Thom Hartmann: Sweden Said Good Riddance to Austerity - When Will America?

[thomhartmann]

Dr. Richard Wolff, Economist / Author-Democracy At Work / Professor of Economics Emeritus, University of MA, joins Thom Hartmann. Sweden has said good riddance to austerity. On Sunday - the country's voters chose a group of left-wing and center-left parties -led by the Social Democrat party - to head a new government. In total - left wing parties won 43.7 percent of the vote and 159 seats in parliament. When all is said and done and the Social Democrats have formed a government - it will mark the end of Sweden's short-lived experiment with austerity. In the eight years since outgoing prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt's right-leaning Moderate Party took control of parliament - Sweden has seen huge tax cuts and a flurry of so-called "pro-market reforms" - a change that many in the country saw as a a betrayal of a decades-long tradition of social democracy. With Sunday's elections - though - it looks like the Scandinavian Model is back in business - and will be for quite some time.

The Big Picture with Thom Hartmann on RT TV & FSTV "live" 7pm and 10pm check www.thomhartmann.com/tv for local listings

[merrily]

1. I'd rather not say.

[dvhughes]

2. As a resident of Stockholm, I can say this:

Thom is correct and the elections went as he claims here. However, he omitted a very important detail.
The main reason the left won was not by gaining votes, but because their main electoral rival, the moderates headed by Reinfeldt, lost a fair percentage of votes to the Sweden Democrats. A far right, and one might say extreme-right party with a history of neo-nazi connections and rather intolerant immigration policies. (Their vote percentage doubled in four years from 6% in 2010 to 12% on Sunday gaining them more seats in parliament and are now the 3rd largest party in Sweden. Much of the new votes coming from rural areas.) Comparisons to the rise of the Tea Party are easy to make.

Yes, Thom is correct here, but the piece contains a rosy bias. Opinions from my very left leaning, Swedish friends here in Stockholm about how the election unfolded were not as optimistic and rather discouraging. Some claimed to be embarrassed and in fact, one friend even wondered publicly "Where did my Sweden go?" on his FB status.

One must also take into account that the new Prime Minister, Social Democrat Stefan Löfven does not have a majority of allies in parliament. As stated in the original piece, 43.7% to be precise. So he must form a working government with different parties, with very different agendas, and are not at all inclined to be helpful to the left. If he can't, there very well be a no confidence vote in a year.

Which very likely would erase any recent collateral gains from the left.

So in fact... this election was less a reflection of Sweden's shift to the left and rejection of austerity, and more about the dramatic gains of the far right. Which was why my friends were so upset.

More on this here in English here if interested.