To add to Sachs' synopsis of OECD data, I looked at theirs on population growth and immigration. (I was tickled pink - oops, maybe the wrong color here - to find the tables downloadable as spreadsheets.) Over the past 10 years, population growth of 6 Anglophone countries (including Ireland ?) was 1% per year and that of the Scandanavian countries 0.36%. Net migration over the same period was 4.5 per 1000 population for Anglophones and 1.9 for Scandanavians. First thought, of course, was that if it was so much better in Scandanavia, how come the immigration rate is less than half that of the Anglophones? On the other hand, might not the population dynamics by themselves explain both the difference in average income and poverty rate.
Kent Gatewood
· 3 years ago
I guess we all have a special book. While I really enjoyed the Friedmans' tv series, Alexander Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago is mine. This life changing examination of the consequences of the communists search for social justice has forever made me more than suspicious of those like Ms Lav.
Sean
· 3 years ago
Hmm...somehow, for Sachs, looking at a bunch of numbers caused by a very high number of variables, most of which can't be controlled for, is now "science". And he even included a "poverty rate" of varying standards as well as a surely false "unemployment" rate (for example, Sweden's true unemployment rate is probably twice that reported). Also, why not throw in places like Japan and South Korea as low-tax areas....oh yeah, might mess up your little "R&D % of GDP" data line.
mlinksva
· 3 years ago
Wow, I am deeply embarrassed for Sachs, and for SciAm's editors.
I used to be a subscriber to Scientific American back in the 80's and 90's, but as time went on, the political bias in their articles became increasingly blatant. I stopped subscribing when they crosses the line into presenting publishing pseudo-scientific stuff like the Sach's article. It appears they haven't changed much since I left.
Sad to see such a venerable magazine reduced to such a state.
Brad Hutchings
· 3 years ago
Example 182,361 of "Conservatives are evil, liberals are stupid". Apologies for lumping you in with the conservatives. Embrace being evil. It makes the argument so much easier.
Henri Hein
· 3 years ago
This is mind-numbing.
"The evidence is now in "
Mr. Sachs has only now discovered emperical evidence in the social sciences?
"Friedrich Von Hayek was wrong"
Hayek attacked socialism, not welfare.
One of the things about the Scandinavian countries that is often overlooked is that they have a strong tradition of property rights, going back further than even Englands. Their commitment to a freemarket economy was never in serious question.
All Comments
To add to Sachs' synopsis of OECD data, I looked at theirs on population growth and immigration. (I was tickled pink - oops, maybe the wrong color here - to find the tables downloadable as spreadsheets.) Over the past 10 years, population growth of 6 Anglophone countries (including Ireland ?) was 1% per year and that of the Scandanavian countries 0.36%. Net migration over the same period was 4.5 per 1000 population for Anglophones and 1.9 for Scandanavians. First thought, of course, was that if it was so much better in Scandanavia, how come the immigration rate is less than half that of the Anglophones? On the other hand, might not the population dynamics by themselves explain both the difference in average income and poverty rate.
I guess we all have a special book. While I really enjoyed the Friedmans' tv series, Alexander Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago is mine. This life changing examination of the consequences of the communists search for social justice has forever made me more than suspicious of those like Ms Lav.
Hmm...somehow, for Sachs, looking at a bunch of numbers caused by a very high number of variables, most of which can't be controlled for, is now "science". And he even included a "poverty rate" of varying standards as well as a surely false "unemployment" rate (for example, Sweden's true unemployment rate is probably twice that reported). Also, why not throw in places like Japan and South Korea as low-tax areas....oh yeah, might mess up your little "R&D % of GDP" data line.
Wow, I am deeply embarrassed for Sachs, and for SciAm's editors.
You should know about http://nytimes.blogspace.com/genlink<br>
I used to be a subscriber to Scientific American back in the 80's and 90's, but as time went on, the political bias in their articles became increasingly blatant. I stopped subscribing when they crosses the line into presenting publishing pseudo-scientific stuff like the Sach's article. It appears they haven't changed much since I left.
Sad to see such a venerable magazine reduced to such a state.
Example 182,361 of "Conservatives are evil, liberals are stupid". Apologies for lumping you in with the conservatives. Embrace being evil. It makes the argument so much easier.
This is mind-numbing.
"The evidence is now in "
Mr. Sachs has only now discovered emperical evidence in the social sciences?
"Friedrich Von Hayek was wrong"
Hayek attacked socialism, not welfare.
One of the things about the Scandinavian countries that is often overlooked is that they have a strong tradition of property rights, going back further than even Englands. Their commitment to a freemarket economy was never in serious question.