Only if the monies raised actually went towards the programs they’re supposed to fund, but let’s be honest... they won’t. Not in the US anyway. The problem isn’t having enough money; it’s how the government wastefully spends the money they already have access to.
It's not about how much you spend it's about how well you spend it. Let's face the sad fact: people usually aren't wise enough to spend their money well, quite the opposite. That's a fact that advocates government involvement in your wallet management. Of course there's a risk of corruption and misuse and you have to figure those out before that. So you need transparency - like public tax records, respectable media and other institutions. I swear the debate on how the money shall be spent is hard and loud in high tax rate countries. The last thing people want is that their tax money is wasted. However, most people agree that there are some purposes that are worth paying for, like your neighbors healtcare even if they're been unemployed for the half of their lives for some unknown reason. It's pretty much just admitting that most of our success is determined by luck instead of our own excellence.
Yes, I already do. When I combine how much I pay in federal, state, and local income taxes; property taxes, sales tax, SSA, Medicare, 401k, medical insurance premiums, life insurance premiums, medical costs, college tuition so on and so forth. But I don’t get much in return. One devastating illness, I’d possibly lose my job since since FMLA is only guaranteed 12 weeks of unpaid leave, go bankrupt, my medical costs may or may not be covered by my insurance, even then I’d have to cover coinsurance and deductions. Don’t even talk about education costs, childcare costs, cost of care when I become old. So yes, tax me 60-70% because that’s effectively what I’m paying anyway, but ensure that I get free healthcare, free college education, paid medical leave, free or subsidized childcare, and take care of me when I’m old and can no longer work.
I´m swedish. I don´t care about numbers or percent tax. What´s important to me is how I can live my life. I have a normal job as a train driver. I own my own house, have a car (Volvo of course), enough money in the bank so I can travel on my vacation (five weeks/year, I was in the US this winter and will go to Japan in October). I have a cottage in the mountains in the north of Sweden where I can go skiing or hiking. I have no debts from studies. I can get healtcare if I need and not being denied by any insurance company who makes profit from my money. I can stop working when I´m old and survive economicaly. I feel free to do what I want. No, the state doesn´t own me even if the taxe is high as some Americans think. Always have to think of how to survive would have stressed me and make me feel not free. America is probably good if you are rich otherwise I don´t think so.
Train driver. Goverment worker? Cant compare you to a normal employee in the private sectors. Same here in Austria. Goverment workers are very wealthy compare to others.
@@myklagenfurt Generally government workers in sweden are worse off money wise but may have some additional benefits not available to someone in the private sector. There are of course outliers
@@andrewgan5055 The average salary for a train driver in Sweden is about 31500 SEK (or 3300 USD) a month. That would then be taxed for about 32% if memory serves and will be about 21420 SEK / 2250 USD in your bank account. VAT in sweden is 25% so you could argue that those 21420 SEK are then only worth about 16065 SEK / 1700 USD for purchasing wares, but that wouldn't be entirely true as VAT is only added on certain wares, and not on most of your regular bills, like rent and so forth.
You forgot to mention a key issue, that corporate tax rates are rather low in Sweden. The high taxes apply only to personal income. This system creates an incentive for companies to operate in Sweden, while still being able to maintain the welfare state.
A complete lie, those taxes mainly go to pay debt to international banks who give loans to Sweden and its schools. They just use schools and kids to steal you, who said in the first place that education must be that long and expensive? Sweden was way richer before those high taxes. Now they sell their companies to Chinese.
@@iironhide6209 I didn't say anything about debunking, did I? My point is pretty obvious, isn't it? It's not a good comparison, 1 small country with 1 huge country.
@@TheCrazierz Both countries have extremely developed economies and are tech hubs of the world. The actual size of the countries do not matter. Admittingly, America's hetereogeneity in culture (multiculturalism and pro-illegal immigrant mindset) does make this comparison a bit iffy.
Ultimately higher taxes won't be effective in the United States until the federal and local governments learn how to spend money. The top two contributors to the national debt are healthcare and the military complex both combined cost over a trillion dollars a year. I believe we have plenty of capitol money to work with but the funds are so poorly spent and misused that we can't allocate the funds to programs such as education, infrastructure and healthcare that actually helps people.
And like 7% or so of the budget goes to pay interests on the debt. 5-7% of the national budget for military spending is quite typical in Europe. USA could decrease the defence budget from around 15% of the budget to around 9% and still be superior in terms of military spending.
@Jonas Jam The debt situation is of higher importance then many realize. National debt is postponed tax. What you borrow today, you don't have to tax today though you will have to pay by tax money sometime in the future. The US National debt is more 3 times larger then Swedens, relative to resp. nations GDP of course (30% for Sweden and 102% for the US). That means that the US is under-taxed by a factor of 3 or so.
they could restructure the military to run as a PMC, a PMC at the size of the US army navy and air force combined with 400k/year grunt salaries would still be cheaper than the current system
A person that makes 78K USD in Sweden takes home WAY more than 23.6 K USD. Way, Way more. I make 442 K Swedish Krona/year (44 K USD) as a Construction worker, and I take home roughly 269 K SEK (27 K USD). Granted, If you earn more you tax more, as a procentage of your income, but not to the Point where 78 K USD becomes 23.6 K USD. Did you mix up marginal tax rate with final tax rate? Because it's not the same thing. Also, 1/3 of the Money that the employer pays, are a tax to begin with and is ofc not taxed again. If your total cost for the employer is 90 K, you pay income tax only tax on 60 K (the first 30 is a pay role tax). And Everything under about 50 K of that is taxed at the regular rate (about 22-25% after deductables, depending on where you live) and only the last 10 K is taxed with an extra 20%.
@@correctionguy7632 They could also have gotten the payroll tax wrong. Basicly, Sweden has a payroll tax of 31.32%. That's a tax the employer have to pay to the government, in addition to your salary. It covers pensions and a couple of other things. If you simplify the math to the level of a 5th-grader, then you could come to the conclusion that Swedish taxes are roughly 60+%, since payroll tax is 31.32%, income tax ~30% (depending on where you live and before deductions. In reality it's about 21-25%), then you just keep ~35%. In reality, the income tax is only calculated on the salary, not the payroll tax, so the math gets wrong.
I have a question. What about inheritance and taxes on that? Do you see a devide between the Swedes who inherit summer houses and those that live in apartments for generations? I feel like that's a larger issue in many countries. How does Sweden deal with that?
@@amdl270 We abolished inheritance tax about 10 years ago, IIRC. No property tax either. Bad moves, as far as I am concerned. Those taxes does more for equality than most other taxes.
With the amount the US taxes it’s citizens CURRENTLY, we would well be able to pay for social services... the problem is the MONEY IS NOT BEING USED FOR THAT. So no matter how much you tax Americans, the corruption in the government will stifle whatever “free” programs we want to implement. It literally doesn’t matter if you tax us at 100%, it wouldn’t solve the problem.
@@gwaiwohng2181 No one has ever suggested anything close to that... the 70% is graduated tax bracket.. of 10million. Try looking up graduated taxes because you sound ignorant
It depends what you do. I don't bug people on their day off but I've gotten calls and texts on my day off. I worked all the time at my last job. I no longer work there. They took advantage of me.
The corporate tax rate in the Netherlands is 20-25% and in Sweden it is 22%. IKEA has a special tax deal in the Netherlands, involving foundations and holding companies in Liechtenstein and Luxembourg, which has been investigated by the EU.
As a Swed i can tell you they messed up the numbers on this one. They failed to factor in the ”employer fee” which is a tax on income that is supposed to go to paying for ”social fees” meaning daycare, healtcare, a small pension and other vauge taxposts. This part of the tax is about 32% on top of the income tax part, which itself is about a minimum of 32%. So even if you make the equivalent of 38000usd a year you pay 32+32% in taxes. And it only goes up from there. Not to mention that sales tax is 25% a cross the board and there are added fees and special tax on all the most expensive commodities.
thats crazy lol. I would run away from that country if it was me. And now even more with the immigration crisis in the country. Sweden is sprinting to destruction.
Aren't those figures off though? I mean the employer fee, as I understand it, is paid prior to your salary, which means you pay your income tax off the remaining bit, not the gross total. It just makes no sense because I know you guys dont pay higher taxes than we do (I am Danish). That's one reason so many Danes live on the other side of the bridge. The way I understand it is as follows: E.g. you negotiate your salary at 50,000. To pay you this, the employer is charged 32%, so he pays 16,000. You then get paid the 50,000, and on that pay 35% (which appears to be what they pay in Stockholm). You pay another 17,500, leaving you with 32,500. So this means that your gross salary (including employee fee) was 50,000 + 16,000= 66,000. But the total taxes paid were 16,000 + 17,500 = 33,500... or just over 50%. Very much like the rest of Scandinavia.
@@alanfrost75 Yes slightly off i guess but the "Employer fee" is currently 31.42% of an employees gross income and is in reality a tax on income and not a fee. But my point was also that that is not where it ends. The Swedish VAT was temporarely jacked up from about 4% to 25%....that was 50 years ago now and we are still at 25%. And on the flip side If you own a company you get to turn over 25% of what you charge to the government. That often means that in retail the govenment makes more profit from your sales than you do. Just cause other scandinavian countries has it as bad as we do does not mean it fine. The VAT is actually the biggest problem. It makes it so that a lot of imported gods becomes unresonably expensive. Sometimes to the point of beeing cost prohibitive to customers. And finaly, it's not like Swedes get what they paid for. When you call the police; they don't come, when you go to the hospital you wait for hours, you have to pay for a ride on the bus or train even though you paid for the road, the tracks and the traincar. The list goes on...
@@antonw-uw4ov lies, VAT is not 25% across the board, food stuffs are 12% etc. ffs trying to correct "misinformation" with yet more misinformation... brilliant bud
Who calculated that take-home pay? Geez, it's 21st century, people, and you still don't know how to calculate taxes. It'd be around 48k USD depending on the municipality.
@@RohanDaDev No, not close. You pay 12% tax from the very first SEK in income. This is *excluding* "tax charges", I.E. taxes payed for specific services (a total of ~32%). Its really, really crazy that you dont know these things. I dont know if you are to blame or if it is our educational system that is insane.
Well, holding your government to account is your responsibility. We have our fair share of scandals too, but we like to remind our politicians come election day, because "The North remembers".
"As President, Trump has pushed us up to $21 trillion in national debt and he is now on track to reach new record debt levels way, way, way above that. … The [Republican] Trump tax cuts have significantly accelerated what is now Donald Trump’s rush to a fiscal crisis much worse than anything he encountered in his Atlantic City Casino bankruptcies." - Lawrence O’Donnell, "Debt Soars Under President Donald Trump Tax Cuts," June 26, 2018, goo.gl/nEAHMN GOP Economic Adviser: Most Irresponsible Tax Cuts In U.S. History, Nov 16, 2017, ua-cam.com/video/rIXxkLnq8pY/v-deo.html "I Trusted You!" Furious Trump Voters REVOLT Over Republican Tax Scam, Feb 5, 2019, ua-cam.com/video/2Q7ud7ESQXc/v-deo.html Budget Deficit Soars To 6-Year High Under President Donald Trump’s Republican Tax Cuts, Oct 16, 2018, ua-cam.com/video/EIuzmxeNbyI/v-deo.html Fed Chairman Powell Says He Is ‘very Worried’ About Growing Amount Of Us Debt, Jan 11 2019, www.cnbc.com/2019/01/10/fed-chairman-powell-says-he-is-very-worried-about-growing-amount-of-us-debt.html Republicans' 'Fiscal Responsibility' Cost Us Trillions, Oct 31, 2018, ua-cam.com/video/FzixrdbPB6g/v-deo.html
@@burdine26.120 it may be counter intuitive, but the national debt doesn't matter. What matters is the bond yealds. It was believed to be a function of the debt, but recent history has shown that there is no limit on how much money America is allowed to borrow. There has not been a bond failure yet, and still the yeald is negative in real terms. Wired times, we have to unlearn what we thought was true about national economy.
@Johnson Taylor more so i started watching these CNBC bits lately and the shift style was felt.. in all cases it looks good and i think VOX wouldn't mind the competition.
You can thank America for that if America didnt they basically all of Asia and Europe would have been Russian rn the U.s sacrifices for the world while the world crises the u.s we should just stop protecting. Them so we can afford all those programs and see how countries come begging to us
we must...or else they totaly deplatform the individual...radio signal reconnisiance AND deep state under cover agency it´s the military weapon they use
Taxes in Switzerland are quite similar to those in USA. In fact a little higher. But this created a somehow false picture. For example they have private healthcare insurance. So premiums don't count forward taxes. But the market is strictly regulated and operates more like single payer system then a free market system. The also spend 3x less of GDP on Defense.
Hausner85 you are wrong, they are sensibly lower. It’s not a case that many celebrities such as Paris Hilton have moved there to avoid high American taxes
@@marianotrani8438 And how did you messured it? By looking at same tax rates? If you want to determine general level of taxation in a given country you should look at share of GDP collected as taxes by the government. US collects 27.1% of GDP as taxes and Swiss collect 27.8%. So in general the taxes are quite similar in both. And now about people who move to pay lower taxes. They are SCAMMERS. The wealth is a result of conditions, opportunities and safety that given society provides. Elon Musk couldn't build his rockets in Somalia. You are take a lot from society in order to become wealthy. And the society has the right to charge you for that in form of taxes. But is you are avoiding paying you are a cheat and should be tratead like one. The government should send IRS after you and not try to appease you by lowering taxes.
Instead, >95% of the commentators have absolutely no idea about their income tax. Thats probably why you see no "war". Theres not really anything left or right about this: sweden is taxing the poor. Not sure if its left or right. Its pretty unique.
Some time ago I asked a Swedish friend of mine about the high taxes in Sweden. He said, quite proudly, "we don't mind because we get value for our tax dollar". That resonated with me. I suppose the reason why other nations are adverse to paying higher taxes is because we don't perceive we are getting value for the dollar. American politicians promoting universal health care should take note and promote the economic benefits and outcomes - not promote it as a government social program or hand out. On average, Americans pay 30% more for health care and live an average of 3 years less than other OECD countries. Much of the savings is driven by better preventative care and elimination of profit and middlemen. After all, insurance companies need to make money for shareholders and they have little interest in preventative care as often insurance is tied to employment so there is less motivation; however, a single payer is going to take the long view. I live in Canada where we have universal medical care but it does not cover drugs like Sweden. I don't mind paying taxes to fund our medical care - I know I am getting value. I only wish it was extended to drug and dental.
Not sure if it was intended, but this was a nail on the head moment. Its in the word "perceive". Yes, the difference - the reason Sweden has this situation - is general perception. Your friend perceives that his money is needed for the services he receives. In reality, this is objectively false. But the perception is what will make him happy or unhappy with the situation. Now, combine this with a government with an insane grip on the market(s), and not least huge influence over media. And not in the US way - where you have very polarized political influences - no, in the Swedish way, where there is just one, single narrative.
Honestly, your friend has had the wool pulled over hes eyes. If you call the police in Sweden, they don't come. If you report a crime they send you back a notice that the case has been dropped in 2 weeks. If you go to a hospital you wait for hours. You have to pay to take a bus or train, even though you paid for the road, the tracks and the traincar or bus. And if you have your own car you get to pay 60% tax on you gas. Taxpayer money in Sweden goes mostly down into the big black hole that is large govenrment, wasted on nonsense.
