from the hip

Is this really the welfare state people wanted in Denmark? Less than 50% of the people in Denmark are now working to provide for the other half – more than 50% now get their income from the Danish state, reposts Danish newspaper Politiken today.

To me this sounds pretty bad. It raises a lot of questions, even if – as is the case with Denmark – everybody are provided for economically. To me, participation in the labor market is an important thing – that 50% is outside the labor market does not sound so good.

Also – how fair is this? How does it feel for the half that provides the goods? Not my kind of welfare state!

Danish newspaper Politiken reports that pre-pubescent Danish girls develop breasts a year earlier than previously. And this seems not to be as a result of their own hormones, according to a new survey from the Rigshospitalet’s Department of Growth and Reproduction. Politiken writes:

“We believe this is a result of environmental factors – hormone disrupting substances that have a strength to develop breasts despite the fact that the girls do not enter puberty. These substances are everywhere – in cosmetics, foodstuffs, paint – everywhere,” says Sr. Lise Aksglæde one of the authors of the report, naming parabenes and phthalates as two of the substances under suspicion.

More than 2,000 Copenhagen girls between five and a half and 20 years of age have taken part in the puberty survey. Half were surveyed in 1992 and 1993 and the rest between 2006 and 2008. Results have been published in the American scientific journal Pediatrics.

Denmark has been hit very hard by the international recession. Private consumption has dropped rapidly. Car sales are hit especially hard. The Danish newspaper Politiken writes:

Car sales are generally a good indicator of whether people are hanging on to their money; In the fourth quarter of 2008 car sales dropped no less than 23.8 percent. Other goods dropped 1.1 percent.
The new figures come the day after new unemployment figures showed an increase for the fourth month in a row. January jobless figures showed an increase of 5,000 with unemployment now at 2.3 percent.

The Danish GDP for the year 2008 as a whole is negative. And, as yet, there a few signs that the drop in the Danish economy is declining.

Danish newspaper Politiken reports that Danish car sales have dropped dramatically:

Private and business car sales in November 2008 were halved compared to the same month in 2007, according to the latest report from Statistics Denmark.
Businesses purchased some 3,600 vehicles in November 2008 – 2,200 fewer than in the same month last year. Private purchases also dropped dramatically – from 9,300 vehicles last November to 4,700 cars this year.
The biggest drop has been in vans and heavy vehicles. Sales of vans of between 3 and 3.5 tonnes have dropped by 60 percent compared with November last year.

It is hard to interpret this as caused by anything else than the financial crisis.

The Scandinavian countries are known all over the world for their welfare states. The Scandinavian countries have provided their citizens with low priced kindergartens, free education, great universal care programs, social security, care for the elderly, and much more.

But the current international crisis challenges the welfare states of the Scandinavian countries as well. The Danes have now started discussing the future of the Danish welfare state. Danish newspaper Politiken writes:

The prospects for the Danish economy are so bleak that reforms are needed if the country is to avoid cutbacks in schools, elderly care and other public services according to Minister of Taxation Kristian Jensen (Lib).

“With the current state of the economy there are two choices for the future – either less welfare or extensive reforms. The economy is not sustainable in the long run with the reforms and agreements that we have introduced to date,” says Kristan Jensen.

The Danish government is planning to enact a tax reform that will increase the already very high taxes in Denmark substantially. However, the secretary of Finance does not think even this will be sufficient in the currently difficult situation:

“The first step is that we carry through a hopefully ambitious tax reform this spring – and then, when that has been enacted, we must see what the status is. But my view is that a tax reform is not the only tool needed to move forward,” says Kristian Jensen.

The question now is: Will the welfare state of Denmark as we know it surivive? And: Which is the next Scandinavian country to reform its welfare state? My guess is Sweden!

The Danish newspaper Politiken writes that Denmark now is the most expensive country in the EU as far as consumer prices for goods and services is concerned! They write:

Statistics Denmark 2007 figures show Denmark to have the highest consumer prices for goods and services in the 27 European Union countries – 38 percent above the EU average.

