I realize the culture around here is deficient in this regard, but if you're going to make assertions like this, the onus is on you to back them up with facts and figures. Which states got a huge windfall from energy and spent it all? And does Alaska's fund really reflect well on the administration of their energy wealth when objectively compared to Norway's? You'd want to look at things like per capita energy surplus vs the size of the fund per capita. I don't see anything like that in your post.
The Norwegian Central Bank is also very interesting and operates differently than the US Fed. Norway's central bank is very transparent in its operations and two elected employee representatives sit on the board. The central bank is also responsible for investing Norway's pension fund (their version of US Social Security, I guess.). The contrast between the ways that Norway's public pension fund and the US Social Security trust funds are handled is rather striking. Instead of being restricted to investing in government bonds, Norway's Central Bank invests the pension funds in equities of corporations all over the world, with the exception of corporations on the black list for bad behavior. Norway has no net debt, and no deficit, but they do sell bonds to facilitate cash flow. You can read about the operations of Norway's Central Bank at the Bank's web site. You can also read the lists of companies they invest the pension monies in and the black listed companies. http://www.norges-bank.no/templates/section____11339.aspx
The markets are not big enough for SSI type investments, another reason you cannot compare a small educated, homogeneous, oil exporting western nation to the US. Norway can invest like that because Norway is small.
I always get a laugh when all these people see how scandinavian countries are near or at the top of all these international metrics, then people go on the scavenger hunt for the secret sauce: "but if only we could copy how scandinavian countries educate their children, run their government pension, keep crime so low, etc" Well, we can't because the USA is not made of scandinavians. Don't worry though. Scandinavian countries are working hard to kill the golden goose with their immigration policy, so before long they will have all the troubles we do.
All Eastern European countries are homogeneous and yet they're operated by the mafia. So your thesis is a failure. We all agree the Scandinavians have good governance. Good governance occurs only when the population is 1/ literate 2/involved and 3/ the process of governance is transparent Scandinavians have ALL THREE in place. In the US, we have NONE of the above 3. Deporting all the blacks out would still not solve the underlying rot in American democracy. The other MAJOR factor weaking American democracy is the use of Private money to elect public officials. This results in nothing but corrupting Democracy. We end up with Cheneys closed door negotiations with energy corporations and higher energy costs. Or No-Bid contracts to corporations with close ties to political officials. Scandinavians remove this source of corruption by paid lobbyists working inside govt. by making elections publicly funded. Actually, now that we've reviewed the differences, it's people like you who are the problem in the weakening of American democracy My suggestion is Norway should invade us militarily to spread real democracy.
"All Eastern European countries are homogeneous and yet they're operated by the mafia. So your thesis is a failure." Some african nations are pretty homogeneous too. But, kind of like Eastern Europe they are not populated by scandinavians. My thesis stands.