I was so impressed with the way the Scandinavian/Swedish system was set up when I lived in Uppsala during my exchange year, I plan to move back in the near future once I can secure gainful employment. Jag älskar Sverige, Sverige i mitt hjärta, ja jag vill leva ja jag vill dö i Norden!
Wow du klämde in allt där i slutet. Hoppas du kommer tillbaka och hittar ett bra jobb. fortsätt träna på svenskan. viktigare än många tror, men främst att först, vet många ex amerikaner som pratar engelske hela tiden men förstår svenskan så det går jättebra :D
This is a very similar to Canada's system. Notice how social democratic countries like Sweden, Norway, Canada are always rated the top places to live every year.
Jameel Ja All of those countries have populations that could fit within a single US state. If they had to support 327 million people, you can guarantee things would be different. All of those countries are already experiencing backlash against their socialist and open door policies due to the financial strain it’s putting on taxpayers and their economy. See how welcoming they’ll be in 5 years from now.
@@dymechik721 but wouldn't the larger population allow for more taxes to be collected, it's proportional to your tax base. The more people, the more taxes which means more money for social programs. While you're right, European countries are experiencing a large backlash to immigration, I haven't noticed that level of backlash in Canada. I strongly believe that if you help everybody it's better for society. You never know who/where the next entrepreneur or inventor will be and from which country they will emigrate from. Prime Example is Steve jobs, his biological father was a Syrian immigrant, he was given up for adoption and went on to create the largest most successful business (Apple) in history.
Yet we were one of the poorest countries in most of that time and got rich only because of how world war 2 made many countries lose resources which they had to but from Sweden aswell as removing much of our social democracy.
My parents hastily left their countries and everything they had due to war and had to reestablish themselves in a completely new environment, shortly before I was born. Now, thanks to the welfare of Sweden, I am months away from a degree in law, without drowning in debt and I will always be grateful for the possibilities that this country has given me and my family. För Sverige i tiden
@@petter5721 You know what, random UA-camr? You are right. I am taking my degree, payed by Swedish taxpayers, and putting it to fruit somewhere else:) Great idea! Peace!
@@petter5721 he won't go to the shithole his predecestors created. He will enjoy the easy life he got from other peoples nation by luck that's how globalism works
in the u.s. we should start describing what we pay to private companies for healthcare, education, childcare etc as taxes. I think we would stack up as one of the highest taxed countries in the world.
Correction Guy u realize in Sweden they don’t have the money like in the country to pay for the health care or up keeping of their population because 25 percent of the population has came In 30 years without paying much taxes if paying them at all. Therefore if any economic strife or major disaster hits, the country has a large potential to implode. A large population boom would even be bad for the country as more money is spent on healthcare,child care and schooling. Considering the majorities of a population are in lower class and that the incoming immigrants are known to have large families with many kids their country I not in a great place to succeed in the long term.
In Sweden tax money goes to school, health care (psychologists, hospitals and elderly people who are not able to take care of them selves), police, military, student loans, art in cities, infrastructure and another social services. For instance when I work 30% of my earned money goes to services that I and other people have right to. If I break my leg I don't have to pay for the health care but I have to play for my visit at the hospital but it's not much.
Just look at how bad things are in Sweden. They're clearly suffering under an oppressive tax system. Obviously this should strike fear in all Americans. ; )
I don’t know how to calculate the Swedish taxes because there are so many layers of taxes to keep track of. But if you discuss with people working in smaller or independent accounting firms in Sweden. They can elaborate the calculation and explain that the combined layers of taxes for a company will in actuality be close to 60-70% in taxes. And all those taxes is just being squandered by previous and current governments that thinks that throwing money at problems will solve everything. They are mistaken in their strategies.
Yes American Socialist want to tax the rich super high. Sweden doesn’t do that. They tax the middle and upper middle with high income and VAT tax. If you want to tax the rich you tax Corporates and Capital Gains which Sweden’s rates are both low.
So according to the Swedish tax calculator a person in Stockholm earning in gross 46,000 kr/mo costs the employer ~60,500 kr/mo (726,000kr/yr or $88,000) and takes home ~34,800kr/mo ($50,600). So the actual tax rate for such person is some 42%.
Realised that Singapore's top income tax rate of 22% is relatively low but the qualifying annual income to hit that top rate is low too (S$320,000/US$230,000/SEK1.8m the last time I checked). We've quite a number of other significant taxes too e.g. 30-45% on water bills, on CNG, ~200-300% on cars, ~S$8-10 per 20 cigarette sticks (& no duty-free allowance for tobacco importation)
Top-rated health care in Sweden? LOL. My uncle has lived there his ENTIRE life and the wait to see a specialist can take months; there have been occasions when he has paid his own way just so he or my aunt could receive medical care in a realistic time frame.
@Unicode UTF-8 Name I live in America, so I'm going to have to shut you down on that one. Also, genetic issues account for a small percentage of health issues. For example, the vast majority of cancers are created NOT genetic but are lifestyle and/or environmental. Healthy choices are a major indicator of disease risk.
The key thing in a consumer economy is whether or not its citizens have a substantive amount of money for consumer goods to generate demand. Sweden's high taxes ensures that the basic necessitates of life and social welfare concerns of its people are taken care of, that frees up the remaining take home pay to be spent on consumer goods. America's relatively low taxes in contrast, do not stimulate economic growth because its citizens end up spending a lot of their own money for things that in other countries are paid in common, especially on health care.
Copying and pasting the Swedish model in USA wouldn't work out. In USA we do not have the same labor participation rate, education, and value-added jobs that the Swedes have (I am talking at a general level). We are not as healthy and physically active as they are, so our healthcare costs would be exponentially higher (just look at Bernie's 30 Trillion Medicare-for-All cost over 10 years). They also do not have the state-centric government model, but instead they have a more centralized and powerful central government. Until recently they did not have to deal with the costs of illegal migration (and once they starting dealing with it, the parties on the right started gaining traction in order to give some balance). I am not against importing some reforms that can be customized four our American republic, but just a massive copy-and-paste would be naive.
US would benefit from taxes getting directed towards relevant educations being cheaper and less debt oriented towards the people. Also taxes getting directed towards sick leave policies and maternity leave would add a level of relief to the lower and medium working class. Still any country that blindly tries to copy and model everything like Sweden, will soon find out that the blind is leading the blind. Being proactive in any given issue was never the DNA of Sweden.
Saltponds239 Lol and the same thing for healthcare. We have fairly high taxes as well and we got lots more debt. Our government is corrupted by the private medical industry and public government unions.
1. The USA spends more on education per capita than any other country. And we don't tax (loot) or citizens this much to get this money. 2. Why no mention of the 1990s privatizations and tax/spending cuts in Sweden? 3. Sweden was 6th in the world in GDP per capita in the 1960s (it fell down the ranks). 4. Why no mention of Sweden's lower levels of regulation and government control? (no minimum wage, school choice, partially privatized social security, etc.) This greatly contributes to allowing the market to breathe and be productive. 5. Sweden's tax system is rich-friendly. I doubt our lefties would very much like that. If about half the tax revenue comes from the value-added tax, then that means Swedish taxation is very close to flat. Not to mention their top income tax bracket kicks in at a pretty low rate.
The problem with these comparisons is that the reality of the other country is extremely different from the reality of the US... Of course, there are lessons to be learned, but transplanting a policy from a country that is totally different than yours has high risks of rejection.
They make 78k$ and are only left over with 23,634$?!?!?! 70% dedications, This is crazy!!!!! In Germany it’s about 1/3. Even this is a lot! Employed? No thanks. With a own business I have more control to keep more money!
Okay yeah I saw that too and was like "WTF?". This needs to be explained better, because by the looks of it, this would seriously screw low-income citizens!
@@olzhask.6130 but still 70% deductions. its not just taxes, its taxes, benefits and contributions. the crazy thing is, that it gets deduct per percentage. the more you earn, the more you pay.
@@GeneralBlackNorway what is wrong? its not just tax. its taxes, contributions and benefits. 70% all together as they said in the video. the more you earn, the more you pay. im from Germany. here gets about 1/3 deduct. taxes, health insurance unemployed insurance, retirement plan, etc included in the 1/3 salary deduction.
A complete lie, those taxes mainly go to pay debt to international banks who give loans to Sweden and its schools. They just use schools and kids to steal you, who said in the first place that education must be that long and expensive? Sweden was way richer before those high taxes. Now they sell their companies to Chinese.
I find it quite facinating how citizens from each country seem to crave what the other has: Swedes are complaining about high taxes (ethen when these are going to the benefit of the state). So they escape abroad to get more financial freedom. Americans who feel constantly blown by politicians and companies, want a more equitable tax systems that actually benefit the population.
Linus on the Line that other guy is speaking nonsense. I am also a Swede and many of my family live abroad. The reason most people are going outside is not because of immigration because if that was a thing we wouldn’t be voting for Centre Party, Moderates or other Left or centre right parties. Because most swedes living abroad has voted for Left-centre right parties which aren’t opposed to immigration. The reasons are more complex due and varies a lot, like higher prospect of education in higher levels, and also the fact that globalisation which makes living abroad easier (like tell me, would you enjoy living at -10c throughout the whole winter?) and also some people also move for more financial prospects.
Grass is always greener on the other side. Also, living in northern climate can be really depressing. Imagine getting only 5 hours of proper sunlight per day.
I currently live in Sweden, and my experience is, if you are planning to have a family, Sweden is the best country. You will get the most out of your tax payment through education, child support, health care, and daycare. However, if you are single and not planning to have a child, I think you can better off by residing elsewhere. Don't get me misconstrued; you still get an education, health, and unemployment benefits. But if you are in a demanding profession (computer science, IT, Software Engineering, Nurse, Medical doctor, etc), you have a high probability to get more remuneration after-tax in other countries.
This video is a bit misleading. Sweden takes in almost as much in V.A.T and excise taxes, as it takes in from income tax and those are regressive taxes on consumption, where the poor pay exactly the same as the rich. Also, the income tax in Sweden is very high for low-income earners as well as the rich. For example, someone in Sweden who makes 20,000 pays as much income tax as someone who makes 200,000 in the united states (32%). The top 10% of income earners in the united states pay about 45% of all taxes. In Sweden, the top 10% only pays about 27% of all taxes. Also, Swedish corporations pay about the same corporate tax as corporations in the US do, so no, they don't tax big business. Finally, Sweden has a pro-competition free choice model in education, something that teachers' unions in the US would never allow simply because its too 'neoliberal'. Their education is really an amazing example of what they do so well, which is to strike a balance. The state collects taxes and pays for education, but citizens are allowed to pick any school they want for their kids and a lot of schools are privately ran. That's how you take care of your people. You combine the free market and welfare into a hybrid model. Sweden has a great free market and a wonderful social safety-net that makes of use of that market.
Education is paid by the municipalities (kommuner), not states (landsting). There are very few private schools in Sweden (probably less than 10). There are however many "free schools", which are run by private entities but almost entirely reimbursed by the municipalities (skolpeng). And the free schools must adhere to the national curriculum set by the Agency for Education (skolverket). So it's not a free market. There's lots of regulation.
@@WhiteRussianBC As I wrote, it is a pro-competition free choice model, not a free market. All countries have regulations on education. I was referring to how they choose to deliver the service, which i think is excellent.
@@harry24798 Ok. The "free choice" model was introduced in the 90's, but it has faced criticism due to increasing school segregation. The leftist party wants to get rid of it completely. The majority of teachers are also against it, according to a survey.
It is all about the quality of life for the Citizens. When the Citizens needs are satisfied, when citizens are happy, when needs of education, health care and family time are addressed and services provided for children to grow, all the citizens will prosper. When the citizens prosper the country grows and the use of fear to divide the winners and losses will no longer be effective.
And yet all these Scandinavian and quasi-socialist countries of Europe were coming apart at the seams, ready to deport, imprison and exterminate immigrants from a wave of immigrants from Syria. They have proven how stable and happy their citizens and countries are indeed under these socialist systems.
A complete lie, those taxes mainly go to pay debt to international banks who give loans to Sweden and its schools. They just use schools and kids to steal you, who said in the first place that education must be that long and expensive? Sweden was way richer before those high taxes. Now they sell their companies to Chinese.
No, the estonians are the ones that were only involved. The business and idea was created by a Swede and a Dane, three estonians coded the software. It's a swedish startup.
@@HIDDENSAINT McDonald's employees make like at least 20k here which is practically getting them homeless at that point but far better here. People here want Free healthcare is because we think we won't pay for it, but we get taxed for it. Sales Tax alone is 8.5% where I live and that doesn't include the stuff that comes from my paycheck. People just want free stuff without working for it.
@@ScottiPimpin McDonald's in Sweden has to pay their workers more. Housing isn't nearly as expensive as in the US even if it can become high in central Stockholm. There are government programs in place to help people who doesn't make enough money to survive on their own.
Correction: Sweden's population has exceeded 10 million since at least 2017 (if not as early as 2016). Those statistics come straight from the Swedish Central Statistics Bureau, whose job it is to keep track of national statistics like these.
I like the idea, highly doubt that can be the case in the US. The government does a poor job managing the money they have access to right now. Over staffed and underpaid in some agencies and under staffed and over paid in others.
As someone who's grown to like a more fiscally conservative view, it's oddly comforting to see how Sweden has an "efficient" tax and welfare system, though I'd like to hear whether or not there are some parts of their healthcare system that can bottleneck healthcare delivery.
Loose in some limited respects, but much stricter than America in other aspects. Food and chemical safety, worker's safety, worker's rights, etc. are very regulated, and unions are much stronger than in the US. And yes, we have a voucher system, but most people go to public schools run by the local government. There's basically no privately funded education (maybe 4-5 schools in the entire country). And unlike the US, where school funding is based on the parents' wealth (absolute insanity), the worst-performing schools are given the largest amounts of money and the best-paid teachers.
@@albinjohnsson2511 I think the problem we have in the US is corruption and allocation of funds. In some cases poorer schools are given extra funds and the money is still wasted in corrupt teachers Unions bad spending habits. I mean just look at what happend with Covid 19 the teachers Union in Chicago was saying your a white supremacist or internalized your whiteness if you wanted the schools to open up closed schools affected poorer schools more than rich schools because many of the upper class can put their kids through private school and many private schools have been open for a while. Not to mention these high schools pretty much pass anybody. Are diplomas are diluted compared to past generations. You can get D's in all of your classes and still graduate. You can almost do nothing and still pass, but it varies from state to state. I'm in CA it's a good idea to look at how other countries run their school systems, but The problem I have with comparing the US to Nordic countries is that we are a way more diverse and way more populated country. It is not an apple to apple comparison by any means.
The recession in the 90’s was because of high regulations, high taxes and “social democratic” policies. The government ran out of other people’s money. We bounced back because we took away those high regulations. But now we are running out of other people’s money again.
