Since it seems as ifthe Tour des Nordiques has started again, I checked to see if there were “Ask the…” threads from other Nordic countries. Sure: Iceland, Sweden and Finland have been covered, but I couldn’t find Norway. Even if it seems as if there are a few Norwegians here.
I don’t have anything to start with, except the obvious question: Do you have any questions about Norway?
And if this topic has been covered before, I apologize profoundly in advance and would already ask a mod to close the thread and point me towards the original one.
I’m glad you came in. For years, I have been hearing about how the Norwegian Government funds its old age pension system. I understand that the Norwegian government has set up an investment fund, which is funded by oil revenue. This fund will be so rich that it will be able to pay pensions to all of Norway’s retirees, even when the oil runs out.
how does it work?
This is, of course, an assumption with a lot of conditions that nobody can know are valid, but here’s my take on it:
We’ve had a universal public pension/Social security system since 1967. We’re socialist, remember? For many years, it worked pretty well, with enough young people paying into it to cover the number of retirees we had. Now, with increasing life expectancy for everyone and decreasing birth rates - essentially what’s happening all over the Western world - there’s a deficit. Or, there would have been if not for the fact that a lot of our trade surplus[sup]*)[/sup] is being invested in the “oil fund”. The oil fund is basically the Norwegian government[sup]**)[/sup] playing the stock exchanges of the world (or, as it’s called in newspeak: investor business), with one important motivation: They’re playing for long-term returns rather than short.
Now, the return on those investments is supposed to cover the deficit in our public pension fund, and hopefully we won’t have to decrease services/increase pension age as much as “socialist” countries with trade deficits will have to do. But since we’re still in the investment stage and building capital abroad, no-one really knows if it will work.
[sup]*)[/sup] All of it oil and gas fueled
[sup]**)[/sup] The money comes from tax on national and international oil companies. We’re socialist, so we tax the oil companies as much as they can take while still finding it interesting to drill for oil here
Yeah, I know it’s a way of preserving fish for months. Which was needed a couple hundred years ago. Not now. Just stop it.
Lefse with lingonberry preserves, meatballs with cream gravy, potatoes with butter & dill, krumkaka --why would you put lutefisk on the same table with all that good stuff? Just stop it.
We have a few traditional dishes that originate from the problem of preserving food from a short harvesting season through a long winter. For some weird reason, they’ve become national relics that most of us claim to love. And some of us love to feed those dishes to the tourists to see their faces
I prefer bokmål, that’s what I was taught at school. But I don’t really have any strong feelings on the topic, I can understand both just as well. And nynorsk has a more saga-like and direct feel to it, so it’s the right language for reading the old Norse sagas in. Bokmål is just too anemic for that use
I understand that prisoners in Norwegian jails are treated much more nicely than American prisoners and that the recidivism rate in Norway is much lower than in the US. True?
Also, I understand that Norway has a socialized economic system that pretty much guarantees that all citizens have food to eat, shelter, and health care, employed or not. True? Or an exaggeration? And that you also have one of the highest per capita incomes on the planet.
You’re from Norway? Do you know Sven? Tall, blond guy? Used to have a beard, but he might have shaved it by now. C’mon, you’ve gotta know who I’m talking about, right?
I don’t have the statistics, and frankly, I’m too lazy to embark on a long-time Google quest to provide cites, but that’s my impression to. Sorry that I won’t be of more help than this
Slight exaggeration. We have public unemployment insurance covered by taxes, providing some 60% of your original income for - i think - about one year. After that, you’re on social security. To qualify, you generally have to sell your valuables (like cars and flatscreen TV), but after that you’re supposed to be provided with an allowance that keeps you from starving or becoming homeless. We have communal apartments indended for those who can’t afford to buy or rent themselves, although the demand is somewhat higher than the number available. We also have public health care: Hospitals are free, a visit to the doctor or the ER costs a fairly affordable deductible of 200-400 NOK (35-70 USD), and anything above a grand total of ~2000NOK (350 USD) over the course of one year is refunded for everyone, rich or poor. We have private health providers who aren’t part of the public system if you want to skip the queue or if you want to pay for something the public system won’t provide (like “unnecessary” cosmetic opreations). Those you have to pay in full yourself. But generally, people don’t go bankrupt because they don’t have health insurance, and even the poor are provided for.
So, basically, we do have poor people in Norway, but generally “poverty” here describes a state where you can still afford the most basic needs like food and a place to live. Not, however, dental care or booze.
If not the highest, at least one of the highest. With correspondingly high costs of living
Yeah, sure I do. We’re only ~5 million people here, so everyone of course knows everybody
Another question: do really rich people leave Norway? (On account of the high taxes?)
Take the Norwegian guy who owns the Timex Watch Co.-is he still a citizen? Or has he moved to some tax haven?
Some do, some (I think most) don’t. The man currently assumed to be Norway’s richest, Kjell Inge Røkke not only lives in Norway, but has also given public support to the ruling Labor Party. OTOH, another of the rich ones, John Fredriksen is currently a Cypriot citizen and lives in London.
Nope, not him. Neither has his daughter Anette who have taken over most of Fred’s inheritance. She still lives in Oslo.
Had a chat with our snowshoeing guide this weekend, and while we were pretty sure you guys invented what we call “cross-country” skiing, we were wondering if a form of showshoeing had been used by your original native inhabitants, or if your ancestors just used skis to avoid sinking into deep snow when out hunting & trapping?
I think I read somewhere that the Norwegians changed their language solely so that it would sound less like Swedish. Is that true?
Do you own a Norwegian forest cat? Are they popular in Norway? I’ve seen them at cat shows and they are lovely. We have a Maine Coon who sort of looks like one.
