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Smart Social Policies in Finland, Dumb Ones in the US
http://www.nationofchange.org/smart-social-policies-finland-dumb-ones-us-1409361384
It’s not that Finland doesn’t have its share of crimes, including violent crimes, but police are not swarming the streets, they don’t carry semi-automatic rifles on patrol, and they are even polite when they make arrests. When the teenage son of a friend of ours in Finland was caught with friends one evening a year or so ago smoking marijuana in a playground, the police simply called his parents, who came in and were advised to reprimand him and talk with him about the seriousness of taking drugs. There was no arrest or appearance before a judge, no fine, and no handcuffing.
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But it’s not just the lack of a police presence, or the quality of the infrastructure in Finland, that shocks a visiting American. There are intelligent policies being pursued in Finland, even under the current conservative government there, that make the US simply look ridiculous and self-destructive.
Consider just this one: In Finland, for some time now, there has been a “Job Alternation Program” in effect. This commonsense program allows workers up to age 60 who have worked for at least 16 years in any field, from factory to university, to take up to a year’s leave at 60% of their regular salary, during which absence, the employer is supposed to hire an unemployed entry-level replacement who thus gets an opportunity to gain work experience that will hopefully allow such people to land a regular job in the field. During this paid leave, the regular employee is free to train for another skill, to volunteer, or just to kick back and recharge. This kind of leave can be taken as often as every five years!
This is a program that costs the employer nothing, as the replacement employee is paid from the savings derived from reducing the salary of the employee who is on leave. But everyone benefits: the employee who gets the time off, the young unemployeed worker who gets work experience in a chosen career, the employer, who gets both an eager young recruit to try out or train risk-free, and an existing employee who either gets a rest or new skills and comes back revitalized, or who perhaps leaves, making way for the employer to hire the new recruit at, probably, a lower starting salary than was being paid to the older worker, and the larger society, which has found a creative way to help young workers move into productive jobs. (We actually have a successful version of this at many colleges and universities. It's called a sabbitical leave, where faculty can leave for a year, generally at reduced pay. During that time the school can replace them with cheap part-time adjuncts or a young one-year faculty appointee. Yet even here, though universities love sabbaticals, which actually save them money, not all offer them, and many that do use them as rewards for favored professors and withhold them from others.)
Another smart idea that simply doesn’t stand a chance in the Dickensian US is paid maternity leave. The US and Papua New Guinea share the distinction of being the only two countries that do not have any paid leave for new mothers. Finland, meanwhile has one of the world’s most generous programs, with mothers getting 105 days of paid maternity leave at 80% of salary when a baby is born, plus another 158 days at 58% of salary. This latter leave can be taken by mother or father or shared by both. Unpaid leave for childcare can continue through age three, with a guaranteed return to the same job. All children also have a right to daycare and afterschool care through age 7, regardless of income. This only makes sense. How else can a parent go out and work? Does all that cost Finnish taxpayers money? Of course. But we all see the results of not having such a policy here in the US, where poor parents -- especially single mothers -- struggle on minimal welfare (also at taxpayer expense) with a new baby because they cannot afford child care that might allow them to at least go out and earn a living.
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GDP means very little to the average worker!
Edited to add: Our unemployment rate is actually higher than the official 6.2% U3 rate. I haven't looked at the U6 for a while; but, it's always higher.
But we're better than North Korea! 