Sweden was the 3rd wealthiest country in 1968 before their welfare state was big. The welfare state grew enormously and within a short period of time they were only the 14th richest. Only other advanced country to have a bigger relative decline has been Japan. Denmark was catching up with the US in gdp per capita before they significantly expanded the welfare state in the 1970s. They then stopped catching up. Even before becoming big welfare states Nordic countries had some of the highest life expectancies in the world. Despite being backward and relatively impoverished midway through the 1950s Singapore and Hong Kong through a relatively free market, free trade and low amount of government spending now have higher life expectancies than all Nordic countries, even though Nordic countries were far ahead midway through the 20th century
Nominal GDP per capita is not everything. You must also look at Poverty rates, GDP PPP per capita (Which can tell you the cost of living) and Social mobility. The US has higher GDP per capita than Sweden, But it also has higher Poverty rate.
@@TheProcrastinator6 And lets not forget, that in Singapore, they have Mandatory Savings Accounts for medical expenses and Housing, in lieu of high taxes.
@@TheProcrastinator6 that's true but that doesn't mean that if government hadn't mostly monopolised the housing market that a succesful free market in housing couldn't have come about. Overall Singapore gov. still spends less than 20% of gdp, whereas US spends about 40%. So yes, you won't find a single country that doesn't take some people's money and give it to others, but Singapore and Hong Kong do a lot less of it than Western countries do and still get better results in life expectancy and education
@@jascrandom9855 I agree. The poorest Americans probably get far worse education than in Sweden. However a well educated Swede could probably have a better standard of living in the US than in Sweden. A poor education system isn't too closely related to the tax rates. Turing education into a private free market would help more than giving money to an inefficient government. Scandinavian governments are the least corrupt in the world. That's not the case in the US
The people that wants to raise taxes to support social services are the very same people who are misappropriating such funds; that is, our government. Also, the Nordic model functions because, in the case of Sweden for example, it is a homogeneous society. They do support their own people. They do not have millions of people per year who show up in their country to be taken care of. Besides, money doesn’t grown on trees particularly here in the U.S.A. And, it is a fact that many undocumented arrive here, not because they’re suffering persecution, but because they have families with no means of support.
High taxes definitivly slows growth, at least when you tax small businesses heavily. Me, as a small business owner in Sweden would employ tomorrow if the taxes on employees wasn't 31%. It cost me ~$4000 to write a $2000 paycheck. Those money are then taxed 25% (on most goods) in VAT. America wouldn't be the worlds biggest economy today with the Scandinavian taxes yesterday.
Det kostar dig inte 4000 att betala ut 2000. Det kostar dig 2000 att betala ut 4000, de 2000 du tror att du betalar, betalar arbetstagaren i skatt. Att du gör inbetalningen, rent fysiskt, gör det inte till dina pengar.
@@victorcapel2755 Arbetsgivare betalar 31,42% i arbetsgivaravgift innan arbetstagaren får sin bruttolön, som i sin tur skattas på ca 30%. Arbetsgivaren ska även betala ut 12% i semesterersättning på den anställdes bruttolön. Spelar väl ingen roll hur beskattningen är fördelad. Har en anställd 20 000 i utgifter per månad är det 20 000 denne behöver i fickan. Om dom pengarna beskattas av arbetsgivare eller arbetstagare spelar i sammanhanget mindre roll?
Mike Jag vet vad man betalar. Jag har haft anställda själv. Min poäng var att inkomstskatten inte är dina pengar, det är inte du som betalar den. Det är du som gör inbetalningen, men det är din arbetstagares pengar. Samma med semesterersättningen. Dessutom beskattas inte arbetstagare med 30% i Sverige, snarare 21-25%. OM du betalar in 30% betalar du för mycket till skatteverket och för lite till din arbetstagare (du bör räkna in jobbskatteavdraget), det får de tillbaka på skatten, men det är onödigt att skatteverket får de pengarna under året istället för arbetstagaren. Det du betalar är arbetsgivaravgiften. Det är dina pengar.
Sweden’s finances are in free-falling right now. The Crone is falling with 5% per year since we’re not producing enough or have quality products that anyone would like to buy! We HAVE been doing ok only in spite of socialism, not because of it. Taxes has a sweet spot that makes the business flourish because the people are well taken care of. Today though the taxes aren’t giving us nearly enough in return and even going to work in comparison to stay at home with a salary from the government is not always justifiable. About the healthcare: there is a waiting list so long that people are dying before they get the treatment they sorely need. If you want to know how Sweden’s finances are doing - look at the ex Soviet Union, because that’s where we are heading! This is no bleeding Utopia!
Motivates Me as another Swede, cuz I guess you’re one too, I cannot agree less with this statement. Our healthcare is far from inadequate and a lot of people manages to survive because of it and if you compare it to a lot of other countries, even our neighbors, Sweden still has one of the best survival rates. Of course things can be better but that’s always how it is. No country will ever be a utopia. The fact that Sweden is so prosperous without any big product like Norway’s Oil for example is already amazing. The amount of entrepreneurs that start businesses and contribute to Sweden’s economical growth is astounding. Our economy is more based on businesses rather than a specific product like Norway. Yes financially it is going downwards now and it is important to take action to make things better but growth comes and goes
Sweden does not have high taxes, Sweden have high taxes on wages. As said in the video there are no taxes on wealth, capital, property, no heritance tax, no gift tax, and in reality virtually no capital gains tax. Bigger companies can negotiate their corporate tax. So although Sweden seem to pride itself for their high taxes this apply mainly for wage work.
@Harry Lagom Yeah... trade unions... About that... Too bad we in North America basically broke their back years ago. Shareholder profits comes before worker safety, you know.
In the USA, both education and healthcare are ridiculously expensive. Long story short, there are too much corruption and they are too powerful to bring to justice. The question should not be about high taxes with better government service vs low taxes with less government service. The proper question is how to address this runaway prices in education and healthcare in USA.
Ja the American model would be more acceptable if they could remove all the corruption ACA is not like the Swedish model but if you could pay a reasonable amount then it's up to you if you like have a ACA insurance or not
So ultimately Sweden has taken the employer and employee contributions that go into the void of benefit insurances and collects them as taxes. Then provides the services that the taxes pay for with fewer middlemen at a more efficient cost to the tax payers taking care of most needs. So the take home they have is really what they have for food, housing, transportation and entertainment. Looking at my pay stub on the contributions based on my base salary of 65k plus the employer required contributions (social security & medicare matching and Healthcare Plan cost) to employ me. Currently There is already a 37.72% tax wedge. I'm not including my 401k or life insurance as I didn't catch those mentioned in the video so those are still coming out after that wedge before take home. Which is kind of misleading considering my take home is actually 55% and after house, care, student loans and personal loan and monthly utility bills, etc. My disposable income for food, entertainment and travel is roughly 7% of my salary. Yeah in about 5 years when my loans are paid off that grows drastically, but I think I'm pretty average in the financial situation most Americans are out of college and it takes a decade before the bills are paid off where we have full disposable income. But, it doesn't really seem like there is much of a difference in what is going on as far as out of pocket cost between myself and the average Swedish employee. The biggest difference is the fact that most of the funds I pay goes to a bureaucracy and middle men all taking a very large chunk with no accountability or book public keeping to prevent abuse and overcharges to the systems that those funds go into. I've pointed out on different videos and on twitter threads that healthcare and medicare contributions for myself. Costs almost $11k between myself and my employer before insurance touches a single penny on my bills. That is an insane amount of money lost into a void before I get any high level of care beyond basic shots and checkups. Which often don't even require $500 annually. So more than 90% of what I effectively pay for never comes to me, which is a massive massive loss to the tax payer under the ACA because it forces people to pay into middleman after middleman all taking a share before the hospital gets paid. The hospital overcharges to try and get a better negotiated price which hurts people without insurance because the billing is based on consumers never seeing the bill for these outrageous charges. The sickening thing is that most people don't know that the ACA has to backend fund the insurances to cover preexisting conditions via other taxes collected which is not measurable for an individual level. So it is even more than what I have calculated already. We also don't need "free college education". We need better public education that prepares children to be adults, which has fallen off drastically to leaving 18+ year olds highly dependent on their parents and social hand outs instead of knowing how to get basic job skills, pay taxes, have a monthly or weekly budget. College is meant to be a focused education on a skill or study that can be leveraged in a career. Now it's a high school replacement and doesn't even give the skills needed for that area of study the graduating student can pick up in the job force without additional training. This defeated the purpose of a college degree being a requirement for a job. The degree was meant to signify the graduate already had the training and needed skills and didn't require more training to take on the job. My father went through a 2 year trade school for a position that now students have to go through a masters program for the exact same education the 2 year trade school gave over 30 years ago. So before there is "Free college" there needs to be fix for this massive gap that has grown in education. I also think schools should be taxed 100% on all profits made from sports to discourage the push for funding sports over the actual curriculum of the students and the continued cuts in programs like art and music. They can have sports and sporting events and take what they need from revenues for equipment, travel and staffing. But if the profits don't fund academia directly there after gets taken away from school.
He keeps on telling that we spend taxes on education and health care. But then when you look at where does money actually go to you get a bit upset. It doesn’t go to much to the workers. I just graduated collage as an HVAC engineer. But what I learned in school doesn’t really help to much, all the equipments we used was from 20 years ago. We didn’t have a teacher for over 3 months because the school couldn’t afford it. We had one old guy who took a train from Stockholm every 5 day but he hadn’t been working for over 10 years so he had no clue what kind of refrigerant they used and the ones who were banned. What they don’t say it what schools they put their money to. They give all the money to school that has good impressive education, all the other education that is some what hard or complicated for an average citizen to understand we just get left in the mud. Really do wish in school they would have taught me how taxes work, how I can apply for a job, how to write a VC, how to search for UIF if I’m unemployed or TELL ME ANYTHING THAT WOULD BENEFIT ME!!! No instead of that teach me about the WW2 in three different grades, yeah really need to know about religion through 5 different grades when I’m atheist or hey teach me ALL THE USELESS MATHEMATICAL FORMULAS I WILL NEVER HAVE ANY USE FOR!!! It’s fine teach me nothing that I actually will have use for in life I’ll be fine. Health care is the only thing you actually successfully did right, although it’s fine that you say that you want to help the old people who built this country then take away all their money so they can’t even pay for their medication. Swedish politics honestly disgusts me
You are right except for religion, it is a complete lie, those taxes mainly go to pay debt to international banks who give loans to Sweden and its schools. They just use schools and kids to steal you, who said in the first place that education must be that long and expensive? Same for medicine. Sweden was way richer before those high taxes. Now they sell their companies to Chinese.
Most of Swedish companies are moving jobs to East European countries - Poland, Hungary and more and more to India and China. Because of high salaries in Sweden and also because of high taxes
@@albinjohnsson2511 Sweden's tax bracket is much less progressive than much of Europe, or countries like the US or Canada. Sweden has consistently lowered its tax brackets and they completely eliminated their top tax bracket. Even with the 15% rise of the Swedish Krona to the US dollar, the top tax bracket in Sweden is only $81k USD (was only about $70k USD at the beginning of 2020). Every one who makes more than that pays the same percentage. Swedish taxes are high, but they are much less progressive than the US, for example, where someone who makes $600k pays almost twice the rate of someone who makes $70k.
@@kavinsky2 do you not understand the population is largely hegemonic while in the US there are vast swathes of different income levels, lifestyles, and much larger population sizes for DIFFERENT demophrahic groups. as in there might be more elders to young adults etc. This isnt a copy and paste situation.
They saved their economy in the 90s by moving AWAY from socialist policies. Also, they can afford high taxes while not hurting their economy by having an even freer market than the U.S. end of story
As an Immigrant who has lived and done business both in Sweden and In the USA. Doing business is very difficult in Sweden due to the bureaucracy and hard market penetration barriers. Selling products to Americans is much easier than swedes as they all have limited sources of income and are very stingy in trying new things. Americans fall in love with a product and will spread it easily amongst their peers while Swedes do not. Having employees in Sweden is very difficult as their taxes are very high and they are backed by Unions. You cannot fire someone due to incompetency if they have a permanent contract, so workers get very lazy and start calling in sick and you still have to pay them!!! I have been here for the past 10 years and made a good enough fortune but I can still say making money through a business is very difficult here. Most start-ups operate at a loss for 3-5 years, only to get bought up by a big company that has "strong" ties with the government.
higher tax means, rather than you deciding what to buy with your money, the government decides it for you. it's your money, but government will spend it for you.
@@alexjones7845 in the end what you pay for is a very generous welfare system. I believe that the Swedish people get more in their pockets when they not have to pay health insurances, save money for college etc etc.
@@alexjones7845 it all comes down to how that money is being spent. The reason why this system won't work in the US is because taxpayers' money are squandered on illegal immigrants and other bloated useless welfare programs
@@1N73RC3P7OR lol what? It's owner by swedes but they have their fund in the Netherlands. So most of the money end up in funds to avoid taxes. It's still owned by swedes
@@sebastiant4206 ofc I mean that ikea is owned by swedes but this is an Ikea in the Netherlands, it says "ingang" which means entrance in Dutch and it has a Dutch flag.
this video is wrong on many of its facts, as for example the amount someone would effectively come into wealth if they earned above 79000 dollars, the sum they would actually gain is around 40000... If you want to get a correct picture, research yourself.
Not beeing mean to our neighbour sweeden, but Norway has way higher Tax again. The Tax is so high Norwegians go to sweeden to buy groceries on a regular basis for those who lives along the border.
Mækkel Montages that’s really cool, I really wanna go to Bergen one day! I had been to Oslo, Larvik, Sandefjord, Alesund and Trondheim! Anyway you guys have so many DJs popping up from there so that’s cool haha! I am from the opposite end of you, Stockholm, so Norway is also pretty far. I take flights most of the time. It’s indeed quite expensive, everything especially food cost substantially more whenever I am in Oslo. It would seem it has to be cheaper considering Norway literally has a huge investment arm amounting to €3 trillion and a handy oil money business but it is quite the opposite lol. But then again I don’t think it’s that bad, we are all way better condition then most other countries so at the end of the day as long as it’s sustainable, there isn’t much negative. Maybe on a long run there needs to be something done for lower middle class people as the taxes in both countries seem to effect them quite a bit, a better government support to them would be something I would appreciate. That way the kinks in the current tax system in both countries could be refined further
well one the subject of corruption, the problem in america is that their government has barely changed in the last 200 years with such an outdated system its no wonder the republic is dysfunctional
@@johnpathadan right, you basically have to depend on those social programs and lower cost housing and stuff if the equivalent of 25k a year is enough to sustain your living expenses. It certainly wouldn't be here. I would've imagined that those higher tax brackets would've started in say the $100,000 us range. Again, not super familiar with cost of living there but in the US $25,000 a year would be crippling paycheck to paycheck abject poverty.
I got a question! Sweden is always slammed as a hellscape when people talk about how their politics are a failure it's a horrible place to live, a horrible country. I know it's politics and I won't get further into it... but how bad is it?
Swede here. It's not a horrible place to live. The political issue is not good. But almost all European countries are dealing with nationalists now and there's similar issues in many other countries here in Europe. The way of living has not changed at all. People are happy, healthy and working. Come and see for yourself! :)
Sebastian Tomic the politics is fine. I don’t know how people get the idea it is bad. The fact that SD is in emergence is dividing both the left and right bloc. Anyway the fact that Annie Löof joined Lofven’s government is kind of a progress in seeing both blocs having some unison. I just hope Ulf Kristessan doesn’t align himself with SD, it will be horrible for them because Moderate supporters will basically flock to Centre and Liberals.
