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We subsidize their military spending. Denmark is a small country, so they can cruise on the backs of the big guys (Germany, USA). They barely have a standing army and they spend half of what NATO has in its guidelines.
Imagine if we could outsource all our military spending to some other country. With our economy we would have all the same benefits and then some.
Wrong.....
We spend military money because it enriches many a person...and now serves the double duty of spying on each of us almost full time.
We would never spend less because the Military Industrial Complex doesn't want to....
If Denmark didn't sign the treaty they could come up with a couple nukes and be done with it....
Nice try, tho...but this has absolutely nothing to do with the subject at hand. Even if your statement had a grain of truth to it, the amounts involved would be tiny. Examples follow at the end.....
BUT, if you really want to "imagine", just imagine if we had universal health care and spent the same they did per capita. That would be a savings greater than our ENTIRE Military Budget. See what I mean? One of these things is not like the other!
So, take a far-out example and say that 400 Billion US Dollars is used on "protecting" other countries (this is WAY far above the amount spent....and obviously most is spent on fruitless efforts like Iraq, etc. which are not Denmarks problems)........
Now say that we protect approx. 1 billion foreigners (Japan, Europe and many more...again, this is mostly BS since they all have plenty of military)....
Denmark has about 7 Milllion souls....or well less than 1% of those people we are protecting.
Taking it against the total, that would mean Denmark "costs" us about 3 Billion per year, not even a rounding error of our budgeting, let alone anything that "imagine what it could do here"......
If you want to "imagine what it could do", cut our health care and Security State (not protecting Denmark - more like War on Drugs, spying on you, militarization of Police, building more jails, etc.)....then you'll see some real money.
Yes the Nordic countries are great examples of having a strong safety net caring for the poor and allowing capitalism to thrive. While they clearly aren't far left economies they are certainly much better places to live than the United States.
It is thanks to the global security generously provided by the United States that the Nordic countries can spend their money on safety nets. They directly benefit from the taxes of our coffers and the blood of our soldiers.
Without us, the Islamic terrorists would be bringing the fight to them in their campaign to recapture the Iberian peninsula then take over the rest of Europe and the world.
Lots of people think lots of things, especially about "isms" Lots of people think Finland is Scandinavian and would not know a Swede from an Uralic. Lots of people think they understand Marxism as well when they don't.
I don't know, what do you call it? You mean to tell me a 60% tax rate means you can call it something?
If most of the output of the economy is managed by private capital it means its a capitalist system with a generous welfare state. In other words the money is made with capitalism and its spent by the government in welfare in the so called Scandinavian states. This differs vastly from the state managing the economic output. When the state decides to manage the productive society, its more akin to the socialism stage of Marxism. It could spend most of its money on the military with a very limited amount of welfare. Sound like Soviets at all to you perhaps?
Just because you have no idea what you are talking about, don't look at me. You have your own problems, and they are rather severe in the lack of perspective.
You’re trying to be cute by trying to be abstruse and over complicating the issue, but you don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.
Contrary to what we hear from Bernie and other socialists. Most Nordic countries rank very high on the freedom index and are great countries for business.
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One of the most common fallacies of the new populists is to say that their model is the “Nordic” one and that those countries are successful examples of how “socialism works”. When I mentioned it to the Finnish Finance Minister Petteri Orpo at a recent ECR dinner, he could not believe it.
Expropriations, massive tax increases, appropriation of savings and subordinating the growth model to political control is what populists defend. The same as Venezuela, which all of them praised — from Bernie Sanders to Owen Jones or Corbyn and Chomsky — until it collapsed. Then they moved on to the fallacy of “the Nordic model”.
Do you know what interventionists forget about the Nordic nations?
They are leaders in the economic freedom index (Heritage) and ease of doing business according to the World Bank.
Just like the economy is largely crony capitalism based on financial speculation, debt, rent seeking, and less real production and consuming. We also have crony welfare. It doesn't matter if taxes are 30%, 50%, 70%. As long as welfare money is funneled by big corporation it is useless. Examples: load schools with all type of junk foods that don't nourish kids, give them all sort of technologies bought from big corporations, overpriced health care, no tolerance for pity crimes/highest prison population, etc. etc. Non of these things do any real service for people because it's not what they want, it is what top share holders what to give them.
This gets brought up quite often when people on the right claim that country X is socialist (lately Venezuela) when the reality is...its not either. But many Nordic countries are far more socialist as per their definition so they get pulled into the debate in order to point out the idiocy of the argument.
And really its a argument of degrees. And trying to blame socialism for some other underlying issue thats harming the country being discussed.
And hey if they arent going to argue rationally people respond back using the closest similar counterpoint-which is often nordic countries.
I mean, lets be honest here-I've been called a socialist, and worse, for wanting universal healthcare.
Why can people just agree that both capitalism and socialism are needed? People are always going to the extreme, black or white, left or right, rich or poor, Whatever happened to balanced?
Capital is needed for the economy. Welfare or what socialism stand for access to education, health, food, etc. is also needed. The problem with either system is that they get corrupted. I gave a few examples in comment #36. Look at what has happened to the music industry, what a disgrace! It has been rotten by their money making attitude, it used to be about art and talent.
It is so in every aspect of life, money over the human development.
An accusation so well supported by a say nothing babbling post .
You mean to tell me you were not trying to be cute all this time?
Stand up for something instead of leaving a waste trail proving the subject matter is above your level of competence.
It always cracks me up when some coffee shop barista or burger flipper comes on CD trying to sound as if they’re Milt Friedman. LMAO
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