In Energy, and Virtually Everything Else, Denmark Gets It Right
A young Danish girl in the grass.
This video on Denmark will make you smile, while explaining what makes this small country such an excellent place to live (for everyone except sun worshipers).
Denmark is a good example of government-at-work in the best possible sense of the phrase. People pay substantially higher taxes than they do here in the U.S., but almost 9 out of 10 report they do so gladly, since they enjoy terrific services that greatly contribute to their enjoyment of life. What do you get when you blend free education and healthcare, lots of economic opportunity, and generous vacations–offered to everyone, regardless of socio-economic class? Happy people. Denmark ranks #3 in the world happiness rankings.
As they say, The reason behind the high level of support for the welfare state in Denmark is the awareness of the fact that the welfare model turns our collective wealth into well-being. We are not paying taxes. We are investing in our society. We are purchasing quality of life.
Moreover, Denmark tends to tax things that they want less of. The 100% tax on personal automobiles means almost zero traffic, and very little consumption of pollution -causing fuels. When a client in Copenhagen drove me at full freeway speed out to his house for dinner after work one evening at about 6 PM, he asked, “Do you notice anything missing?” When I didn’t understand what he meant, he offered this clue: “rush hour?”
As we’ve noted previously, the Danes run their country almost exclusively on renewable energy. Though this is partially a moral decision, it doesn’t require any real sacrifice; they have clean energy resources coming out their ears, and a next-door neighbor (Germany) to which they can sell any amount of off-peak power.
In any case, it’s a fabulous place to be.
Craig,
You really do love “selective” truths. Do you really believe the CEO of an obscure “Happiness Research Institute”, speaks on behalf of the Danish people?
I’m not sure of the significance of the rush hour illusion to renewable energy?
I’m sure the fact that the entire nation has less than half the population of London, and even the Capital has only 628,000 is more likely to be the real cause. Oh, I hope he was driving one of the heavily subsidized 0.6% electric vehicles registered in Denmark.
Don’t get me wrong, I like Denmark and the Danes, but everything isn’t quite as rosy as you believe.
1) The Dames actually use more Coal as a percentage (38.6%) than Americans
2) Denmark is replacing coal with “Bio-mass. Last year Denmark imported 3.6 million tonnes of wood pellets. Mainly the pellets are imported from Russia. These pellets are contributing to the destruction of the vast Russian tundra forests at a rate of 10,000 square miles per year
3) Denmark’s relatively unexceptional free education system is paid, like all of it’s public sector from, now dwindling, oil revenues.
4) The EU reports the Danish welfare state welfare is unsustainable. Health care is substandard and danish productivity has fallen while private and public debt have risen. The EU warns of real problems becoming unsupportable by 2024.
5) Denmark’s wind turbines are in real trouble with more than 40% no longer working and by 2025 nearly all will need replacement. The is no funding provision for this eventuality.
Craig, my humble advice is to return those rose tinted glasses back to Bernie Saunders and do a little skeptical research ! (How about starting with Russian forest depletion).
If only Americans could see that people like Obama are trying to help instead of thinking Trump is their saviour. Yesterday I saw Trump’s campaign on television. It was full of so much bs, yet everyone was cheering for him. He said that now more people were getting better treatment when they’re sick even though he’s the one who got rid of Obama’s health plan. Maybe they’re doing better because the only people who can afford it are the upper class, freeing up space in hospitals. Sometimes I wonder how dumb the 40% that support him have to bee to completely disregard what he’s doing.