The Swedish tax system is the very opposite of what Americans want. Sweden(and other Scandinavian nations) tend to have some of the lowest corporate taxes in the developed world while individuals pay around half their income on tax. In the United States, the prevailing narrative is that corporate taxes should pay more while individuals want to pay the lowest taxes possible . Also ,Sweden eliminated the inheritance tax over a decade ago, has no taxes on wealth and no property taxes( though it does have municipal taxes that are basically property taxes by proxy). So if you want the Swedish model, expect to pay at least 49 to 60 percent in total taxes if you earn over $38,000 while seeing Amazon pay around 21 percent in taxes.
If you save money and put it in real estate you can get really good tax write offs especially for an S corp. It's actually pretty good for businesses, Sweden's tax laws really encourage business, not exactly a tax heaven but a good environment especially with the spendy citizens. Also no property tax Edit: nvm they mentioned it in the video
They have those numbers wrong. With a normal salary you pay around 30% income tax. There is a 25% VAT on all goods tough, and high taxes on alcohol, cigarettes and gas for example. But, Sweden has a payroll tax of ~31%. That's a tax the employer have to pay to the government, in addition to your salary. It covers pensions and a couple of other things. And you as an employee don´t see that. That is probably where they find that number. So a person earning lets say 50k a year would roughly get 35k out. Not 19k!
Because some people, by no fault of their own, would literally die without redistribution? It's not that hard to grasp. There are also more selfish reasons to favor distribution since it simply makes for a nicer society (less crime, better-educated public, better average health, etc). Things like infrastructure, security, power, encouragement, good schooling, rich parents, and possibilities are not equally distributed. To be rich you first have to have a certain amount of luck. How any thinking person can fail to fathom this is beyond me. It's also beyond me how anyone could be fine with a couple of extremely lucky billionaires hoarding extreme amounts of wealth while other people - real living human beings with hopes and dreams - die of easily preventable disease and starvation.
@@albinjohnsson2511 It's hard to disagree with some of your points, but you take really idealistic view of socialist society. The biggest mistake you make is you assume that those "extremely lucky billionaires hoarding extreme amounts of wealth " are going to pay those 61,85%. Nope, it's the middle class who is going to take the hit and the healthiest society is where the middle class can thrive, giving jobs to low income workers (which in my opinion shall have really low tax burden). Also death is part of a human nature. I believe that anyone shall be entitled to healthcare and curation of diseases (which may be costly), but in practical terms there is a limit how you can help or in other words whether it's worth it to invest e.g. $500k into giving someone few more years to live. It's sad, yet it's nature... and I don't think you need 61,85% tax in order to provide fair healthcare service to anyone.
Dennis Pietrandrea I live in Sweden and my take home is 30k - I own my own home and total expenses (including restaurants) rarely go beyond 10k considering everything we get for ”free”. That is 20k every month to consume on fun things (or better yet, invest). Entry level jobs in Sweden has a take home of about 17k which is plenty to live a good life. It’s not as bad as you think.
@@TheRealCaptainAwesome See in my eyes that is very bad. If you make 30k take home at a non-entry level job and I can flip burgers and make almost as much as you that is a problem. It defeats the purpose in my eyes of going to school to do a job that is infinitely more stressful with many more hours to work when I could just flip burgers and live well.
@@dennisp8520 I definitely see your point... and in some ways, I do agree. I just meant that while I would make a lot more in the U.S. my living expenses would also be much higher there. And if you end up in an accident or get sick the costs seem to be extremely high in the U.S. compared to a few dollars in Sweden. In Sweden, a 13k difference in take-home improves your finances by way more than it sounds like. And in my case, that is the salary 2 years after school. Basically, you've got higher salaries in the U.S. but also much higher living expenses. In Sweden, the numbers are smaller, but you never have to worry about getting sick, etc and the money you get can safely be consumed (even if one might want to invest it). No system is perfect.
@@dennisp8520 It is obviously easier to get rich in the U.S, but at the same time there are people not able to get proper healthcare there. In Sweden most people are able to live great lives without worrying about money. But yes the gap between high salaries and low salaries are obviously lower. Pros and cons with all systems.
Dennis Pietrandrea That doesn’t have to be a problem. If ‘you’ would rather not study and can make a living wage flipping burgers, then do it-why is that bad. I think what’s often left out of the conversation in the discussion is the fact that there are clearly differences in the ideology, mentality (or whatever you want to call it) between between Americans and Scandinavians, in general. I think most Americans would agree with you that 1) flipping burgers is not a very dignified job 2) it’s only worth investing in anything (time, money, education) if it means big returns for me as an individual. The Scandinavian mentality is more collective. All workers and jobs are deserving of dignity-equals labor unions for just about every sort of work and fair wages. Scandinavians are willing to pay more taxes because, of course, they find the trade-off worth it-affordable healthcare, childcare, education, paid leave etc. BUT, there is also this sense of realization that it’s not just about ME getting all that I can get that ultimately will make ME happy BUT that my ultimate wellbeing is tied into how well (or not well) those around me are doing. Scandinavians definitely enjoy spending (and do) on eating out, coffee shops, entertainment, vacations, technology etc BUT they probably don’t spend as much on these things as Americans-maybe because they have less disposable income..? Don’t know. But, again, they generally don’t mind because they see the benefits playing out in the larger society.
Big taxes make people more dependent on government. Like they said, it all depends on how the money is spent and how it's spent is decided by politicians. While for them it seems to be working so far, making everyone overly-dependent on government is prone to failure at some point.
in sweden it works because they are a democracy and not a two party republic that means in sweden people get accurately represented more than they would if the used the american system
Yes... Something most it be. Let me think... .... .... ... No... can't think of anything. Maybe the weather, the cold and dark half the year. But that have nothing about the money.
I guess the catch comes during tax time. Rather have that instead of having huge student loans and a very expensive healthcare. So much red tape here compared to over there which does screw everyone. I'd take that catch.
Do you want to pay double for your cars? Do you want to be taxed starting at half your income? No, you would never agree to that and you'd never leave America in order to move to Sweden either.
Not rationing big portions of your paycheck to daycare or student loans because you're rationing 43% of your paycheck to taxes which are then rationed to daycare or postsecondary education doesn't change your big picture. The fact that so many people are confused by this financial shell game is seriously concerning. Free means you ration zero dollars. It doesn't mean adding a middle man the shows up with a gun and demands your money or else.
As a good friend of mine who’s Swedish says... in Sweden it’s a crime to be rich as you’ll be taxed back to being upper middle class. But the social security net is so good, people don’t mind. Also, it helps not to have enemies or have an economy based on running a war machine as taxes can be used FOR the people than lining the pockets of defence contractors(But Swedish firms make excellent guns and the USA is an important market). Although, she does buy a load of electronics when she visits the US. 🤣 Can’t let go of good deals.
@@ХейХей-ю3ф no, it's not punishment. You still pay the same taxes for what you've been paying before. For example: Let's say there are 3 tax thresholds. -over 20000 - 20% -over 30000 - 30% -over 40000 - 40% If you earn 15000, then you don't pay any taxes. If you earn 25000 you pay only for this 5000, so all you pay is 1000. If you earn 35000 you pay nothing for 20000. You pay 20% for the next 10000, which is 2000. And you pay 30% for the next 5000, which is 1500. Then it goes the same when you reach another threshold. So you still are richer than someone who earns less. You say "it's punishment". But amount of work is not proportional to the money you earn. I mean, it's better in Sweden, but look how it looks like in other countries. Also - someone who is very rich - like Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates will never be able to spend all this money. They also don't work like 50 (or 500 or 500000) times harder than their engineers or their janitors or whoever. Im not saying to tax them, so we take like all of their money. I'm saying that they should pay more than poorer tax payers. They still will be rich. Redistribution also benefits the rich (not the richest, but the rich yes). System is more stable. Economy is less vulnerable to crises, if there are smaller inequalities. www.equalitytrust.org.uk/economic
When people talk about taxes in different countries they often leave out the fact that the US has state and local taxes as well. We should be having the federal government fund the states so state taxes are only supplemental. Also: Federal taxes don’t fund spending. Taxes are a means to reduce inflation.
The reason why higher taxation in the US is looked at with skepticism is, that more money would end up in Government's treasury which could then be used to significantly improve healthcare or education which would mean less money left to be spent in Walmart. This is what large corporations are afraid of. People may become self-sufficient. No more sheep to be sheared.
Would you pay more in taxes for better health-care or more social services?
CNBC Hi, this is the first comment to you and replied to you the first time.
Only if the monies raised actually went towards the programs they’re supposed to fund, but let’s be honest... they won’t. Not in the US anyway. The problem isn’t having enough money; it’s how the government wastefully spends the money they already have access to.
Perhaps you at CNBC haven't watched what happened to Michael Dell at Davos
ua-cam.com/video/CLD621JTPaA/v-deo.html
It's not about how much you spend it's about how well you spend it. Let's face the sad fact: people usually aren't wise enough to spend their money well, quite the opposite. That's a fact that advocates government involvement in your wallet management. Of course there's a risk of corruption and misuse and you have to figure those out before that. So you need transparency - like public tax records, respectable media and other institutions.
I swear the debate on how the money shall be spent is hard and loud in high tax rate countries. The last thing people want is that their tax money is wasted. However, most people agree that there are some purposes that are worth paying for, like your neighbors healtcare even if they're been unemployed for the half of their lives for some unknown reason. It's pretty much just admitting that most of our success is determined by luck instead of our own excellence.
Yes, I already do. When I combine how much I pay in federal, state, and local income taxes; property taxes, sales tax, SSA, Medicare, 401k, medical insurance premiums, life insurance premiums, medical costs, college tuition so on and so forth. But I don’t get much in return. One devastating illness, I’d possibly lose my job since since FMLA is only guaranteed 12 weeks of unpaid leave, go bankrupt, my medical costs may or may not be covered by my insurance, even then I’d have to cover coinsurance and deductions. Don’t even talk about education costs, childcare costs, cost of care when I become old. So yes, tax me 60-70% because that’s effectively what I’m paying anyway, but ensure that I get free healthcare, free college education, paid medical leave, free or subsidized childcare, and take care of me when I’m old and can no longer work.
I´m swedish. I don´t care about numbers or percent tax. What´s important to me is how I can live my life. I have a normal job as a train driver. I own my own house, have a car (Volvo of course), enough money in the bank so I can travel on my vacation (five weeks/year, I was in the US this winter and will go to Japan in October). I have a cottage in the mountains in the north of Sweden where I can go skiing or hiking. I have no debts from studies. I can get healtcare if I need and not being denied by any insurance company who makes profit from my money. I can stop working when I´m old and survive economicaly. I feel free to do what I want. No, the state doesn´t own me even if the taxe is high as some Americans think. Always have to think of how to survive would have stressed me and make me feel not free. America is probably good if you are rich otherwise I don´t think so.
Train driver. Goverment worker? Cant compare you to a normal employee in the private sectors. Same here in Austria. Goverment workers are very wealthy compare to others.
He might be in the private sector, the Railways isn't all goverment run in Sweden.
@@myklagenfurt Generally government workers in sweden are worse off money wise but may have some additional benefits not available to someone in the private sector. There are of course outliers
Are train workers millionaires in Sweden?
@@andrewgan5055 The average salary for a train driver in Sweden is about 31500 SEK (or 3300 USD) a month. That would then be taxed for about 32% if memory serves and will be about 21420 SEK / 2250 USD in your bank account. VAT in sweden is 25% so you could argue that those 21420 SEK are then only worth about 16065 SEK / 1700 USD for purchasing wares, but that wouldn't be entirely true as VAT is only added on certain wares, and not on most of your regular bills, like rent and so forth.
Sweden's growth is a funded by my Spotify subscription.
lol
US growth is funded by my netflix subscription.
Next time you will learn by stop being so gullible..
jerry kurata 😂😂
Bra
You forgot to mention a key issue, that corporate tax rates are rather low in Sweden. The high taxes apply only to personal income. This system creates an incentive for companies to operate in Sweden, while still being able to maintain the welfare state.
A complete lie, those taxes mainly go to pay debt to international banks who give loans to Sweden and its schools. They just use schools and kids to steal you, who said in the first place that education must be that long and expensive? Sweden was way richer before those high taxes. Now they sell their companies to Chinese.
@@mnofal7 at least the swedes don't go bankrupt over getting hit by a car
Many countries (Including Sweden) use a VAT, which is paid by the rich/business in that way.
@@mnofal7what no, we were extremely poor and underdeveloped before Folkhemmet
@@mnofal7and don’t have defecit spending like america which has almost three times the debt to gdp ratio
Sweden has no property taxes, no inheritance tax, and no taxes on wealth. Quite the opposite compared to America.
The more migrants it lets n drawing upon welfare you will be forced to impose higher, and new taxes!
Sweden has a population of 1 US state....
@@TheCrazierz and your point? How does it debunk their tax system's success
@@iironhide6209 I didn't say anything about debunking, did I? My point is pretty obvious, isn't it? It's not a good comparison, 1 small country with 1 huge country.
@@TheCrazierz Both countries have extremely developed economies and are tech hubs of the world. The actual size of the countries do not matter. Admittingly, America's hetereogeneity in culture (multiculturalism and pro-illegal immigrant mindset) does make this comparison a bit iffy.
Ultimately higher taxes won't be effective in the United States until the federal and local governments learn how to spend money. The top two contributors to the national debt are healthcare and the military complex both combined cost over a trillion dollars a year. I believe we have plenty of capitol money to work with but the funds are so poorly spent and misused that we can't allocate the funds to programs such as education, infrastructure and healthcare that actually helps people.
Yeah, lets build that wall!
And like 7% or so of the budget goes to pay interests on the debt. 5-7% of the national budget for military spending is quite typical in Europe.
USA could decrease the defence budget from around 15% of the budget to around 9% and still be superior in terms of military spending.
@Jonas Jam
The debt situation is of higher importance then many realize. National debt is postponed tax. What you borrow today, you don't have to tax today though you will have to pay by tax money sometime in the future.
The US National debt is more 3 times larger then Swedens, relative to resp. nations GDP of course (30% for Sweden and 102% for the US). That means that the US is under-taxed by a factor of 3 or so.
they could restructure the military to run as a PMC, a PMC at the size of the US army navy and air force combined with 400k/year grunt salaries would still be cheaper than the current system
It'll never be effective because it won't be the rich paying most of the taxes in the end, it'll be the middle class.
A person that makes 78K USD in Sweden takes home WAY more than 23.6 K USD. Way, Way more.
I make 442 K Swedish Krona/year (44 K USD) as a Construction worker, and I take home roughly 269 K SEK (27 K USD). Granted, If you earn more you tax more, as a procentage of your income, but not to the Point where 78 K USD becomes 23.6 K USD.
Did you mix up marginal tax rate with final tax rate? Because it's not the same thing.
Also, 1/3 of the Money that the employer pays, are a tax to begin with and is ofc not taxed again. If your total cost for the employer is 90 K, you pay income tax only tax on 60 K (the first 30 is a pay role tax). And Everything under about 50 K of that is taxed at the regular rate (about 22-25% after deductables, depending on where you live) and only the last 10 K is taxed with an extra 20%.
You are right. I live in Sweden. Can confirm. They messed up something with those numbers.
