Several weeks ago I had the privilege to talk with Mella McCormick, a philosophy professor at Northwestern Michigan College, about a book called The Nordic Theory of Everything: In Search of a Better Life, by Anu Partanen. Here’s Mella’s overview:
The book compares the Nordic approach to life with that of the United States, which interestingly enough is polar opposite in many ways; for example, the Nordic countries provide their citizens with free universal health-care, free higher education, paid maternity and paternity leave, to name a few things.
Despite the United States' proposed claims to value principles such as liberty, freedom, independence, the U.S. has created a system that makes its citizens dependent on others: students are dependent on parents to help pay for higher education and thus become beholden to them (this could potentially influence where the student goes to school, what she studies, selected career path, etc.); employees are dependent on their employees for health benefits, thus potentially enslaving a person to a job that he does not like or finds unfulfilling but cannot afford to leave; due to the high cost of geriatric care, adult children are left with the task of caring for their elderly parents which could potentially corrupt the elderly-parent/adult-child relationship (i.e. elderly parents feel like a "burden" to their children, children feel overwhelmed by medical tasks they are not trained to perform).
Partanen argues that the social services that Nordic countries provide for their citizens is what allows them to lead more authentic, free, and liberating lives, not less, as the anti-socialist rhetoric that portrays Nordic countries as "welfare states" would have you believe.
According to "For Generous Parental Leave and Great Schools, Move to Finland" (New York Times Review), there are many facts to support this contention:
- Finland’s child poverty rate is less than 5 percent, compared with 25 percent for American children.
- Smoothly functioning and comprehensive health insurance
- A full year of partially paid disability leave
- Nearly a full year of paid parental leave for each child and a smaller monthly benefit for an additional two years (should I or the father of my child choose to stay at home longer with our child)
- Affordable high-quality day care
- One of the world’s best K-12 education systems
- Free college and free graduate school.
"The basic view on government in Norway is that you elect people whose responsibility it is to help create a society where people aren't necessarily 'dependent' on others or government but actually have a fair chance at creating a good life for themselves with the help of good government regulations and equal opportunities."
