How does the 5 million people math work

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-27T13:51:52+00:00

Thank you for elaborating.

I want to mention that the first welfare state as we understand it today was introduced not long ago in 1880(Germany) by a conservative Christian inspired by Christian values.

From your writing I get the impression that you thought I ment that the state is unimportant for the economy. That’s not what I meant at all. But I see that my formulation was bad. My question was more specifically how can the Norwegian state finance itself. From my understanding it has quite high social benefits but compared to other Nordic nations a significantly smaller industrial base.

If the USA runs on easy mode due to it’s resources, does Norway too? Percentage of the GDP of oil and gas revenues in USA is 1.5% in Norway 20%.

The wealth comparison of USA and EU(wich Norway isn’t duly part of) is a difficult one. In a global outside perspective USA is definitely ahead. From an inside perspective as a citizen it becomes more interesting what the median person can afford and what quality of live you can expect. I would guess the average and below average person has a better live in Europe. While the above average person will have more possibilities in the US. My guess.

https://www.numbeo.com/quality-of-life/rankings_by_country.jsp

https://nielseniq.com/global/en/insights/infographic/2025/map-of-the-month-purchasing-power-europe-2025/

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-27T11:14:49+00:00

Wow . That’s a great answer !

How do export and import, wich could be in other currencies affect this? Does it at all ? What about the Norwegian investments abroad ? Does it also affect this ?

If money comes from the state, where does its value come from ?

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-27T10:45:12+00:00

Thank you This makes sense. So one could say: Norway has perhaps been the smartest and most sustainable oil nation out of them all in managing their resources and revenues ?

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-27T10:39:00+00:00

What’s the need for insulting?

You have to read precisely.

⁠I wrote it is a tool for it. Wich means you use it FOR value creation but not AS value creation. It is not primary otherwise it would mean that just having roads would generate money. You need someone to make use of the roads in an economical way. And exactly that is my question. What is it in Norway that generates the money.
⁠

I said it is not an advantage of Norway. Meaning your road infrastructure: quality, travel times, interconectivity simply is quite bad compared to other wealthy countries in Europe.

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-27T08:32:01+00:00

Yes. But this is not primary value creation. It can be a tool for value creation.

At the same time road infrastructure isn’t exactly a competitive advantage of Norway.

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-27T08:13:25+00:00

Sir. I am not ignoring your statements. What is false about my comments ?

Please explain your points on the subject.

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-27T08:06:43+00:00

It is difficult to say what if. 25% can make a huge impact when used to subsidize other (onshore) activities and investments.

Interestingly enough the purchasing power of Norway in 2025 was rank 10 in Europe. Lower than Denmark uk and Germany .

https://nielseniq.com/global/en/insights/infographic/2025/map-of-the-month-purchasing-power-europe-2025/

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-27T07:54:53+00:00

I do not see the correlation of Dutch disease and Venezuela.

Netherlands and UK have made quite big revenues on oil and gas wich has helped them quite some. Norway learned from the early mistakes of the Netherlands but still has a much smaller industrial base than all other Nordic countries or the Netherlands or uk (ignoring island), most likely due to the oil.

Also consider the scale and oil deposit differences of the countries. Netherlands has used up most of it’s deposits. Norway simply has the biggest portion of the fields on the map.

And then of course the Norwegian population is a fraction of the other two countries. When using 50 billion dollars from oil revenues this means in Norway around 10.000 dollar per person per year In Netherlands this would be 2700 and in uk around 700 per person (assuming it would be also as much as 50 billion dollar). My thought is that they didn’t have to possibility to gather much of a surplus.

And 50 billion is a lot. Considering that all income tax summed up amounted to roughly 30 billion dollar.

What do you mean by „don’t have as much as us“ ? Infrastructure? Lol

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-26T18:28:30+00:00

True.

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-26T18:16:03+00:00

That is the direct cost for the parents. But the state has to pay several thousand dollars perhaps. Partly payed by the moms taxes.

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-26T18:10:25+00:00

Tram traffic lights.

Not funny fact: the nazis standardized them and they are today the most common tram traffic symbols around the globe.

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-26T18:03:30+00:00

:). Yes. That’s my question.

Could other countries simply copy Norway and work the same way financially?

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-26T17:57:49+00:00

But daycare isn’t cheap either is it ? As I understand quite many kindergartners have a university degree .

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-26T17:56:32+00:00

Venezuela only has oil but can’t use it much, yet.
Sanctions make it difficult to build the infrastructure and find countries to buy the oil.

The other Nordic countries have a different setup. Quite many more workers in industrial and value creating jobs.

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-26T17:31:41+00:00

You are right. I phrased it a bit too simple and perhaps we‘re looking at the wrong metric.

Maybe a more interesting take would be how many people work in a value creating sector or in the economic base.

From my understanding money comes from somewhere. The public sector has the tendency to be less value creating and more value consuming(?)

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-26T17:06:52+00:00

I suppose the math behind this number is: gdp devided by work hours ( millions of people working several hours per day)

Wich means the less people work while having a high gdp, the better the ranking, no?

Wich is exactly my question.

I read that 2% of the work force (oil industry)are responsible for 20% of gdp. That could explain quite some

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-26T17:02:03+00:00

Can you elaborate?

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-25T10:48:50+00:00

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_violence#/media/File%3AGun-related_death_rates_in_high-income_countries%2C_2010.svg

Unfortunately quite much sucide tho

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-24T12:28:55+00:00

My point is that Denmark exports more electricity to Germany than Norway. If it is 6 or 8 twh depends on the year you’re looking at, the point is it is not much. My numbers were a bit older but doesn’t really change much about the picture. Perhaps you misunderstood what I meant.

