Showing posts with label carbon taxes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label carbon taxes. Show all posts

Monday, June 16, 2008

WASHINGTON TIMES: Beguiling curves of the Swedish model

To give readers of Political Animal an idea of what the Labour Party's "Swedish Model" is this piece from the Washington Times will give you a glimse. Particularly important are these two outtakes:

The outlines of the Swedish "third way" welfare state began appearing in the 1950s. As late as 1960, taxing and government spending in Sweden, as a percent of GDP, was only slightly larger than in the U.S. But then the welfare statists went into full bloom. Taxing and spending surged in Sweden during the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s until the mid-1990s, when tax revenues were more than 50 percent of GDP and government spending had reached a whopping 66 percent by 1995 (a peak from which it has slightly declined).

The extent of the failure of the Swedish model are both shocking and little known. For example, no new net jobs have been produced in the Swedish private sector since 1950.

In New Zealand over the last 9 years the State has grown faster than the economy and total Crown Expenses are expected to be $67.9b for the year to June 2008, or 41.2% of GDP. That is awfully close to Sweden in the 1990s and will clearly lead to a larger State apparatus and a smaller private sector.


Originally published 10:27 p.m., April 25, 2004, Washington Times

When considering the Swedish model, one can be forgiven for thinking of a comely statuesque blond with blue eyes. However, to economists and policy junkies, the Swedish model refers to the "third way" between socialism and capitalism many on the American left laud as the ideal.

Does the Swedish model work as advertised? According to a new paper by the highly regarded Swedish economist, Nils Karlson, the "model has become quite different from what was intended and to what many people still believe to be the case."

The extent of the failure of the Swedish model are both shocking and little known. For example, no new net jobs have been produced in the Swedish private sector since 1950. (By contrast, the U.S. created more than 60 million new private-sector jobs during the same period, from 52 million in 1950 to about 115 million in 2002.) "None of top 50 companies on the Stockholm stock exchange has been started since 1970."

Again, contrast this with the U.S. where many of our biggest companies had not been born or known of in 1970, such as Microsoft, Intel, Wal-Mart, Home Depot, Cisco, etc., Mr. Karlson's litany of failures of the Swedish model include: "Sweden has dropped from fourth to 14th place in 2002 among the OECD countries (i.e., affluent industrialized countries) in terms of GDP per capita since 1970."

In addition, "well over 1 million people out of a work force of around four million did not work in 2003 but lived on various kinds of public welfare programs, such as, pre-pension schemes, unemployment benefits, sick-leave programs, etc." Finally, "a majority of the adult population are either employed by the state or clients of the state in a sense that they have a majority of the income coming from public subsidies."

A half-century ago, Sweden was a great success story. One hundred fifty years ago, Sweden began a transformation from a poor agricultural society to a rich industrial society. The economy was deregulated, taxes were lowered and tariffs abolished. Modern limited liability company laws and a patent system were adopted. The result was from 1890 to 1950, Sweden was the world's fastest-growing economy, and developed a number of globally known and respected companies. During this time, Sweden was a low-tax country where the total tax burden reached only 21 percent of gross domestic product by 1950 (currently total taxes are approximately 30 percent of GDP in the U.S.).

The outlines of the Swedish "third way" welfare state began appearing in the 1950s. As late as 1960, taxing and government spending in Sweden, as a percent of GDP, was only slightly larger than in the U.S. But then the welfare statists went into full bloom. Taxing and spending surged in Sweden during the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s until the mid-1990s, when tax revenues were more than 50 percent of GDP and government spending had reached a whopping 66 percent by 1995 (a peak from which it has slightly declined).

The rise in taxing and spending was coupled with increased market regulation, "social engineering" and state planning. All the taxing, spending and regulation had a number of unintended consequences, such as undermining volunteer organizations as people increasingly turned to the state for help. Job security legislation made employers more reluctant to hire. Fewer new firms were created, new inventions and innovations declined, and real costs of providing goods and services rose. Increasing taxes on labor undermined work incentives and increased the "black" or underground economy.

