unemployment rate http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds...:NO&dl=en&hl=en&q=unemployment+rate+in+norway
The easiest way would be to call Norwegian embassy. Also I am sure if you research it, you will get the answers. Visiting the place could also open eyes.
Norway is in a special position though due to its sovereign wealth fund. But there are other examples. For instance Switzerland is a great example. It has successfuly implemented direct democracy (swiss people vote almost every month) as well as several social security programs. These programs may seem "socialist" (i.e. evil?) in the eyes of brain washed americans but they allow Switzerland to enjoy one of the lowest percentage of poor people in the world. Education is free, universities are very cheap (about $1200/year) including the ETH Zürich that ranks in the top 10 technical universities in the world, everyone has healthcare coverage and the median salary is around $72K... Now doesn't this "socialist" country look horrible to live in? Ninna
Norway has a great economy-- for its citizens. How many illegals emigrate to Norway a year, drop a few anchor babies at a hospital that are now citizens who remain on the public dole for generations? The US has more illegal immigrants than Norway has citizens! And as someone else mentioned, they are a net exporter of oil. Kick out illegals and provide services to legal (this needs to be defined as well) citizens and ratchet down the standard of living by reducing available credit based on failed demographic and socio-economic experiments to those who can actually pay and the US would have a nice economy again too.
Norway's oil is 25% of GDP. Their oil fund works out to $110,000 per citizen. If Norway did not pump money out of the ground, where would they be? Socialism does not create wealth. Socialism consumes wealth until there is little left.
Statoil, created by the merger of Statoil and Norsk Hydro in October 2007, is 67-percent-owned by the Norwegian government and controls 80 percent of Norway's oil and gas production. State-owned Petoro administers these ownership interests and manages the production licenses and companies. Funny how owning the natural resources as opposed to having them in private hands is so beneficial to the people in Norway. A novel idea where the people of Norway and not international oil corporations are major beneficiaries of oil and the wealth it holds. BTW there are many countries that are net exporters of crude oil and yet continue to deliver nothing but misery to their citizens.
Ask yourself why nothing has been done about illegals? We had 3 Republican Presidents in the last 30 years. Perhaps becasue it is good for the busienss? The solution is very simple: create an enforcement system where for each illegal employed the penalty is $100K fine. Nobody would hire them and they would not come. We would save a bundle on border security and prison system would have to be reduced in size. Question is (again) why hasn't a scheme like that been implemented? Perhaps it would hurt businesses who love to hire illegals pay them next to nothing and enjoy extra profits. Go to any Perdue or Tyson chicken factory and you will see who works there and what would happened to those two and many more if there was a penalty to hire illegals.
Many countries with oil have a large GDP % coming from oil. Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria are perfect examples. Yet most do not have the standard of living comparable to Norway and rely on cheap labor to sustain growth and high standard of living for the select few. There are other coubtries who are social democracies which by US standards of what socialism is would squarely place them in the commie camp. Sweden is one example, Switzerland would be another and Finland and Denmark would also be up there as a socialist country (again by US view on socialism). None of those countries have oil yet the benefits I outlined for Norway would be very similar in those 4 as well. What's their excuse for being able to have such a high standard of living and I do not mean monetary one only but a wide array of services provided by the state to all of its citizens? Capitalism creates wealth in a way that leaves 90% of society in poverty and 10% in total luxury - hardly a winning combination.