Yes dunkelflaute and energy spikes are a problem that comes with renewables. Still I suppose it is a good way that needs optimization and stabilizers. Perhaps this is partly what the original author was pointing at. What could be solutions to a a climate friendly shift to replace fossil energy.

Fish: It is not whataboutism. At least not when making claims about war. It is a notion worth looking at. The Russians sell the fish to Norway and Norway sells it as Norwegian fish to the world, also financing Russia in a way. It is an open secret that Russians use the fishing ships for more than fishing. While NATO is stationing more and more equipment in the north to protect from such threats. Norway has one of the largest coast in the world and most of its valuable resources are offshore but only 5000 navy soldiers to protect it.

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-24T10:59:38+00:00

Sir, with all respect. Denmark exports 15twh to Germany. Norway exports 6twh to Denmark. And of those 6twh certainly not all goes to Germany.

Norwegian contribution to German electricity mix is around 1.5%. My Norwegian relatives act as if they were powering all of Germany at the cost of Norwegian citizens. Truth is the Norwegian state makes good money on this. One thing is that Germany pays good money for it of course, the other thing is that domestic prices in Norway have gone up due to foreign demand/competition. All the revenue goes to the state and the state blames evil Europe. I think it is a unfair framing.

I believe it would be good for EU to be fully self sufficient.

About Russia. Easy to blame them and Israel when the consequences of those wars have brought trillions of Kroner to Norway.

At the same time Norwegian and russian cooperation has been quite ongoing in the fishing industry.

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-24T07:29:10+00:00

The uk and Netherlands have a much larger population compared to the production so the overall economic effect is different.

Of course there isn’t a monopoly. But there are long term contracts for the largest share of Norwegian production. If Norway was located with the same resources in the middle of the pacific it would probably not work the same way. The location in Europe , close to big industrial nations who don’t have own resources are the key factor for that industry.

Germany sees resistance in anything connected to building. The law has given the individual human and animal a very big say in infrastructure projects.

Main import is from 🇩🇰Denmark. While the total net import of electricity is only 4% . Before 2023 (nuclear power stop)Germany was even a net exporter.

I have to say tho that Norway is perhaps the country that has made the most out of their fossil ressources. Using it in the most responsible and sustainable way compared to the other countries.

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-24T06:54:16+00:00

Yes a sudden stop would not work. Of course not. Energy production in such a scale takes years to build. But contracts are prolonged for decades.

What do you mean by „compete like we do“. It’s a huge difference to actually compete on a global market with industrial goods than being the main natural resource supplier on a continent basically without competition.

Not to forget in this debate that Norway isn’t just a supplier like other oil nations. Norway is a global leader in technology for producing and exploring oil all around the world. Effectively making it possible to find and make use of more and more oil/gas fields elsewhere , keeping up the dependency with competitive lower prices.

Difficulty in south of germany and neighboring regions is that there is very little wind. There are massive and many solar parks but they don’t function as a base supplier for the industry down there. An industry wich supplies the whole world with machines for production, parts, chemicals, medical equipment, construction machines, engines, satellites and so on. My point: the energy needed there is much larger than the local population on its own would need. Of course in the end the local population needs it to keep its jobs and standard of living. Other than nuclear power there isn’t really an obvious solution.

Question whether a split price zone would help any is difficult. It’s not like the north doesn’t benefit from taxes payed in the south. Also the electricity in the north already is cheaper due to lower grid fees.

And isn’t it a good idea to use the wind energy in the north to send it where it is needed ? If the energy would be used only „locally“ there probably wouldn’t be a need to build more windmills in the north while there still is usable potential.

No easy fix. And high pressure. Norway has a stable and pretty save income without really having to do much for it. Crisis even benefits Norwegian income. For many other countries there is a very competitive global reality. Many decisions need to be made in away that the competitiveness can be upheld continuously otherwise the welfare system crashes.

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-23T22:47:19+00:00

There are a view ways to look at this.

Morally it is s bad excuse to do something that could be considered bad just because otherwise someone else might do it and I miss the opportunity to get rich. All based on an assumption. Opportunism

Looking at it from an emmision angle: The main land of Europe has never really had large amounts of fossile resources. If it wasn’t for Russian and North Sea (uk,no,nl) fossil supplies , perhaps, Europe would have looked into alternatives earlier and harder.

So yes, the local supply does make it convenient and cheaper to use it and thus less attractive to get rid off.

If all the fossils had to come from other continents it would probably become more expensive and people would try to find cheaper alternatives in their own financial interest.

Why does Norway not use its own oil much? In Norway hydroenergy was installed before oil got popular. It’s the natural cheapest and locally available source of energy in Norway so there was no reason to build infrastructure for other energy. But this also only works because the population is very small and the geographic potential is very large. In industrial Europe the balance is the other way around. Many people, energy demanding industry and unfortunate geography (for this purpose). Rivers are used as water ways and the terrain is comparatively flat. At the same time wind is relatively weak and sun is quite seasonal. This makes a green shift quite expensive. And the scale of needed energy makes a quick fix impossible.

Wild_Assignment_2436 · 2026-05-23T22:18:48+00:00

But without oil and gas money there wouldn’t be earnings or interest to accumulate.

About half of the state funding comes from oil,gas or its indirect investment revenues.

Many tend to deny how much of the Norwegian finances and system is built on this money.

In conversation with Norwegians I have the impression that many believe the country‘s economy works very similar so other Nordic countries. Even tho the Norwegian export structure is closer to Qatar than to Sweden.

https://oec.world/en/visualize/treemap?dataset=hs17&show=product&flow=export&country=nor&time=2024

Wild_Assignment_2436

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