"Did you mix up marginal tax rate with final tax rate" ofcourse they did and its certainly no accident. this is burger entertainment after all.
@@correctionguy7632
They could also have gotten the payroll tax wrong.
Basicly, Sweden has a payroll tax of 31.32%. That's a tax the employer have to pay to the government, in addition to your salary. It covers pensions and a couple of other things.
If you simplify the math to the level of a 5th-grader, then you could come to the conclusion that Swedish taxes are roughly 60+%, since payroll tax is 31.32%, income tax ~30% (depending on where you live and before deductions. In reality it's about 21-25%), then you just keep ~35%.
In reality, the income tax is only calculated on the salary, not the payroll tax, so the math gets wrong.
I have a question. What about inheritance and taxes on that? Do you see a devide between the Swedes who inherit summer houses and those that live in apartments for generations? I feel like that's a larger issue in many countries. How does Sweden deal with that?
@@amdl270
We abolished inheritance tax about 10 years ago, IIRC. No property tax either.
Bad moves, as far as I am concerned. Those taxes does more for equality than most other taxes.
With the amount the US taxes it’s citizens CURRENTLY, we would well be able to pay for social services... the problem is the MONEY IS NOT BEING USED FOR THAT. So no matter how much you tax Americans, the corruption in the government will stifle whatever “free” programs we want to implement. It literally doesn’t matter if you tax us at 100%, it wouldn’t solve the problem.
so sad
US taxes go to war. The best business on the planet. Sad
100% tax truly still wouldn't create the Leftist utopian socialist state.
Democratic Socialism is two wolves and a sheep voting what's for dinner.
@@gwaiwohng2181 No one has ever suggested anything close to that... the 70% is graduated tax bracket.. of 10million. Try looking up graduated taxes because you sound ignorant
US first needs to end corruption
And no one is allowed to call you at home from work on a day off
well yeah but i don't pick up phone on my day off anyhow... so....
Same in Germany
It depends what you do. I don't bug people on their day off but I've gotten calls and texts on my day off. I worked all the time at my last job. I no longer work there. They took advantage of me.
Just like the movie Office Space!
That's good! I plan on starting my own company here in the USA in a year or two from now and that will be a policy I put in place.
IKEA was a Swedish company, but they have relocated to the Netherlands for tax reasons (of course not their official reason).
IKEA's founder was a nazi
It is still a Swedish company. No matter which manuevers they take to avoid taxes
The corporate tax rate in the Netherlands is 20-25% and in Sweden it is 22%. IKEA has a special tax deal in the Netherlands, involving foundations and holding companies in Liechtenstein and Luxembourg, which has been investigated by the EU.
@@DukeNukemIsHere3 its not a corporation
@@mackan7086 how is it swedish if its not located in sweden?
As a Swed i can tell you they messed up the numbers on this one. They failed to factor in the ”employer fee” which is a tax on income that is supposed to go to paying for ”social fees” meaning daycare, healtcare, a small pension and other vauge taxposts. This part of the tax is about 32% on top of the income tax part, which itself is about a minimum of 32%. So even if you make the equivalent of 38000usd a year you pay 32+32% in taxes. And it only goes up from there. Not to mention that sales tax is 25% a cross the board and there are added fees and special tax on all the most expensive commodities.
Jahopp
thats crazy lol. I would run away from that country if it was me. And now even more with the immigration crisis in the country. Sweden is sprinting to destruction.
Aren't those figures off though? I mean the employer fee, as I understand it, is paid prior to your salary, which means you pay your income tax off the remaining bit, not the gross total. It just makes no sense because I know you guys dont pay higher taxes than we do (I am Danish). That's one reason so many Danes live on the other side of the bridge.
The way I understand it is as follows:
E.g. you negotiate your salary at 50,000. To pay you this, the employer is charged 32%, so he pays 16,000. You then get paid the 50,000, and on that pay 35% (which appears to be what they pay in Stockholm). You pay another 17,500, leaving you with 32,500.
So this means that your gross salary (including employee fee) was 50,000 + 16,000= 66,000. But the total taxes paid were 16,000 + 17,500 = 33,500... or just over 50%. Very much like the rest of Scandinavia.
@@alanfrost75 Yes slightly off i guess but the "Employer fee" is currently 31.42% of an employees gross income and is in reality a tax on income and not a fee. But my point was also that that is not where it ends. The Swedish VAT was temporarely jacked up from about 4% to 25%....that was 50 years ago now and we are still at 25%. And on the flip side If you own a company you get to turn over 25% of what you charge to the government. That often means that in retail the govenment makes more profit from your sales than you do.
Just cause other scandinavian countries has it as bad as we do does not mean it fine.
The VAT is actually the biggest problem. It makes it so that a lot of imported gods becomes unresonably expensive. Sometimes to the point of beeing cost prohibitive to customers.
And finaly, it's not like Swedes get what they paid for. When you call the police; they don't come, when you go to the hospital you wait for hours, you have to pay for a ride on the bus or train even though you paid for the road, the tracks and the traincar. The list goes on...
@@antonw-uw4ov lies, VAT is not 25% across the board, food stuffs are 12% etc. ffs trying to correct "misinformation" with yet more misinformation... brilliant bud
Who calculated that take-home pay? Geez, it's 21st century, people, and you still don't know how to calculate taxes. It'd be around 48k USD depending on the municipality.
@CanadianLoki76 can you elaborate the calculation please, I live in Sweden but do not agree with these numbers..
In Sweden your first money until the poverty line is tax-free
Be nice! She's American. We'd be lucky if geographically she could point out where Sweden is on a world map.
My god the arrogance.. do you know what the "allmänna löneavgift" is? No, you dont. You have no clue what you are talking about.
@@RohanDaDev No, not close. You pay 12% tax from the very first SEK in income. This is *excluding* "tax charges", I.E. taxes payed for specific services (a total of ~32%).
Its really, really crazy that you dont know these things. I dont know if you are to blame or if it is our educational system that is insane.
Sweden has an accountable government. The US does not.
Well, holding your government to account is your responsibility. We have our fair share of scandals too, but we like to remind our politicians come election day, because "The North remembers".
We don't really. Our goverment sucks at the moment
"As President, Trump has pushed us up to $21 trillion in national debt and he is now on track to reach new record debt levels way, way, way above that. … The [Republican] Trump tax cuts have significantly accelerated what is now Donald Trump’s rush to a fiscal crisis much worse than anything he encountered in his Atlantic City Casino bankruptcies."
- Lawrence O’Donnell, "Debt Soars Under President Donald Trump Tax Cuts," June 26, 2018, goo.gl/nEAHMN
GOP Economic Adviser: Most Irresponsible Tax Cuts In U.S. History, Nov 16, 2017, ua-cam.com/video/rIXxkLnq8pY/v-deo.html
"I Trusted You!" Furious Trump Voters REVOLT Over Republican Tax Scam, Feb 5, 2019, ua-cam.com/video/2Q7ud7ESQXc/v-deo.html
Budget Deficit Soars To 6-Year High Under President Donald Trump’s Republican Tax Cuts, Oct 16, 2018, ua-cam.com/video/EIuzmxeNbyI/v-deo.html
Fed Chairman Powell Says He Is ‘very Worried’ About Growing Amount Of Us Debt, Jan 11 2019, www.cnbc.com/2019/01/10/fed-chairman-powell-says-he-is-very-worried-about-growing-amount-of-us-debt.html
Republicans' 'Fiscal Responsibility' Cost Us Trillions, Oct 31, 2018, ua-cam.com/video/FzixrdbPB6g/v-deo.html
@@burdine26.120 it may be counter intuitive, but the national debt doesn't matter. What matters is the bond yealds. It was believed to be a function of the debt, but recent history has shown that there is no limit on how much money America is allowed to borrow. There has not been a bond failure yet, and still the yeald is negative in real terms.
Wired times, we have to unlearn what we thought was true about national economy.
The Swedish "leader" is an failed welder. Did not even finish that education haha ..
might seem odd but for like the first 20 second i thought this was a vox video.
Ayyadi Hamza they stole the way vox creates content
They're both hyper liberal channels so I'm not surprised.
It's the vocal fry.
@Johnson Taylor more so i started watching these CNBC bits lately and the shift style was felt.. in all cases it looks good and i think VOX wouldn't mind the competition.
Don’t you be giving them crazy ideas like that. I need to pay for my Netflix somehow :-p
Moral of the story- Sweden spend tax dollars on -military- education, healthcare etc.
Sweeden doesnt need a millitary tho. Its not a major country in the world
_ thanks to the USA citizens,
You can thank America for that if America didnt they basically all of Asia and Europe would have been Russian rn the U.s sacrifices for the world while the world crises the u.s we should just stop protecting. Them so we can afford all those programs and see how countries come begging to us
Aaron Balderas politics is not that simple, young one
@@taf4939 ik but they should why protect them even they criticize us?
*probably, the Swedes have a high trust in their institutions*
we must...or else they totaly deplatform the individual...radio signal reconnisiance AND deep state under cover agency it´s the military weapon they use
All the Nordic countries have. And it works because we have tranparency.
sure, we do
Not really... Americans just don't trust their institutions...
@@andrewjensen8189 u dont say
Can you do a video on Switzerland? Low taxes and still a very good performance socially and economically!
Since it's impossible to copy Switzerlands position, why should they even bother?
Nazi Gold LUL
Taxes in Switzerland are quite similar to those in USA. In fact a little higher. But this created a somehow false picture. For example they have private healthcare insurance. So premiums don't count forward taxes. But the market is strictly regulated and operates more like single payer system then a free market system. The also spend 3x less of GDP on Defense.
Hausner85 you are wrong, they are sensibly lower. It’s not a case that many celebrities such as Paris Hilton have moved there to avoid high American taxes
@@marianotrani8438
And how did you messured it? By looking at same tax rates? If you want to determine general level of taxation in a given country you should look at share of GDP collected as taxes by the government. US collects 27.1% of GDP as taxes and Swiss collect 27.8%. So in general the taxes are quite similar in both. And now about people who move to pay lower taxes. They are SCAMMERS. The wealth is a result of conditions, opportunities and safety that given society provides. Elon Musk couldn't build his rockets in Somalia. You are take a lot from society in order to become wealthy. And the society has the right to charge you for that in form of taxes. But is you are avoiding paying you are a cheat and should be tratead like one. The government should send IRS after you and not try to appease you by lowering taxes.
Hm surprising peaceful comment section, was expecting a war between left and right.
Instead, >95% of the commentators have absolutely no idea about their income tax. Thats probably why you see no "war". Theres not really anything left or right about this: sweden is taxing the poor. Not sure if its left or right. Its pretty unique.
Thats because these people havent been to sweden and seen how "perfect" it is
@@linusjoensson8219 Scandinavia: Raising Funds using Everyone.
@@linusjoensson8219 high exise taxes screwing you
Some time ago I asked a Swedish friend of mine about the high taxes in Sweden. He said, quite proudly, "we don't mind because we get value for our tax dollar". That resonated with me. I suppose the reason why other nations are adverse to paying higher taxes is because we don't perceive we are getting value for the dollar.
American politicians promoting universal health care should take note and promote the economic benefits and outcomes - not promote it as a government social program or hand out. On average, Americans pay 30% more for health care and live an average of 3 years less than other OECD countries. Much of the savings is driven by better preventative care and elimination of profit and middlemen. After all, insurance companies need to make money for shareholders and they have little interest in preventative care as often insurance is tied to employment so there is less motivation; however, a single payer is going to take the long view.
I live in Canada where we have universal medical care but it does not cover drugs like Sweden. I don't mind paying taxes to fund our medical care - I know I am getting value. I only wish it was extended to drug and dental.
a often overlooked reason for high taxes is the selfish gain in it, i get more if everyone pays tax than if everyone didnt
Not sure if it was intended, but this was a nail on the head moment. Its in the word "perceive". Yes, the difference - the reason Sweden has this situation - is general perception. Your friend perceives that his money is needed for the services he receives. In reality, this is objectively false. But the perception is what will make him happy or unhappy with the situation.
Now, combine this with a government with an insane grip on the market(s), and not least huge influence over media. And not in the US way - where you have very polarized political influences - no, in the Swedish way, where there is just one, single narrative.
Honestly, your friend has had the wool pulled over hes eyes. If you call the police in Sweden, they don't come. If you report a crime they send you back a notice that the case has been dropped in 2 weeks. If you go to a hospital you wait for hours. You have to pay to take a bus or train, even though you paid for the road, the tracks and the traincar or bus. And if you have your own car you get to pay 60% tax on you gas.
Taxpayer money in Sweden goes mostly down into the big black hole that is large govenrment, wasted on nonsense.
Agree on that dental and prescription drugs should be free in Canada.
I was so impressed with the way the Scandinavian/Swedish system was set up when I lived in Uppsala during my exchange year, I plan to move back in the near future once I can secure gainful employment. Jag älskar Sverige, Sverige i mitt hjärta, ja jag vill leva ja jag vill dö i Norden!
Wow du klämde in allt där i slutet. Hoppas du kommer tillbaka och hittar ett bra jobb. fortsätt träna på svenskan. viktigare än många tror, men främst att först, vet många ex amerikaner som pratar engelske hela tiden men förstår svenskan så det går jättebra :D
Sverige är överskattat
@@WhiteRussianBC ööh... Nej.
Sweden is terrible. I hate this country and moving to Australia
@@toniownez i dont care. good for you.
This is a very similar to Canada's system. Notice how social democratic countries like Sweden, Norway, Canada are always rated the top places to live every year.
Jameel Ja All of those countries have populations that could fit within a single US state. If they had to support 327 million people, you can guarantee things would be different. All of those countries are already experiencing backlash against their socialist and open door policies due to the financial strain it’s putting on taxpayers and their economy. See how welcoming they’ll be in 5 years from now.
@@dymechik721 but wouldn't the larger population allow for more taxes to be collected, it's proportional to your tax base. The more people, the more taxes which means more money for social programs.
While you're right, European countries are experiencing a large backlash to immigration, I haven't noticed that level of backlash in Canada.
I strongly believe that if you help everybody it's better for society. You never know who/where the next entrepreneur or inventor will be and from which country they will emigrate from. Prime Example is Steve jobs, his biological father was a Syrian immigrant, he was given up for adoption and went on to create the largest most successful business (Apple) in history.
You can't compare those countries to USA .
Canada and Sweden are shitholes
Jihad against normies N Furries lmao imagine thinking Canada and Sweden are shitholes. Have you ever been there?
But Canada is going un the wrong direction ( more and more american)
Proud to be a Swede 🇸🇪🇸🇪🇸🇪🇸🇪🇸🇪
Hälsningar från Finland!
That's racist!
@@Nico-zw9ud is that sarcasm?
@@Nico-zw9ud 😂😂😂
@@MehmetlerMehmedi There people that think being proud of their country is racist...
Need remember, Sweden not fight in the different wars for last 100 years. It is very important for any economy.
Yeah they were clever
EVGHENII GUTU actually it’s 200+ years. We had our last peace 1816.
claes! Actually it was 1814, but who’s counting.
Yet we were one of the poorest countries in most of that time and got rich only because of how world war 2 made many countries lose resources which they had to but from Sweden aswell as removing much of our social democracy.
