• honey_im_meat_grinding
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    1 year ago

    Wealth is definitely a strong element. It’s easy to forget that socialism is just democratic ownership of the economy, not just “workers owning the means of production” because that forgets all the people who can’t work. In addition, these elements add to Norway’s status as a mixed economy with market socialist elements:

    • 30% of the domestic stock market is owned by the Norwegian state
    • They operate 70+ state owned enterprises (SOEs), including a national bank and telecom
    • Norway has 50% union density, which is pretty high compared to the rest of the world
    • They have works councils where workers get 33%(?) of the seats on the board of larger corporations
    • 20% of Norways population lives in democratically owned housing (housing coops), originally funded by the government but now growing their membership faster than the population is growing
    • Norway uses Georgist-style taxes on land (natural resources - oil, aquafarms, hydropower, wind energy) because no one worked for the creation of those natural resources hence a good cut of the profits should belong to the people

    When you compare these to China, you’ll notice that a so-called communist country gets beaten on many of these in relative terms, which is a strong case for Norway being quite socialist (obviously they also have capitalism hence the “mixed economy” part, before someone goes “well actually”)