. And it consists exclusively of screamers. There's a relatively large and extremely vocal subset of the population who are adamant that borders are, if not fascist, then at least barbaric. To these people, the idea of actively collecting immigrants in Libya, Syria, Nigeria or Somalia and shipping them direct to Norway, would be far preferable to the current situation. Then there's their polar opposites, a group which is perhaps smaller, but at least equally vocal. These are the ones suggesting, anonymously or otherwise, that the best course of action would be dispatching warships to the Mediterranean, in order to sink refugee boats before they can make it to Europe. So the Norwegian view is clearly no single thing, but it feels like the majority has been leaning more towards "sort out the current bunch before admitting more" lately. At the height of the recent crisis, everything suddenly got a bit more strict, and there's been an increased effort to ship rejected asylum seekers out of the country. The result is that fewer have been arriving; a fact which in itself sparks debate. Some are relieved, and point to the stricter policies as wise choices which has had the desired effect, while cautiously suggesting we might get even stricter. Others are disappointed, and berate the authorities for letting people suffer and die in conflict areas while shutting our gates to the needing. The role of Sweden in all this is interesting. Sweden is often cited as an example of how not to do things. Even the (non-screaming) pro-immigration segment will mostly agree that we don't want to end up like them. That said, Norway has far stricter criteria for being granted residency than Sweden. Migrants know this, and thus will prefer to go there instead of here. This past summer, in spite of the Schengen agreement, border controls were actually implemented between the Scandinavian countries – including between Sweden and Norway. However, as it turned out, rather few of the migrants were headed here, compared to the numbers wanting to go next door. It's seen as far easier to become a resident in Sweden, and the background checks are less stringent. The existing diaspora communities are also far larger in Sweden. Regarding benefits, I honestly couldn't tell you. Note, though, that if you are applying for asylum or residency in Norway, your application will be rejected if you leave the country at any time while it's being processed. I would imagine the same is true in Sweden, which could help explain why rather few immigrants try coming here from there.
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Oct 30, 2016 22:49
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uguu posted:How much does the government pay you to live somewhere rural? Depends on how rural you're willing to go! Now, you're seldom actually paid to go live in some backwater. However, If you have a student loan, and you live in the northermost bits of the country, your loan can be reduced by up to ten percent every year you stay there. In the north of Norway in general, the electricity tax is set at a lower rate than elsewhere; in the very northernmost bits, it's set to zero consumers. Businesses in the same areas also pay a lower electricity tax, and the payroll tax is set at the lowest rate in the country. There are additional benefits if you're able to go live on Svalbard, that huge, barren wasteland we've got way up in the Arctic ocean, but moving there is – realistically – not an option for most. You would need to get a job, something you can pretty much only get through the government-owned coal mine company (which also owns most everything else up there) or at a meteorological research facilities (read: some tent pitched in the middle of a blizzard).
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Oct 30, 2016 23:00
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Mercrom posted:QI said Norway gave sushi salmon. Hmm. If you enjoy skiing (be it cross country, downhill or over a jump) you have plenty to be grateful to Norway about. And we've been bringing mineral nitrogen fertilizer into the world for more than a century now, feeding untold billions in the process. We also make some killer naval strike missiles, if that's more your thing. And the "cheese planer", which Norwegians are absurdly proud of. Josef K. Sourdust posted:Thanks for the reply! With regards to nervousness, the people is divided. It's funny; there are two "sayings" which most Norwegians (above a certain age, anyhow) will have at least heard spoken of. One is "never again April 9th", a popular post-war mantra referencing the German invasion which began on that day in 1940. During the Cold War it became sort of a motto reflecting a dedication to maintain a strong military, capable of real deterrence. Realistically, the military doctrine in this period was always based on hanging on until the Americans could get here, but there was a will to maintain a strong army, a large and well-trained reserve force with military weapons stored at home (a force which could act as a guerrilla force against potential invaders), and a well-equipped coast guard, navy and air force. "Never again" would a foreign army be able to steamroll Norway with ease due to... well, actually, that's where the other saying comes in. The other saying is "policy of the broken gun". This was actually the name of the Labour Party's policy of demilitarizing Norway, based on the belief that even having a military could be perceived as aggression. The key, in their eyes, to a peaceful world was to just get rid of all weapons; if everyone would just break their guns, there could naturally be no war. The party came into power in 1935, while the rest of the world was quite busy doing the exact opposite, and predictably the whole idea backfired somewhat. Since the Cold War ended, the ideas behind that second saying has been gaining new traction. War is bad, militaries are bad, and acting aggressively towards our neighbours through Bad Things™ like economic sanctions are just rude. These people would rather just have everyone sit down and settle their differences peacefully. There are also quite a few people – perhaps especially so in the north – who would prefer a happy, friendly, let's-all-get-along attitude towards Russia. These are not necessarily pacifists, but they are more inclined to believe Russia is the victim in some sort of smear campaign by the US and EU; both of which they dislike (or even despise). On the other hand, the first of those sayings has been springing back into use lately as well. Many do believe Russia is a real and imminent threat, if not to us then at least to some of our NATO allies. Officially, we try to maintain a constructive dialogue with our largest neighbor, and apart from condemning moves like annexing Crimea, this seems to be what we're doing. That's the short story on nervousness. As for our military; while the idea of si vis pacem, para bellum didn't disappear entirely after the Cold War ended, our military spending fell drastically. I believe the armed forces of Norway actually employs more bureaucrats than actual soldiers these days, and the poor state of our reserve force is a matter of some debate. We do have some very high-tech boats, our special forces are in reasonably good shape, and we've ordered a ton of expensive jets from the US, but our army as such is a pretty sorry sight. I've seen several different estimates, the most pessimistic ones stating we could at best hold back a Russian assault some 48 hours. Sweden is probably even worse off, though.
