MISTER, WE COULD USE A MAN LIKE GENERAL PINOCHET AGAIN:

Obama And The Swedish Welfare State (Richard Rahn, 2009-08-20, Brussels Journal)

In the late 1980s and 1990s, Sweden began an economic course correction that continues today. Marginal tax rates were reduced for most of the population. The wealth tax and inheritance tax were abolished. Financial markets, telecommunications, electricity, road transport, taxis and other activities were deregulated. Privatization of industry was begun, and the current government is continuing the process.

The generosity of some welfare and other benefits has been reduced, with the goal of making work more economically rewarding relative to government benefits. Also, trade liberalization has been expanded greatly. The result has been a pickup in economic growth, and Sweden is no longer falling further behind other developed countries.

One notable success has been pension reform. Sweden was the first nation to implement a mandatory government retirement system for all its citizens. Sweden, like the United States and most other countries, was then faced with an increasing, unfunded social security liability as a result of low birthrates and people living much longer.

After studying the problem in the early 1990s, the Swedes approved in 1998 moving toward a Chilean private pension system, first developed by former Chilean Labor Minister Jose Piñera. (Seventeen countries have adopted variations of the Piñerian system, which has been very successful in Chile.)

The new Swedish pension system has four key features, including partial privatization, individual accounts, a safety net to protect the poor and a transition to protect retirees and older workers. The benefits have been substantial budgetary savings, higher retirement income and faster economic growth.

Those who wish to chase the Swedish model need first to decide which model they seek: The high-growth, pre-1960 model; the low-growth model of the 1970s and 1980s; or the reformist, welfare-state model of recent years.

The irony is that the current Democrat Congress and administration are rapidly emulating the parts of the Swedish model that proved disastrous and rejecting those parts that are proving to be successful.