Number two on the list is Ireland with 25 percent above the average. The lowest consumer prices among the old EU countries are to be found in Greece and Portugal where prices are 11-15 percent below the average.

The lowest prices are to be found in the new EU countries, with Bulgaria coming in at 53 percent below the EU average.

Denmark is also the most expensive country in the EU for foodstuffs and non-alcoholic beverages where Danish price levels are 43 percent above the EU average.

I am sure those numbers are correct. The only country in Europe more expensive than Denmark is Norway, which is not a member of the EU and thus not included in these statistics.

The little, otherwise relatively liberal country of Denmark, known perhaps especially for its liberal attitudes towards pornography,  may well be one of the most control-oriented states  in the world as far as the Internet is concerned.

Since 2005, the Danish state has monitored everything everybody has been doing on the Internet. The Danish newspaper Politiken writes:

According to metroxpress, the state is monitoring everyone’s behaviour on the internet as a result of legislation that requires all user names and passwords to be lodged with the State and University Library and the Royal Library. The libraries file everything from children’s scribblings on Arto.dk to love letters and profile pictures on Dating.dk.
The technology is known as Internet Harvesting and the Net Archive currently harvests all Danish sites four times per year.
However, some news, dating and other social network sites are harvested daily, according to Eva Fønns-Jørgensen of the Net Archive at the State and University Library in Århus.

Code release
“Danish sites have a legal duty to provide access codes and we have been harvesting text, pictures and audio since 2005,” she says.
At the moment, researchers are the only ones allowed to see the extensive personal material grabbed through Internet Harvesting. But 70 years after the death of, for example, a person with a dating profile, all information comes into the public domain.

The thinking behind this is that people themselves have chosen to place materials on the Internet, and that once it is one the net it is publicly available.

So there we go. Public nudity and liberal rules about pornography. But Big Brother is watching. And letting others watch as well!

1984 has come and gone.

See also: Inventor of the Internet warns against ‘Big Brother’ systems that track the sites you visit

Iceland, which is currently in an economic meltdown, will be getting  help from its Nordic neighbors. The Danish newspaper Politiken writes that:

Iceland’s Prime Minister has been in contact with his Nordic counterparts ‘for some time now’, according to Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen, and Nordic help may be on the way to the beleaguered Icelanders.
The prime minister’s comments came as the benchmark Icelandic index, which has been closed for business for some days, reopened and plummeted a full 76 percent. Trade in Iceland’s three largest banks, which have been taken over by the state, remain suspended.

Elsewhere in the paper, Politiken reports that Iceland will be receiving a borrowing facility for 500 mill. Euro from the Danish national bank. The Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet, on the other hand, reports that the loan is 400 mill Euro, and that the borrowers are Denmark and Norway, both with 200 mill.

See also:

• Times – Iceland secures €200m from Norway, Denmark
• New York Times – Iceland Turns to Neighbors to Prevent a Collapse

Paris Hilton is in Copenhagen today and for a few more days. She is apparently promoting her line of products (bags produced in her name by PH Europe, to be sold in more than 80 countries worldwide) at some fashion event in Copenhagen. She is together with Benji Madden, her rocker boyfriend.

And Copenhagen seems to love her. She creates chaos, says the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet. Especially the media are wild. They are all full of pictures and articles about Paris Hilton, and the TV-stations have shows going where Paris Hilton says “I love Copenhagen” (I think that is about all she has said, so far), and where spectators are interviewed about why and how much they love Paris Hilton.

It is all slightly insane. I mean, so far she hasn’t done anything, and hardly said anything?

I wonder: Will the city remain standing if she shows up tomorrow without her undies?

In Denmark, body paint is becoming fashionable among pregnant women. They go and get their bodies painted, and then, next, get themselves photographed. This is a nice way to create very special and sometimes even spectacular memories of their pregnancies.

I think the pictures are stunning. Very beautiful, and with some very intriguing designs also!

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