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Oct 31, 2016 17:20
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Josef K. Sourdust posted:Thanks for the detailed response. Sweden has actually been the target of a whole lot of unwanted Russian attention lately; what with exercises both simulating nuclear and conventional bombing runs against the country, numerous (unconfirmed) submarine incursions into Swedish waters as well as airspace violations by fighter aircraft these past 2-3 years. Much of this is assumed to be tied pretty directly to Swedish dreams of NATO. As stated in the opening post, Norway was a founding member of the organization, so it would be pretty moot to threaten us from joining; hence we have seen far less such directly provocative activity. Instead, Russian bombers have returned to their Cold War pattern of travelling down our coastline, staying just outside our airspace, but still close enough to prompt our fighters to scramble to intercept and escort them. Funnily enough, there's no clear-cut right- or leftist stance when it comes to Norwegians' attitude to Russia these days. You'll find anti-immigration screamers, typically far right on the spectrum, squarely in the "our Russian brothers" camp. You'll also find pro-immigration screamers, whom will often self-identify as socialists or outright communists, telling you how Russia is a victim to American propaganda. The more I think about it, the more I'm starting to think Norway is a country more divided than one might initially guess. PS: I just came across a relatively recent poll, wherein 45 percent of Norwegians consider Putin a threat to Norway, while 47 percent do not. Pursesnatcher fucked around with this message at 00:02 on Nov 1, 2016 |
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Oct 31, 2016 23:44
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Zero Gravitas posted:Something you Nordmenn can help me with: Fellow Norwegian gave some great answers already, but I'll try to pitch in as well. Apart from Tekna, which is a sweet tip, NITO is also an organization to look into. Both organize engineers, and there's a bit of overlap. In addition to looking into these organizations themselves, they also own Teknisk Ukeblad – the largest polytechnic newspaper in Norway, whose job portal might help you find what you're looking for. As for companies looking for people, Kongsberg is indeed a good tip. Seeing your background I immediately though of Kongsberg Automotive and Kongsberg Maritime. With a degree in aerospace engineering, perhaps their missiles are more your thing though. Barring that, if you care for the great outdoors and living far beyond the wall, there's this sweet space center which the Russians mistook for an ICBM launch site back in the day; maybe there's something for you there? Kopijeger posted:And they don't see the contradiction in this? How do they rationalise wanting to work in the country yet at the same time rejecting the language? This is probably tied to the whole "everyone speaks English" bit, coupled with the fact that the Norwegian academic world uses English as the working language (at least that's how it is in most areas of STEM research, God alone knows what they do in the social sciences), much like in the oil sector.
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Nov 6, 2016 20:48
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ToxicSlurpee posted:I think Norway is a gorgeous, gorgeous country and I'd like to at least visit some day. I keep thinking it'd be a great place to move as America shits itself to death. Perhaps this is "grass is always greener" territory but, well, the fact is I like cold places that have poo poo loads of trees, hills, and mountains. If cold/trees/hills/mountains is what you want, you certainly won't be disappointed! Currently the grass is not so much "greener" as it is "white, frozen, dying a slow death under blankets of ice, only to rise again about 4-5 months from now". Food shocks are pretty uncommon as well, and avoiding fish is easy enough. Apart from the horrible examples of traditional food, we eat pretty much the same things you do – and restaurants, I just learned a few days ago, are required to list all allergens next to every item in their menu. Blanket "EVERYTHING INCLUDES GLUTEN" statements atop every page is apparently illegal now. However! When it comes to finding work, you might be in for a surprise. Do you have a master's degree, and are you happy doing web development? If so, finding something should be reasonably easy – and learning to speak Norwegian would help a lot. If you have a bachelor's degree, you would need some pretty solid experience on your CV to be eligible for most positions. If you're not into web development, there are still some opportunities, but there's not really a huge demand for programmers in Norway. By Norwegian standards you would be well paid, though – the average gross salary for a system architect with a master's degree is currently about $80k, while a computer engineer/technician makes some $70k gross. While these figures are representative for people with tons of experience, even the starting pay for engineers in IT is pretty solid – about $55k. Make sure to check out the wall of text regarding taxes earlier in this thread, though, for an idea of what those figures translate to in net pay.