In addition to cataloging the economic decline resulting from the rise in the Swedish welfare state, Mr. Karlson argues that perhaps the most damaging consequence of the "third way" is the loss of "dignity" among the Swedish people. Mr. Karlson takes a classical approach and argues every individual has a "unique value" and a "good society" requires individual liberty, personal responsibility and respect for the liberty of others.

As the welfare state undermines the ability to engage in productive activity to support oneself, and individual liberty and responsibility, there will be a corresponding loss in dignity. This loss of dignity debilitates both the individual and society.

The Swedish model teaches us good intentions are not enough when trying to create a humane, compassionate and prosperous society. Failure to fully understand the economic and social consequences of policies that increasingly regulate and tax productive activity was the Swedish model's fatal flaw.

Unfortunately, this same ignorance of the consequences of taxing, spending and regulation is rampant among far too many of the American political and media class. The good news is the Swedish model is not totally useless; it is a fine model of what not to do if only we can get the American people and their opinion leaders to understand it.

Richard W. Rahn is a senior fellow of the Discovery Institute and an adjunct scholar of the Cato Institute.

Thursday, January 17, 2008

Global Warning: Tax Iceberg Ahead

Originally posted at the Share Investor Blog in June 2007 the piece below is also strongly politically slanted so I reposted it here. As stockmarkets take a dive in 2008 and global economies look increasingly shaky, the carbon taxes that Labour will foist on us are going to bite.

This is on top of increasing mortgage rates and runaway inflation fed by out of control Government spending over the last 9 years.


Global Warning: Tax Iceberg Ahead


It is like sitting on the bow of the Titanic while watching it hit an iceberg. We know it is coming but we don't yet know how big the iceberg is. Let me help you out dear reader.

If one thought the budget was a killer to business and the economy and it clearly is: increased compliance costs, contributions to employees' savings and the two headed monster the inflationary petrol tax-the 3c cut to business tax still puts business behind- then you have got another thing coming.

The biggest thing missing from the 2007 budget was an indication of looming carbon taxes and costs associated with Labour's lunacy over Kyoto and the global warming myth.

It wasn't even given the once over lightly, in fact it wasn't mentioned at all.

In what will be New Zealand business' biggest challenge in generations, global warming taxes, Cullen is playing fast and lose with our kiwi companies simply because they cannot plan with certainty of the future.

These costs loom large in board rooms around the country, only the NZX board room is relaxed because they look likely to benefit from implementing so-called "carbon trading."

The costs to business and the economy cannot be overstated. Businesses, and eventually individuals who emit carbon will be taxed on those emissions. How much we don't know but what we do know is that these taxes will flow down to the consumer and put a bite on the economy with such force that we may never recover.

Like the 2007 budget, the only winners from carbon taxes will be Governments and an army of bureaucrats who will administer the taxes from yet another acre of new Wellington office space.

The two business sectors with the most to lose will be tourism and agriculture, incidentally the 2 biggest earners of foreign exchange for New Zealand Inc. According to those with a green tinge to their blood, including Sir Richard Branson, airline travel is one of the biggest contributors to Global Warming, with the shipping sector and distance traveled by those ships to get goods to market from this part of the world 2 targets for the highest taxes and red tape due to the perception of their "global carbon footprint."

Already New Zealand's agriculture industry has been given a wake-up call over "food miles" and Tesco in Britain discouraging buying of NZ produce because of the distance it has come. Commentators such as Rod Oram are foisted on their own Global Warming crusades, when they on the one hand advocate for GW and carbon taxes(Oram buys carbon credits to off-set his "carbon footprint")but on the other hand moan when the likes of Tesco actually use the argument he advocates against him.

The tourism industry clearly faces a bleak future if these new taxes take a strangle-hold. The further away a destination, the higher the taxes will be on airfares, airlines and a whole host of industry related business. New Zealand is as far away as one can get from the bulk of the worlds population and it doesn't take Einstein to figure out who the biggest loser will be.

We must not confuse the valid issue of polluting our neighbourhood and planet with the Myth of Global Warming. There has been a turning point in the belief of man-made GW from former believers in the scientific world and the focus should now be to get back to reality and impetus on the real issues around us.

GW associated taxes will kill our already shaky economy and the irony is that the worlds biggest and real polluters will be the beneficiary of our Government's stupidity.


C Share Investor 2007 & Political Animal 2008