Snowshoes have never been big in Norway (disclaimer: they might have been in prehistoric times, but there really aren’t many snowshoes in archaeological findings), it’s been skis all the way. Snowshoes have been increasing in popularity the later years, but it’s really a niche market. Skis, now, come in all flavors and varieties, from 10cm wide, 150cm long (4" by 5’) for hunters in forested terrain via steel-edged mountain skis (5-7cm by 190-200cm, 2-3" by 6-7’) to light sport cross-country skis like the ones used in competitions. And of course alpine and Telemark skis. Telemark skis are basically downhill/slalom skis with a Telemark binding instead of the fixed heel alpine binding.
So, basically, our ancestors used skis, not snowshoes. about a thousand years ago, they would often use one short ski with a skin and one longer ski.
Of course not
On a more serious note, I guess the Norwegian diet is very much the same as in other Nordic and North European countries: Limited amounts of veg, often potatoes for carb and either fish or meat. More meat than fish. More and more processed meat like ground meat, sausages and that crap. And deep-freeze pizza and burgers. We do drink quite a lot of milk, though, even as adults. And we take our coffee black. please. Lattes are for metrosexual urban hipsters and a true Norwegian redneck wouldn’t be seen dead with a latte. Even worse is a low-fat soy milk latte, those are generally shunned even by metrosexual urban hipsters.
Hehe, no. We were under Danish rule for about 400 years, so our language is quite influenced by Danish. The western dialects sound slightly Old Norse, with a very slight tonal relationship to Icelandic and Faroese.
ETA: We have, though, had a long-term trend stared by the nynorsk people to make our written language less like Danish. 150 years ago, there was no real difference between written Danish and written Norwegian. That’s probably why we still have almost no problem reading Danish. Spoken Scandianvian, OTOH, is the opposite. When spoken, we understand Swedish more easily than Danish.
Nope, no cat here. I’m a dog person. They are rather popular in Norway, but the most common pet cat is the ordinary Western domestic type.
No tax breaks, but you get a direct allowance from the State from the child is born until he or she turns 18. Tax free. Currently, it’s 970 NOK (some 170 USD) per child per month. And we have State subsidized daycare for everyone to reduce the costs for daycare and give single parents a chance to work. Daycare still costs quite a bit, but we also have support schemes for daycare for job seekers or people taking education.
What’s equally important is probably the right to up to two years of LOA when you get a baby. You get an allowance equal to your salary (within certain limits) for 42 weeks, and most people stretch that allowance over one year.
Not really You may see the occasional TV program where there’s something about those guys, but they’re definitely not in the front of our minds.
A timely thread. My partner and I were going to holiday in Norway this year, but I really think that it is far more likely to be next year now. To that end I have the Lonely Planet travel books- and even bought a book on recipes from Norway (yes- lutefish is in there!).
The main place we wanted to visit was the Lofoten Islands. Have you been there? Any places you would suggest that we should try and incorporate?
Do you mean in Lofoten, Northern Norway, or Norway in general?
Let’s start with Lofoten. You should definitely see the Espolin Johnson museum not far from Svolvær. Kåre Espolin Johnson was a graphic artist and has better than anyone captured the nature and the people in Lofoten. Highly recommended.
Then the towns Svolvær and Henningsvær. Especially Henningsvær is quite picturesque. If you’re into mountaineering, you could try to scale the double summit of Svolværgeita (the Svolvær goat).
The town Å at the westernmost part of Lofoten is nice, and you might like to go out to the island Røst with its seabird colonies and the biggest puffin colony in Norway.
For seeing the midnight sun, I recommend the north side. Fredvang is a very nice town with accomodations. It’s also quite sheltered from the environments even if it’s on the north side.
Fishing and hiking are probably the most characteristic pasttimes for a tourist in Lofoten. Bring hiking gear, raingear, a warm cap and long underwear (preferably woolen) in addition to ordinary clothes like jeans, long and short T-shirts and a sweater or two. Or be prepared to buy some. The weather is unpredictable, and there’s a definite risk of a week or three with nonstop north-westernly winds, rain and temps down into the single digits (celcius), even in summer. And if you’re driving during summer, be prepared for hordes of German, French and Italian mobile homes clogging the rather narrow roads.
If you’re mobile and want to see something slightly different than Lofoten, I can recommend Vesterålen. It’s about a day’s drive northwards.
IMO, the best Norwegian rock and pop bands sing in Norwegian, so they have a limited audience abroad. But I can give a few samplers. Note that I’m an old fart, so I know less about contemporary Norwegian music than the oldies. And the era of decent Norwegian rock was more or less started by the “great four” of the 80s, i.e. Jokke, DumDum Boys, Raga and deLillos.
Young urbanites: Almost never. Older people and in the districts: Quite regularly, often with “kaffe” (not the drink, rather a table of cakes and cookies with coffee, somewhat similar to British afternoon tea). Also at traditional holidays like Christmas.
I don’t have one. My wife has. Basically, the recipe is boiled, mashed potatoes and wheat flour.
Quite often, although probably the most popular UK destination is London, for an extended weekend. Myself, I’d like to take a road trip from England up to Scotland some time.
Many Norwegians vacation regularly at warmer destinations like Spain, Cyprus, Greece and farther away. Recently, the far East (e.g. Vietnam, Thailand) has become more popular, and quite a few students take half a year or a year in, say, Australia. But the big thing among Norwegians is the vacation cabin or vacation house. At the sea, in the mountains or close to a winter resort. Sometimes it feels as if half of Norwegian households have two homes; the ordinary house/apartment and the vacation cabin/house.