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Nov 8, 2016 11:58
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V. Illych L. posted:what even is 'standard' norwegian I think the general idea is that while we have a gazillion academically defined dialects (due to the sheer number of intensely proud linguists/dialectologists this country has produced), it's easier to call the main one "standard" Norwegian than it would be to go into the gritty details on how we have two distinct written forms of Norwegian, three written Sami languages (let's not go into potential dialects there, nor what's up with the other six), one language group shared with two of our neighbors which are mutually intelligible (apart from those people in Skåne), and how these people practice the closest thing anyone can find to good old Norse (if you don't count the Faeroes). And the point made by the lizard is absolutely valid. If you speak one of the dialects which deviate significantly from the ones spoken in the southeast – by nearly half the country's population – and you then move there, things start to change. Either you Stay True™ and Proud™ of your original dialect, or you at least try to, while starting to sound ridiculous as the words your mother taught you turn to mush in your mouth.
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Nov 8, 2016 22:39
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ToxicSlurpee posted:I don't have a master's (yet, anyway...some day perhaps) but I am, in fact, a web developer right now! I also have a BFA so my design skills are better than terrible. Will that benefit me as well? It certainly should! Web developers are in pretty high demand, especially if you can do back-end as well as front-end. Design skills means Photoshop skills, which would likely be considered a minor bonus if you're going into the agency world. Most firms have about 10-20 employees, as their in-house designers are usually super-swamped with work and thus happy not to have to spend time resizing pictures. Josef K. Sourdust posted:Exactly how scared is Norway, member of NATO and neighbour of Russia, today? Scale of gravely concerned to Well... At least children are crying, certain there's going to be a war. No joke! The largest newspaper actually ran a story titled "How to talk to your children about the Trump victory". Kids pick up on the news, and our media has been united in dismissing Trump as a truly dangerous, woman-hating, lying, racist clown. On this one issue, at least, you can picture it as if every single news outlet in the country was like Slate, with only varying degrees of rabid headlines to tell them apart. In fact, even teachers in a coworker's school have been talking for weeks about how the Donald winning would be the worst thing to happen in the whole world, but that the children shouldn't worry, because Hillary would conquer all. Dropping of their kids at school this morning, one child was apparently heard asking if they were all going to die. So there's that. Apart from the doom and gloom of children and socialists (teachers, incidentally, vote socialist to a moronically high degree compared to most other vocational groups), there's not much panic, though. Our Reichsbroadcasting company did give us all a stern warning that Trump might prefer dialogue with Russia over confrontation. There's also some worry how this situation might affect the stock markets, and how that in turn might affect our wealth fund. More militaristic people are actually pretty pleased, since they just see his NATO remarks as a great reason to pump up our spending on defense. Amusingly, our politicians have spent months debating what to do with one of our main air bases, and yesterday they decided to shut the whole place down. Such timing! Also, like one hour after the win was official, parliament was in session, and the head of the socialist party was up criticizing the cabinet for not using harsh enough language when reacting to the news. Most ordinary people are just a little baffled that every single expert was wrong, again, but there's not much concern about Russia specifically. I think it's that whole Lutheran thing, myself :P
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Nov 9, 2016 18:10
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Fuckin Trump Riot posted:So when we say "web development," what kind of work are we talking about? Design? HTML? Backend javascript? I'm asking for a friend named, uh, Bokes MacFee who is looking for a resident permit. He's not me in a mustache, I don't know why you'd think that. I dug around a little, and you can tell MacFee that all of those would help, but from skimming the vacancies pages, Java and .NET seems to be the hottest poo poo today. HTML/JS/CSS are bread and butter, so everyone should know at least some of it, and experience with frameworks like Angular.js and Node.js is a big plus many places. Then there's Python, Django, PostgreSQL and a billion other requirements depending on where you want to go. In the 431 vacancies in IT development on our largest general purpose job portal right now, 67 are for database, 96 for front-end, 38 for IT security, 126 for systems architect and 293 for "developer (general)". There's also some 30-odd vacancies for QA jobs. Here's the kicker: It's kinda hard to get a residency permit for work for non-EU citizens. In theory, we've had a full stop on immigration since 1975, although there are a ton of exceptions. Unless my fellow countrymen here know more, I could certainly look into it later! Keep in mind that an IT engineer does have a 3-5 year university degree – a friend of mine is a computer tech at a very large company, but as he doesn't hold a degree he only makes about $42k even after 5-10 years or so. And again, remember taxes :P ToxicSlurpee posted:I know my way around Photoshop and am currently a full stack developer. Basically the team I'm on is like 1 1/2 programmers (I'm the only pure web dev; the other guy is also our systems guy) so...yeah it sounds like I could probably find work. Granted my work experience is less than a year but...hey. If demand is that high there are probably places going "holy poo poo balls, a PROGRAMMER? HIRE HIM HIRE HIM HIRE HIM." Less than a year of relevant experience can be detrimental to your chances; most companies will look for 2-3 years minimum. It's not a total dealbreaker, though. People still do get hired to do development full-time when they're fresh out of high school, at 18-19 years old, although this is very rare – but it goes to show that talent and the right attitude can get you a long way.