It was, in the 50s and 60s, today it means nothing
My parents hastily left their countries and everything they had due to war and had to reestablish themselves in a completely new environment, shortly before I was born. Now, thanks to the welfare of Sweden, I am months away from a degree in law, without drowning in debt and I will always be grateful for the possibilities that this country has given me and my family. För Sverige i tiden
Då får vi hoppas att du lever ett mycket ärofyllt liv och uppoffrande för Sverige, för att ha räddat ditt och din familjs liv!
YaMoura And now you should move home and rebuild your country!!!
@@petter5721 You know what, random UA-camr? You are right. I am taking my degree, payed by Swedish taxpayers, and putting it to fruit somewhere else:) Great idea! Peace!
@How bout' you chill If my parents are from Sweden and they move to China and then i'm borned, does that make me chinese?
@@petter5721 he won't go to the shithole his predecestors created. He will enjoy the easy life he got from other peoples nation by luck that's how globalism works
in the u.s. we should start describing what we pay to private companies for healthcare, education, childcare etc as taxes.
I think we would stack up as one of the highest taxed countries in the world.
But at least I don’t have to pay it if I don’t want too or don’t have the money
Correction Guy u realize in Sweden they don’t have the money like in the country to pay for the health care or up keeping of their population because 25 percent of the population has came In 30 years without paying much taxes if paying them at all. Therefore if any economic strife or major disaster hits, the country has a large potential to implode. A large population boom would even be bad for the country as more money is spent on healthcare,child care and schooling. Considering the majorities of a population are in lower class and that the incoming immigrants are known to have large families with many kids their country I not in a great place to succeed in the long term.
that was a very good selling point for ACA
@@Luke-bj8mr I hope the human race can evolve to include everybody and not let anybody behind! Bad luck can happen to us every day!
@@blhtml YOU have very childish and naïve ideas !! WAKE up and smell coffee ….. and get the job .
In Sweden tax money goes to school, health care (psychologists, hospitals and elderly people who are not able to take care of them selves), police, military, student loans, art in cities, infrastructure and another social services. For instance when I work 30% of my earned money goes to services that I and other people have right to. If I break my leg I don't have to pay for the health care but I have to play for my visit at the hospital but it's not much.
Just look at how bad things are in Sweden. They're clearly suffering under an oppressive tax system. Obviously this should strike fear in all Americans. ; )
The corporate tax rate is 21% which is equal to the Trump corporate tax rate. AOC wants increase in the corporate tax rate.
Yeah they tried to gloss over that 21% corporate tax rate
I don’t know how to calculate the Swedish taxes because there are so many layers of taxes to keep track of. But if you discuss with people working in smaller or independent accounting firms in Sweden. They can elaborate the calculation and explain that the combined layers of taxes for a company will in actuality be close to 60-70% in taxes.
And all those taxes is just being squandered by previous and current governments that thinks that throwing money at problems will solve everything. They are mistaken in their strategies.
Yes American Socialist want to tax the rich super high. Sweden doesn’t do that. They tax the middle and upper middle with high income and VAT tax. If you want to tax the rich you tax Corporates and Capital Gains which Sweden’s rates are both low.
@@youaremyjoy2 you do know corporation don't actually pay 21% right ?
So according to the Swedish tax calculator a person in Stockholm earning in gross 46,000 kr/mo costs the employer ~60,500 kr/mo (726,000kr/yr or $88,000) and takes home ~34,800kr/mo ($50,600). So the actual tax rate for such person is some 42%.
Realised that Singapore's top income tax rate of 22% is relatively low but the qualifying annual income to hit that top rate is low too (S$320,000/US$230,000/SEK1.8m the last time I checked). We've quite a number of other significant taxes too e.g. 30-45% on water bills, on CNG, ~200-300% on cars, ~S$8-10 per 20 cigarette sticks (& no duty-free allowance for tobacco importation)
But for the worker the tax is only 25% of his income
@@drutten73 hugh exise taxes , you pay more than 25% tax in Sweden
@@coopsnz1 not in normal income tax. If you calculate corporate tax and vat on gods you buy, it’s more. But not on your income
@@drutten73 no lefty or socialist mention that
Top-rated health care in Sweden? LOL. My uncle has lived there his ENTIRE life and the wait to see a specialist can take months; there have been occasions when he has paid his own way just so he or my aunt could receive medical care in a realistic time frame.
@Just another Bird That's what health insurance and making healthy choices are for. That drastically cuts the risk of having issues.
@Unicode UTF-8 Name I live in America, so I'm going to have to shut you down on that one. Also, genetic issues account for a small percentage of health issues. For example, the vast majority of cancers are created NOT genetic but are lifestyle and/or environmental. Healthy choices are a major indicator of disease risk.
If his business isn't really that urgent then he might have to wait a little, yeah.
@@rogergoldberg1545 A little? lol.
The key thing in a consumer economy is whether or not its citizens have a substantive amount of money for consumer goods to generate demand. Sweden's high taxes ensures that the basic necessitates of life and social welfare concerns of its people are taken care of, that frees up the remaining take home pay to be spent on consumer goods. America's relatively low taxes in contrast, do not stimulate economic growth because its citizens end up spending a lot of their own money for things that in other countries are paid in common, especially on health care.
3:30 your figures for tax don't make sense, a person earning 78,000 would have a take home pay of 47,000 and pay $31,000 in taxes.
that sum also include pension contribution and perks (non cash benefits)
That's about right, sucks dosen't?
And no, I'm not defending the horribly ineffective US gov
Copying and pasting the Swedish model in USA wouldn't work out. In USA we do not have the same labor participation rate, education, and value-added jobs that the Swedes have (I am talking at a general level). We are not as healthy and physically active as they are, so our healthcare costs would be exponentially higher (just look at Bernie's 30 Trillion Medicare-for-All cost over 10 years). They also do not have the state-centric government model, but instead they have a more centralized and powerful central government. Until recently they did not have to deal with the costs of illegal migration (and once they starting dealing with it, the parties on the right started gaining traction in order to give some balance).
I am not against importing some reforms that can be customized four our American republic, but just a massive copy-and-paste would be naive.
US would benefit from taxes getting directed towards relevant educations being cheaper and less debt oriented towards the people. Also taxes getting directed towards sick leave policies and maternity leave would add a level of relief to the lower and medium working class.
Still any country that blindly tries to copy and model everything like Sweden, will soon find out that the blind is leading the blind. Being proactive in any given issue was never the DNA of Sweden.
Saltponds239
Lol and the same thing for healthcare. We have fairly high taxes as well and we got lots more debt. Our government is corrupted by the private medical industry and public government unions.
Minnesota is bigger than Sweden
3000 million people to 10 million
1. The USA spends more on education per capita than any other country. And we don't tax (loot) or citizens this much to get this money.
2. Why no mention of the 1990s privatizations and tax/spending cuts in Sweden?
3. Sweden was 6th in the world in GDP per capita in the 1960s (it fell down the ranks).
4. Why no mention of Sweden's lower levels of regulation and government control? (no minimum wage, school choice, partially privatized social security, etc.) This greatly contributes to allowing the market to breathe and be productive.
5. Sweden's tax system is rich-friendly. I doubt our lefties would very much like that. If about half the tax revenue comes from the value-added tax, then that means Swedish taxation is very close to flat. Not to mention their top income tax bracket kicks in at a pretty low rate.
The problem with these comparisons is that the reality of the other country is extremely different from the reality of the US...
Of course, there are lessons to be learned, but transplanting a policy from a country that is totally different than yours has high risks of rejection.
EXACTLY.
They make 78k$ and are only left over with 23,634$?!?!?! 70% dedications, This is crazy!!!!!
In Germany it’s about 1/3. Even this is a lot!
Employed? No thanks. With a own business I have more control to keep more money!
That calculation is wrong, that's not how you calculate marginal tax rates...
Okay yeah I saw that too and was like "WTF?". This needs to be explained better, because by the looks of it, this would seriously screw low-income citizens!
@@olzhask.6130 but still 70% deductions. its not just taxes, its taxes, benefits and contributions.
the crazy thing is, that it gets deduct per percentage. the more you earn, the more you pay.
@@GeneralBlackNorway what is wrong? its not just tax. its taxes, contributions and benefits. 70% all together as they said in the video. the more you earn, the more you pay.
im from Germany. here gets about 1/3 deduct. taxes, health insurance unemployed insurance, retirement plan, etc included in the 1/3 salary deduction.
Ikea based in Switzerland, low tax Canton. Volvo owned by Chinese who are making them in China and bought it for it's technology.
Volvo is still controlled, developed and built in Sweden.
Ikea is not based in Switzerland, my friend.
@@FredrikThool A completely factually false lie having four times the likes of the correction shows why Trump is president today
A complete lie, those taxes mainly go to pay debt to international banks who give loans to Sweden and its schools. They just use schools and kids to steal you, who said in the first place that education must be that long and expensive? Sweden was way richer before those high taxes. Now they sell their companies to Chinese.
@@mnofal7 Firstly, not really. Secondly, why have you wrote the same thing on several other persons comments?
I find it quite facinating how citizens from each country seem to crave what the other has:
Swedes are complaining about high taxes (ethen when these are going to the benefit of the state). So they escape abroad to get more financial freedom.
Americans who feel constantly blown by politicians and companies, want a more equitable tax systems that actually benefit the population.
Just another Bird Imo, excuses, excuses ... if it’s not the taxes then it is immigration and if it is not immigration then there is something else
Linus on the Line that other guy is speaking nonsense. I am also a Swede and many of my family live abroad. The reason most people are going outside is not because of immigration because if that was a thing we wouldn’t be voting for Centre Party, Moderates or other Left or centre right parties. Because most swedes living abroad has voted for Left-centre right parties which aren’t opposed to immigration.
The reasons are more complex due and varies a lot, like higher prospect of education in higher levels, and also the fact that globalisation which makes living abroad easier (like tell me, would you enjoy living at -10c throughout the whole winter?) and also some people also move for more financial prospects.
Grass is always greener on the other side.
Also, living in northern climate can be really depressing. Imagine getting only 5 hours of proper sunlight per day.
Mingwei Zhang no thanks lol. I’ll take a tropical place please (all biomes and seasons have pros & cons)
USA is way better than Sweden! We literally have 60% tax! and it's pure unfair and evil etc!
I currently live in Sweden, and my experience is, if you are planning to have a family, Sweden is the best country. You will get the most out of your tax payment through education, child support, health care, and daycare. However, if you are single and not planning to have a child, I think you can better off by residing elsewhere. Don't get me misconstrued; you still get an education, health, and unemployment benefits. But if you are in a demanding profession (computer science, IT, Software Engineering, Nurse, Medical doctor, etc), you have a high probability to get more remuneration after-tax in other countries.
This video is a bit misleading. Sweden takes in almost as much in V.A.T and excise taxes, as it takes in from income tax and those are regressive taxes on consumption, where the poor pay exactly the same as the rich. Also, the income tax in Sweden is very high for low-income earners as well as the rich. For example, someone in Sweden who makes 20,000 pays as much income tax as someone who makes 200,000 in the united states (32%). The top 10% of income earners in the united states pay about 45% of all taxes. In Sweden, the top 10% only pays about 27% of all taxes. Also, Swedish corporations pay about the same corporate tax as corporations in the US do, so no, they don't tax big business. Finally, Sweden has a pro-competition free choice model in education, something that teachers' unions in the US would never allow simply because its too 'neoliberal'. Their education is really an amazing example of what they do so well, which is to strike a balance. The state collects taxes and pays for education, but citizens are allowed to pick any school they want for their kids and a lot of schools are privately ran. That's how you take care of your people. You combine the free market and welfare into a hybrid model. Sweden has a great free market and a wonderful social safety-net that makes of use of that market.
Education is paid by the municipalities (kommuner), not states (landsting). There are very few private schools in Sweden (probably less than 10). There are however many "free schools", which are run by private entities but almost entirely reimbursed by the municipalities (skolpeng). And the free schools must adhere to the national curriculum set by the Agency for Education (skolverket). So it's not a free market. There's lots of regulation.
@@WhiteRussianBC As I wrote, it is a pro-competition free choice model, not a free market. All countries have regulations on education. I was referring to how they choose to deliver the service, which i think is excellent.
@@harry24798 Ok. The "free choice" model was introduced in the 90's, but it has faced criticism due to increasing school segregation. The leftist party wants to get rid of it completely. The majority of teachers are also against it, according to a survey.
Singapore and Hong Kong have higher per capita GDP. Much better model.
It is all about the quality of life for the Citizens. When the Citizens needs are satisfied, when citizens are happy, when needs of education, health care and family time are addressed and services provided for children to grow, all the citizens will prosper. When the citizens prosper the country grows and the use of fear to divide the winners and losses will no longer be effective.
And yet all these Scandinavian and quasi-socialist countries of Europe were coming apart at the seams, ready to deport, imprison and exterminate immigrants from a wave of immigrants from Syria. They have proven how stable and happy their citizens and countries are indeed under these socialist systems.
A complete lie, those taxes mainly go to pay debt to international banks who give loans to Sweden and its schools. They just use schools and kids to steal you, who said in the first place that education must be that long and expensive? Sweden was way richer before those high taxes. Now they sell their companies to Chinese.
Only citzen are happy the working class that rent , middle class & upper class hate social democracy
Skype was started and created in Estonia. There were Swedes involved but Skype is an Estonian start up.
No, the estonians are the ones that were only involved. The business and idea was created by a Swede and a Dane, three estonians coded the software. It's a swedish startup.
Imagine going to college for 4 years just to take home 23k a year 🤣
but the college was free and if you get sick both your hospital care and wage are paid still..
What if I want to buy a fancy car????
And I DONT get sick.
@@HIDDENSAINT McDonald's employees make like at least 20k here which is practically getting them homeless at that point but far better here. People here want Free healthcare is because we think we won't pay for it, but we get taxed for it. Sales Tax alone is 8.5% where I live and that doesn't include the stuff that comes from my paycheck. People just want free stuff without working for it.
@@ScottiPimpin McDonald's in Sweden has to pay their workers more. Housing isn't nearly as expensive as in the US even if it can become high in central Stockholm. There are government programs in place to help people who doesn't make enough money to survive on their own.
Correction: Sweden's population has exceeded 10 million since at least 2017 (if not as early as 2016).
Those statistics come straight from the Swedish Central Statistics Bureau, whose job it is to keep track of national statistics like these.
Lol 10 mn is nothing
It’s actually fun how people in the comments state “facts” without even giving out reliable sources
Dude trust me
@@TheCrazierz i heared it from a taxi driver that I trust.
The problem is not tax rate, it's huge tax cuts the rich get and the low middle class has to make up for.
If I don’t go to University, nor have kids,etc it doesn’t make sense to give away 65% of my salary.
u get free healthcare and 5 weeks guaranteed vacation tho, roberto
@@WoWPVPc0rner and free University if u want in, and Denmark (idk about Sweden) we pay u to go to University. so u can get smarter
@@WoWPVPc0rner
Assume that you will fall sick only twice in your life time, didn't u waste your money by paying tax
I like the idea, highly doubt that can be the case in the US. The government does a poor job managing the money they have access to right now. Over staffed and underpaid in some agencies and under staffed and over paid in others.
You should consider the fact that Us in 30 times bigger than Sweden in terms of population
I thought it’s common sense that taxes shall be spent on people if they are paid by people. I guess the USA is missing out on something.