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Nov 10, 2016 11:27
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Fuckin Trump Riot posted:Understandable. Plus, it seems there's a lot of You mean over here? As you're both a pretty rare sight (there's about 8500 US-born American immigrants living in Norway right now, and about a quarter of them live in Oslo) and no longer living in America, people would be mostly fine with you.
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Nov 10, 2016 20:06
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going right now over American emigration discussion and entitlement that'd already make it an uphill slog, and I'm not sure how widespread that is. (I'm not trying to 
since that'll bring a whole new political shitstorm in here, but it's something that's been brought up and needs to be considered.)
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ToxicSlurpee posted:In general. Apparently Canada pretty much said they don't want a mass migration of Americans. America doesn't have the greatest reputation right now as is. Some nations are basically saying "you made your mess now clean it up" while ignoring that people wanting to leave are probably not the ones that made it. Certain demographics are looking at the fact that trump promised to target specific entire demographics and are feeling nervous. While I can't speak for Canada or Mexico, Norwegians will generally welcome any American leaving the US with open arms. "You're not like THOSE Americans", they'll ask, and you'll nod, and you'll get a pat on the shoulder (this is the Norwegian version of the most intimate, comforting hug you can imagine). If you click this link within the next 3 hours, you'll see why. That's the front page of one of the top 3 daily newspapers in the country. In fact you'll see a recurring theme on all the national newspapers from today (gathered here until it updates with tomorrow's front pages).
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Nov 10, 2016 20:40
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Fuckin Trump Riot posted:it's cold???? well poo poo I'm staying here then It's not that cold, to be honest. This week, sudden snowfalls caused a power outage affecting thousands of people on the southern tip, and despite many being without power for several days, I don't even think anybody even died! Right now there's only a thin layer of ice and snow around Oslo, and temperatures just a few degrees below freezing. Global warming is real, it seems. I remember the cold of my childhood, growing up beyond the wall... but if I started reminiscing about it, I'd just sound like that four-yorkshiremen-sketch from Monty Python.
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Nov 10, 2016 20:48
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Meydey posted:I have a question about immigration. My daughter just graduated high school in Washington State and wants to move to Norway. She has been saying this long before Trump btw. Gut reactions says "lol no". Without living relatives in Norway, any form of "family reunion" sort of arrangement is right out, as «great-grandmothers-daughters-nieces-brothers-husband» sort of arrangements sadly just won't do. With a living ancestor ready to sponsor her things might be easier, but – big "but" incoming – but while there are few requirements on part of the recipient of a family reunion visa, there's a ton of requirements on the sponsor. She needs a living sponsor with a reasonably close relation, able and willing to document a motivation and ability to be a caretaker for her. This means the sponsor needs to meet requirements for income, residency, and several other factors. Additionally, the processing period for family reunion visas is measured in years, not months. It doesn't matter if she's 12 or 39; this bit is the same for everyone. If you want a niece over from the US or a wife over from Thailand, you'll need to show that you're able and willing to feed, clothe and house said family member indefinitely. So disregarding ethnicity and "Norwegian Roots" altogether (which would be smart, with regards to immigration), she'd need some other way in. Now, many Norwegian learning institutions are connected to some international exchange program or other. From what you describe, I'd suspect this would be the easiest way for your daughter to get in. Thousands of Norwegians use this route to get out of the country for a few years, and if she's willing to get an academic degree here, like a BA or MA, that would likely simplify things even more.
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Nov 12, 2016 02:06
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