Our government is horribly inefficient.
Are taxes are still high and we have 26 trillion in debt with nothing to show for it.
@@jacklan4103 especially not americans
As someone who's grown to like a more fiscally conservative view, it's oddly comforting to see how Sweden has an "efficient" tax and welfare system, though I'd like to hear whether or not there are some parts of their healthcare system that can bottleneck healthcare delivery.
They forget to mention they have loose regulations and they use the school voucher system.
Loose in some limited respects, but much stricter than America in other aspects. Food and chemical safety, worker's safety, worker's rights, etc. are very regulated, and unions are much stronger than in the US. And yes, we have a voucher system, but most people go to public schools run by the local government. There's basically no privately funded education (maybe 4-5 schools in the entire country). And unlike the US, where school funding is based on the parents' wealth (absolute insanity), the worst-performing schools are given the largest amounts of money and the best-paid teachers.
@@albinjohnsson2511 I think the problem we have in the US is corruption and allocation of funds. In some cases poorer schools are given extra funds and the money is still wasted in corrupt teachers Unions bad spending habits.
I mean just look at what happend with Covid 19 the teachers Union in Chicago was saying your a white supremacist or internalized your whiteness if you wanted the schools to open up
closed schools affected poorer schools more than rich schools because many of the upper class can put their kids through private school and many private schools have been open for a while.
Not to mention these high schools pretty much pass anybody. Are diplomas are diluted compared to past generations. You can get D's in all of your classes and still graduate. You can almost do nothing and still pass, but it varies from state to state. I'm in CA
it's a good idea to look at how other countries run their school systems, but The problem I have with comparing the US to Nordic countries is that we are a way more diverse and way more populated country. It is not an apple to apple comparison by any means.
The recession in the 90’s was because of high regulations, high taxes and “social democratic” policies. The government ran out of other people’s money. We bounced back because we took away those high regulations. But now we are running out of other people’s money again.
Sweden was the 3rd wealthiest country in 1968 before their welfare state was big. The welfare state grew enormously and within a short period of time they were only the 14th richest. Only other advanced country to have a bigger relative decline has been Japan. Denmark was catching up with the US in gdp per capita before they significantly expanded the welfare state in the 1970s. They then stopped catching up.
Even before becoming big welfare states Nordic countries had some of the highest life expectancies in the world.
Despite being backward and relatively impoverished midway through the 1950s Singapore and Hong Kong through a relatively free market, free trade and low amount of government spending now have higher life expectancies than all Nordic countries, even though Nordic countries were far ahead midway through the 20th century
Nominal GDP per capita is not everything. You must also look at Poverty rates, GDP PPP per capita (Which can tell you the cost of living) and Social mobility.
The US has higher GDP per capita than Sweden, But it also has higher Poverty rate.
well 80% of singaporeans live in public housing and housing is the largest expense for any resident. That's a pretty socialist idea.
@@TheProcrastinator6 And lets not forget, that in Singapore, they have Mandatory Savings Accounts for medical expenses and Housing, in lieu of high taxes.
@@TheProcrastinator6 that's true but that doesn't mean that if government hadn't mostly monopolised the housing market that a succesful free market in housing couldn't have come about. Overall Singapore gov. still spends less than 20% of gdp, whereas US spends about 40%. So yes, you won't find a single country that doesn't take some people's money and give it to others, but Singapore and Hong Kong do a lot less of it than Western countries do and still get better results in life expectancy and education
@@jascrandom9855 I agree. The poorest Americans probably get far worse education than in Sweden. However a well educated Swede could probably have a better standard of living in the US than in Sweden.
A poor education system isn't too closely related to the tax rates. Turing education into a private free market would help more than giving money to an inefficient government. Scandinavian governments are the least corrupt in the world. That's not the case in the US
Thanks to our tax we have free university, free school food , free dental care up to 23 years old, free school books
The people that wants to raise taxes to support social services are the very same people who are misappropriating such funds; that is, our government. Also, the Nordic model functions because, in the case of Sweden for example, it is a homogeneous society. They do support their own people. They do not have millions of people per year who show up in their country to be taken care of. Besides, money doesn’t grown on trees particularly here in the U.S.A. And, it is a fact that many undocumented arrive here, not because they’re suffering persecution, but because they have families with no means of support.
the experts' speeches are incomprehensible.
subtitles would be much helpful.
press C on your keyboard or the CC on the screen
Hes Danish cut him some slack lmao
Sweden's higher tax are for the middle class.
High taxes definitivly slows growth, at least when you tax small businesses heavily. Me, as a small business owner in Sweden would employ tomorrow if the taxes on employees wasn't 31%. It cost me ~$4000 to write a $2000 paycheck. Those money are then taxed 25% (on most goods) in VAT. America wouldn't be the worlds biggest economy today with the Scandinavian taxes yesterday.
I wonder if you are really from Sweden
@@pfreitasxD Självklart Zlatan
Det kostar dig inte 4000 att betala ut 2000. Det kostar dig 2000 att betala ut 4000, de 2000 du tror att du betalar, betalar arbetstagaren i skatt.
Att du gör inbetalningen, rent fysiskt, gör det inte till dina pengar.
@@victorcapel2755 Arbetsgivare betalar 31,42% i arbetsgivaravgift innan arbetstagaren får sin bruttolön, som i sin tur skattas på ca 30%. Arbetsgivaren ska även betala ut 12% i semesterersättning på den anställdes bruttolön. Spelar väl ingen roll hur beskattningen är fördelad. Har en anställd 20 000 i utgifter per månad är det 20 000 denne behöver i fickan. Om dom pengarna beskattas av arbetsgivare eller arbetstagare spelar i sammanhanget mindre roll?
Mike
Jag vet vad man betalar. Jag har haft anställda själv.
Min poäng var att inkomstskatten inte är dina pengar, det är inte du som betalar den. Det är du som gör inbetalningen, men det är din arbetstagares pengar. Samma med semesterersättningen. Dessutom beskattas inte arbetstagare med 30% i Sverige, snarare 21-25%. OM du betalar in 30% betalar du för mycket till skatteverket och för lite till din arbetstagare (du bör räkna in jobbskatteavdraget), det får de tillbaka på skatten, men det är onödigt att skatteverket får de pengarna under året istället för arbetstagaren.
Det du betalar är arbetsgivaravgiften. Det är dina pengar.
Sweden’s finances are in free-falling right now. The Crone is falling with 5% per year since we’re not producing enough or have quality products that anyone would like to buy! We HAVE been doing ok only in spite of socialism, not because of it. Taxes has a sweet spot that makes the business flourish because the people are well taken care of. Today though the taxes aren’t giving us nearly enough in return and even going to work in comparison to stay at home with a salary from the government is not always justifiable. About the healthcare: there is a waiting list so long that people are dying before they get the treatment they sorely need. If you want to know how Sweden’s finances are doing - look at the ex Soviet Union, because that’s where we are heading! This is no bleeding Utopia!
Motivates Me as another Swede, cuz I guess you’re one too, I cannot agree less with this statement. Our healthcare is far from inadequate and a lot of people manages to survive because of it and if you compare it to a lot of other countries, even our neighbors, Sweden still has one of the best survival rates. Of course things can be better but that’s always how it is. No country will ever be a utopia. The fact that Sweden is so prosperous without any big product like Norway’s Oil for example is already amazing. The amount of entrepreneurs that start businesses and contribute to Sweden’s economical growth is astounding. Our economy is more based on businesses rather than a specific product like Norway. Yes financially it is going downwards now and it is important to take action to make things better but growth comes and goes
Amazing how much you can accomplish when you don't spend all your money on endless wars
Sweden does not have high taxes, Sweden have high taxes on wages. As said in the video there are no taxes on wealth, capital, property, no heritance tax, no gift tax, and in reality virtually no capital gains tax.
Bigger companies can negotiate their corporate tax.
So although Sweden seem to pride itself for their high taxes this apply mainly for wage work.
Plus, Sweden doesn't have a minimum wage.
@Harry Lagom Yeah... trade unions... About that...
Too bad we in North America basically broke their back years ago. Shareholder profits comes before worker safety, you know.
In the USA, both education and healthcare are ridiculously expensive. Long story short, there are too much corruption and they are too powerful to bring to justice.
The question should not be about high taxes with better government service vs low taxes with less government service.
The proper question is how to address this runaway prices in education and healthcare in USA.
Ja the American model would be more acceptable if they could remove all the corruption
ACA is not like the Swedish model but if you could pay a reasonable amount then it's up to you if you like have a ACA insurance or not
How well a society works can be measured by how well it take care of those who can't take care of them self.
US d-
So ultimately Sweden has taken the employer and employee contributions that go into the void of benefit insurances and collects them as taxes. Then provides the services that the taxes pay for with fewer middlemen at a more efficient cost to the tax payers taking care of most needs. So the take home they have is really what they have for food, housing, transportation and entertainment.
Looking at my pay stub on the contributions based on my base salary of 65k plus the employer required contributions (social security & medicare matching and Healthcare Plan cost) to employ me. Currently There is already a 37.72% tax wedge. I'm not including my 401k or life insurance as I didn't catch those mentioned in the video so those are still coming out after that wedge before take home.
Which is kind of misleading considering my take home is actually 55% and after house, care, student loans and personal loan and monthly utility bills, etc. My disposable income for food, entertainment and travel is roughly 7% of my salary. Yeah in about 5 years when my loans are paid off that grows drastically, but I think I'm pretty average in the financial situation most Americans are out of college and it takes a decade before the bills are paid off where we have full disposable income.
But, it doesn't really seem like there is much of a difference in what is going on as far as out of pocket cost between myself and the average Swedish employee. The biggest difference is the fact that most of the funds I pay goes to a bureaucracy and middle men all taking a very large chunk with no accountability or book public keeping to prevent abuse and overcharges to the systems that those funds go into.
I've pointed out on different videos and on twitter threads that healthcare and medicare contributions for myself. Costs almost $11k between myself and my employer before insurance touches a single penny on my bills. That is an insane amount of money lost into a void before I get any high level of care beyond basic shots and checkups. Which often don't even require $500 annually. So more than 90% of what I effectively pay for never comes to me, which is a massive massive loss to the tax payer under the ACA because it forces people to pay into middleman after middleman all taking a share before the hospital gets paid. The hospital overcharges to try and get a better negotiated price which hurts people without insurance because the billing is based on consumers never seeing the bill for these outrageous charges. The sickening thing is that most people don't know that the ACA has to backend fund the insurances to cover preexisting conditions via other taxes collected which is not measurable for an individual level. So it is even more than what I have calculated already.
We also don't need "free college education". We need better public education that prepares children to be adults, which has fallen off drastically to leaving 18+ year olds highly dependent on their parents and social hand outs instead of knowing how to get basic job skills, pay taxes, have a monthly or weekly budget. College is meant to be a focused education on a skill or study that can be leveraged in a career. Now it's a high school replacement and doesn't even give the skills needed for that area of study the graduating student can pick up in the job force without additional training. This defeated the purpose of a college degree being a requirement for a job. The degree was meant to signify the graduate already had the training and needed skills and didn't require more training to take on the job. My father went through a 2 year trade school for a position that now students have to go through a masters program for the exact same education the 2 year trade school gave over 30 years ago. So before there is "Free college" there needs to be fix for this massive gap that has grown in education.
I also think schools should be taxed 100% on all profits made from sports to discourage the push for funding sports over the actual curriculum of the students and the continued cuts in programs like art and music. They can have sports and sporting events and take what they need from revenues for equipment, travel and staffing. But if the profits don't fund academia directly there after gets taken away from school.
He keeps on telling that we spend taxes on education and health care. But then when you look at where does money actually go to you get a bit upset. It doesn’t go to much to the workers. I just graduated collage as an HVAC engineer. But what I learned in school doesn’t really help to much, all the equipments we used was from 20 years ago. We didn’t have a teacher for over 3 months because the school couldn’t afford it. We had one old guy who took a train from Stockholm every 5 day but he hadn’t been working for over 10 years so he had no clue what kind of refrigerant they used and the ones who were banned. What they don’t say it what schools they put their money to. They give all the money to school that has good impressive education, all the other education that is some what hard or complicated for an average citizen to understand we just get left in the mud. Really do wish in school they would have taught me how taxes work, how I can apply for a job, how to write a VC, how to search for UIF if I’m unemployed or TELL ME ANYTHING THAT WOULD BENEFIT ME!!! No instead of that teach me about the WW2 in three different grades, yeah really need to know about religion through 5 different grades when I’m atheist or hey teach me ALL THE USELESS MATHEMATICAL FORMULAS I WILL NEVER HAVE ANY USE FOR!!! It’s fine teach me nothing that I actually will have use for in life I’ll be fine. Health care is the only thing you actually successfully did right, although it’s fine that you say that you want to help the old people who built this country then take away all their money so they can’t even pay for their medication. Swedish politics honestly disgusts me
You are right except for religion, it is a complete lie, those taxes mainly go to pay debt to international banks who give loans to Sweden and its schools. They just use schools and kids to steal you, who said in the first place that education must be that long and expensive? Same for medicine. Sweden was way richer before those high taxes. Now they sell their companies to Chinese.
Most of Swedish companies are moving jobs to East European countries - Poland, Hungary and more and more to India and China. Because of high salaries in Sweden and also because of high taxes
Same story in most 1st world countries actually. Even when Trump was in office, jobs were still flooding from the USA to China and such.
Sweden: totally unprogressive taxation and low corporate taxes.
False. The income tax is very progressive. The more you earn the higher percentage you pay.
@@albinjohnsson2511 Sweden's tax bracket is much less progressive than much of Europe, or countries like the US or Canada. Sweden has consistently lowered its tax brackets and they completely eliminated their top tax bracket. Even with the 15% rise of the Swedish Krona to the US dollar, the top tax bracket in Sweden is only $81k USD (was only about $70k USD at the beginning of 2020).
Every one who makes more than that pays the same percentage. Swedish taxes are high, but they are much less progressive than the US, for example, where someone who makes $600k pays almost twice the rate of someone who makes $70k.
"how did a country of only 10 million people accomplish this?" well.... only having 10 million people probably doesn't hurt
Why? You don't understand how scaling works?
@@kavinsky2 do you not understand the population is largely hegemonic while in the US there are vast swathes of different income levels, lifestyles, and much larger population sizes for DIFFERENT demophrahic groups. as in there might be more elders to young adults etc. This isnt a copy and paste situation.
They saved their economy in the 90s by moving AWAY from socialist policies. Also, they can afford high taxes while not hurting their economy by having an even freer market than the U.S. end of story
As an Immigrant who has lived and done business both in Sweden and In the USA. Doing business is very difficult in Sweden due to the bureaucracy and hard market penetration barriers. Selling products to Americans is much easier than swedes as they all have limited sources of income and are very stingy in trying new things. Americans fall in love with a product and will spread it easily amongst their peers while Swedes do not. Having employees in Sweden is very difficult as their taxes are very high and they are backed by Unions. You cannot fire someone due to incompetency if they have a permanent contract, so workers get very lazy and start calling in sick and you still have to pay them!!! I have been here for the past 10 years and made a good enough fortune but I can still say making money through a business is very difficult here. Most start-ups operate at a loss for 3-5 years, only to get bought up by a big company that has "strong" ties with the government.
we tax the poor more than we tax the rich, we also have one of the worst pension systems
@Oisín O'Sullivan Sweden
No one realized Sweden as a 31.34% payroll tax paid directly by the employer
higher tax means, rather than you deciding what to buy with your money, the government decides it for you.
it's your money, but government will spend it for you.
Basically it has low corporate taxes and high income taxes on individuals and a high vat tax. Tax burden is on the people not business.
Shh LEFTYS can’t hear truth
So, that sounds far worse for the average citizen then...
@@alexjones7845 in the end what you pay for is a very generous welfare system. I believe that the Swedish people get more in their pockets when they not have to pay health insurances, save money for college etc etc.
@@alexjones7845 it all comes down to how that money is being spent. The reason why this system won't work in the US is because taxpayers' money are squandered on illegal immigrants and other bloated useless welfare programs
Who profit off purchase taxes the government not business
0:35 nice that you show a Dutch Ikea
IKEA is owned by the Dutch.
@@1N73RC3P7OR lol what? It's owner by swedes but they have their fund in the Netherlands. So most of the money end up in funds to avoid taxes. It's still owned by swedes
@@sebastiant4206 ofc I mean that ikea is owned by swedes but this is an Ikea in the Netherlands, it says "ingang" which means entrance in Dutch and it has a Dutch flag.
f0REAL it’s ingång in swedish :D
@@Ritaaw1 look again it says ingang nog ingång.
Can we just praise the quality of journalism of these CNBC videos. I subscribed.
this video is wrong on many of its facts, as for example the amount someone would effectively come into wealth if they earned above 79000 dollars, the sum they would actually gain is around 40000... If you want to get a correct picture, research yourself.
Wow. No tax for real estate, inheritance, etc.
This reduces RED TAPE; this is fantastic. Kudos.
Less friction, fast volume. This is smart.
yep id much prefer income taxes and consumption taxes, to property and wealth taxes. They also have a very low corporate tax.
*names 4 Sweden startups
*2 of them are bought by US companies
It's not about quantity it's about quality
So basically they have none
Not beeing mean to our neighbour sweeden, but Norway has way higher Tax again. The Tax is so high Norwegians go to sweeden to buy groceries on a regular basis for those who lives along the border.
Mækkel Montages yeah we Swedes know very well how you Norwegians love coming across our border and visit Systembolaget😂😂
Sondre Johansen unfortunately i live in Bergen which is at the west coast so i can't Get to sweeden on a regular basis :/
Mækkel Montages that’s really cool, I really wanna go to Bergen one day! I had been to Oslo, Larvik, Sandefjord, Alesund and Trondheim! Anyway you guys have so many DJs popping up from there so that’s cool haha!
I am from the opposite end of you, Stockholm, so Norway is also pretty far. I take flights most of the time. It’s indeed quite expensive, everything especially food cost substantially more whenever I am in Oslo.
It would seem it has to be cheaper considering Norway literally has a huge investment arm amounting to €3 trillion and a handy oil money business but it is quite the opposite lol. But then again I don’t think it’s that bad, we are all way better condition then most other countries so at the end of the day as long as it’s sustainable, there isn’t much negative. Maybe on a long run there needs to be something done for lower middle class people as the taxes in both countries seem to effect them quite a bit, a better government support to them would be something I would appreciate. That way the kinks in the current tax system in both countries could be refined further
Interesting. There are regular bus runs to Canada so elderly Americans can buy medicines at affordable prices.
@@danielcarroll3358
Actually, more Canadians travel to America for healthcare than vice versa.
Sweeden has a 21% corporate tax rate...that's what trump lowered it to in the us. Interesting
This system can only work in countries which are almost free from corruption and where the citizens spend their money wisely.
well one the subject of corruption, the problem in america is that their government has barely changed in the last 200 years
with such an outdated system its no wonder the republic is dysfunctional
And don't spend their money in fruitless wars
You make 80k but only bring 25k home, wat?
That's the trick!
you need to learn about tax brackets. For 18,800 kronor to 468,700 kronor income tax rate is 32%. 60% tax rate on incomes above 675,700 kronor.
@@InderjitSingh12 1 dollar = 10 krona. This means you are basically poor if you move out of sweden
@@johnpathadan right, you basically have to depend on those social programs and lower cost housing and stuff if the equivalent of 25k a year is enough to sustain your living expenses. It certainly wouldn't be here. I would've imagined that those higher tax brackets would've started in say the $100,000 us range. Again, not super familiar with cost of living there but in the US $25,000 a year would be crippling paycheck to paycheck abject poverty.
That’s socialism baby!
thats why ikea is based in netherlands
I got a question!
Sweden is always slammed as a hellscape when people talk about how their politics are a failure it's a horrible place to live, a horrible country.
I know it's politics and I won't get further into it...
but how bad is it?
Swede here.
It's not a horrible place to live. The political issue is not good. But almost all European countries are dealing with nationalists now and there's similar issues in many other countries here in Europe.
The way of living has not changed at all. People are happy, healthy and working.
Come and see for yourself! :)
@@sebastiant4206 If I get an offer for a futon to crash on I might just do that.
Sweden is really bad
NeoNazi is pushing political aganda and push Sweden to joing Nato. Sweden is a under dog for US.
Sebastian Tomic the politics is fine. I don’t know how people get the idea it is bad. The fact that SD is in emergence is dividing both the left and right bloc. Anyway the fact that Annie Löof joined Lofven’s government is kind of a progress in seeing both blocs having some unison.
I just hope Ulf Kristessan doesn’t align himself with SD, it will be horrible for them because Moderate supporters will basically flock to Centre and Liberals.
Cut the military budget and its done, no need to increase taxes
The Swedish tax system is the very opposite of what Americans want.
Sweden(and other Scandinavian nations) tend to have some of the lowest corporate taxes in the developed world while individuals pay around half their income on tax.
In the United States, the prevailing narrative is that corporate taxes should pay more while individuals want to pay the lowest taxes possible .
Also ,Sweden eliminated the inheritance tax over a decade ago, has no taxes on wealth and no property taxes( though it does have municipal taxes that are basically property taxes by proxy).
So if you want the Swedish model, expect to pay at least 49 to 60 percent in total taxes if you earn over $38,000 while seeing Amazon pay around 21 percent in taxes.
Sounds like a bad deal for Swedes without children lol
If you save money and put it in real estate you can get really good tax write offs especially for an S corp. It's actually pretty good for businesses, Sweden's tax laws really encourage business, not exactly a tax heaven but a good environment especially with the spendy citizens. Also no property tax
Edit: nvm they mentioned it in the video
@@enriktigasna wrong liar ,,, Sweden is a country of equally poor working class the majorty that don't own homes
How can the 61,85% extortion on your productivity be a good thing regardless of where that many goes?
They have those numbers wrong. With a normal salary you pay around 30% income tax. There is a 25% VAT on all goods tough, and high taxes on alcohol, cigarettes and gas for example. But, Sweden has a payroll tax of ~31%. That's a tax the employer have to pay to the government, in addition to your salary. It covers pensions and a couple of other things.
And you as an employee don´t see that. That is probably where they find that number. So a person earning lets say 50k a year would roughly get 35k out. Not 19k!
Because some people, by no fault of their own, would literally die without redistribution? It's not that hard to grasp. There are also more selfish reasons to favor distribution since it simply makes for a nicer society (less crime, better-educated public, better average health, etc).
Things like infrastructure, security, power, encouragement, good schooling, rich parents, and possibilities are not equally distributed. To be rich you first have to have a certain amount of luck. How any thinking person can fail to fathom this is beyond me. It's also beyond me how anyone could be fine with a couple of extremely lucky billionaires hoarding extreme amounts of wealth while other people - real living human beings with hopes and dreams - die of easily preventable disease and starvation.
@@albinjohnsson2511 It's hard to disagree with some of your points, but you take really idealistic view of socialist society. The biggest mistake you make is you assume that those "extremely lucky billionaires hoarding extreme amounts of wealth " are going to pay those 61,85%. Nope, it's the middle class who is going to take the hit and the healthiest society is where the middle class can thrive, giving jobs to low income workers (which in my opinion shall have really low tax burden).
Also death is part of a human nature. I believe that anyone shall be entitled to healthcare and curation of diseases (which may be costly), but in practical terms there is a limit how you can help or in other words whether it's worth it to invest e.g. $500k into giving someone few more years to live. It's sad, yet it's nature... and I don't think you need 61,85% tax in order to provide fair healthcare service to anyone.
Omega lol I would not want to work a job in Sweden. 70k job and take home would be 20k that's ridiculous.
Dennis Pietrandrea I live in Sweden and my take home is 30k - I own my own home and total expenses (including restaurants) rarely go beyond 10k considering everything we get for ”free”. That is 20k every month to consume on fun things (or better yet, invest). Entry level jobs in Sweden has a take home of about 17k which is plenty to live a good life. It’s not as bad as you think.
@@TheRealCaptainAwesome See in my eyes that is very bad. If you make 30k take home at a non-entry level job and I can flip burgers and make almost as much as you that is a problem. It defeats the purpose in my eyes of going to school to do a job that is infinitely more stressful with many more hours to work when I could just flip burgers and live well.
@@dennisp8520 I definitely see your point... and in some ways, I do agree. I just meant that while I would make a lot more in the U.S. my living expenses would also be much higher there. And if you end up in an accident or get sick the costs seem to be extremely high in the U.S. compared to a few dollars in Sweden. In Sweden, a 13k difference in take-home improves your finances by way more than it sounds like. And in my case, that is the salary 2 years after school. Basically, you've got higher salaries in the U.S. but also much higher living expenses. In Sweden, the numbers are smaller, but you never have to worry about getting sick, etc and the money you get can safely be consumed (even if one might want to invest it). No system is perfect.
@@dennisp8520 It is obviously easier to get rich in the U.S, but at the same time there are people not able to get proper healthcare there. In Sweden most people are able to live great lives without worrying about money. But yes the gap between high salaries and low salaries are obviously lower. Pros and cons with all systems.
Dennis Pietrandrea That doesn’t have to be a problem. If ‘you’ would rather not study and can make a living wage flipping burgers, then do it-why is that bad.
I think what’s often left out of the conversation in the discussion is the fact that there are clearly differences in the ideology, mentality (or whatever you want to call it) between between Americans and Scandinavians, in general.
I think most Americans would agree with you that 1) flipping burgers is not a very dignified job 2) it’s only worth investing in anything (time, money, education) if it means big returns for me as an individual. The Scandinavian mentality is more collective. All workers and jobs are deserving of dignity-equals labor unions for just about every sort of work and fair wages. Scandinavians are willing to pay more taxes because, of course, they find the trade-off worth it-affordable healthcare, childcare, education, paid leave etc. BUT, there is also this sense of realization that it’s not just about ME getting all that I can get that ultimately will make ME happy BUT that my ultimate wellbeing is tied into how well (or not well) those around me are doing. Scandinavians definitely enjoy spending (and do) on eating out, coffee shops, entertainment, vacations, technology etc BUT they probably don’t spend as much on these things as Americans-maybe because they have less disposable income..? Don’t know. But, again, they generally don’t mind because they see the benefits playing out in the larger society.
If sweden had youtube taxes, pewdiepie would make 90 percent of the Swedish government budget
Big taxes make people more dependent on government. Like they said, it all depends on how the money is spent and how it's spent is decided by politicians. While for them it seems to be working so far, making everyone overly-dependent on government is prone to failure at some point.
in sweden it works because they are a democracy and not a two party republic
that means in sweden people get accurately represented more than they would if the used the american system
Just remember ....there is always a...... CATCH
Rohan K_0_0_ being happy?
Yes... Something most it be. Let me think...
....
....
...
No... can't think of anything. Maybe the weather, the cold and dark half the year. But that have nothing about the money.
I guess the catch comes during tax time. Rather have that instead of having huge student loans and a very expensive healthcare. So much red tape here compared to over there which does screw everyone. I'd take that catch.
are you gonna offer that catch or just say vague things without substance?
this sounds so nice, pay some higher taxes but have almost all basic necessities taken care of...sign me up
CNBC: Sweden! (Plays traditional swiss music in the back ground)
I love how Americans think Sweden can't possibly work and yet they kick our ass year after year.
Do you want to pay double for your cars? Do you want to be taxed starting at half your income? No, you would never agree to that and you'd never leave America in order to move to Sweden either.
Not rationing big portions of your paycheck to daycare or student loans because you're rationing 43% of your paycheck to taxes which are then rationed to daycare or postsecondary education doesn't change your big picture. The fact that so many people are confused by this financial shell game is seriously concerning. Free means you ration zero dollars. It doesn't mean adding a middle man the shows up with a gun and demands your money or else.
As a good friend of mine who’s Swedish says... in Sweden it’s a crime to be rich as you’ll be taxed back to being upper middle class. But the social security net is so good, people don’t mind. Also, it helps not to have enemies or have an economy based on running a war machine as taxes can be used FOR the people than lining the pockets of defence contractors(But Swedish firms make excellent guns and the USA is an important market). Although, she does buy a load of electronics when she visits the US. 🤣 Can’t let go of good deals.
it's not a crime to be rich, you are taxed higher yes. But you are still going to be alot wealthier then the rest.
@@zoom5024 sorry, but it's obviously crime to be rich
Extra taxation is penalisation
Progressive taxation is punishment for success
@@zoom5024 no poorer than the offers
@@ХейХей-ю3ф no, it's not punishment. You still pay the same taxes for what you've been paying before.
For example:
Let's say there are 3 tax thresholds.
-over 20000 - 20%
-over 30000 - 30%
-over 40000 - 40%
If you earn 15000, then you don't pay any taxes.
If you earn 25000 you pay only for this 5000, so all you pay is 1000.
If you earn 35000 you pay nothing for 20000. You pay 20% for the next 10000, which is 2000. And you pay 30% for the next 5000, which is 1500.
Then it goes the same when you reach another threshold.
So you still are richer than someone who earns less. You say "it's punishment". But amount of work is not proportional to the money you earn. I mean, it's better in Sweden, but look how it looks like in other countries.
Also - someone who is very rich - like Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates will never be able to spend all this money. They also don't work like 50 (or 500 or 500000) times harder than their engineers or their janitors or whoever.
Im not saying to tax them, so we take like all of their money. I'm saying that they should pay more than poorer tax payers. They still will be rich. Redistribution also benefits the rich (not the richest, but the rich yes). System is more stable. Economy is less vulnerable to crises, if there are smaller inequalities.
www.equalitytrust.org.uk/economic
When people talk about taxes in different countries they often leave out the fact that the US has state and local taxes as well.
We should be having the federal government fund the states so state taxes are only supplemental.
Also:
Federal taxes don’t fund spending. Taxes are a means to reduce inflation.
UK has local taxes too.
Matty Lamb yea but the US pushes a lot of responsibilities onto state and local government
the US can do the same without those high taxes just spend less on the military.
But 70% is mad, that means less disposable income even if a lot of services are paid for by the government
Well, normal income taxes are about 25%
The reason why higher taxation in the US is looked at with skepticism is, that more money would end up in Government's treasury which could then be used to significantly improve healthcare or education which would mean less money left to be spent in Walmart. This is what large corporations are afraid of. People may become self-sufficient. No more sheep to be sheared.