https://x.com/handre/status/2046521991931314334?s=51&t=cLq01Oy84YkmYPZ-URIMYw
"Sweden's socialist experiment collapsed so spectacularly in the 1990s that even the Social Democrats had to abandon their own system and embrace free markets. By 1990, Sweden faced a full-blown economic crisis. Government spending had ballooned to 67% of GDP. Marginal tax rates hit 102% (literally paying the state to work). Public debt exploded. The banking system collapsed under the weight of government-directed credit allocation. Unemployment skyrocketed to 12%. The Swedish model had delivered exactly what free market economists predicted: economic stagnation, capital flight, and fiscal collapse. The government had no choice but to deregulate. They privatized telecommunications, postal services, railways, and electricity. They abolished exchange controls and financial market regulations. They cut government spending from 67% to 49% of GDP. They reduced the top marginal tax rate from 87% to 57%. They opened domestic markets to foreign competition and eliminated price controls across entire sectors. The results were immediate and undeniable. GDP growth accelerated from near-zero to 4% annually through the late 1990s. Unemployment plummeted to 4% by 2000. Productivity surged as companies like Ericsson and Volvo competed globally without government interference. Swedish startups like Skype and Spotify emerged from the newly liberalized economy. Foreign investment flooded back as Sweden transformed from socialist basket case to competitive market economy. Capitalism worked once Sweden removed socialist barriers to growth and competition. Yet, today it is paraded as a socialist success story😂."
https://x.com/aakashgupta/status/2045132187511783550?s=51&t=cLq01Oy84YkmYPZ-URIMYw
"In 2016, Norway gave every 5-year-old in the country a personal iPad. By 2023 their children ranked dead last out of 65 countries on reading enjoyment, and reading scores had dropped below the OECD average for the first time in two decades. The devices had no parental controls. Teachers who raised concerns were dismissed as dinosaurs. Books disappeared from classrooms. Within a few years, roughly 500,000 of Norway's 5.6 million citizens could not read a text message or follow simple written instructions. The mechanism is straightforward. Reading acquisition between ages 5 and 7 requires sustained attention on a static, low-stimulation medium. The brain is wiring the neural circuitry that links visual symbol to sound to meaning. That circuit needs long stretches of uninterrupted focus to form. iPads are engineered to prevent exactly that. Every app delivers novelty on a cycle measured in seconds. The PISA data shows the timeline clearly. Norway tracked above the OECD average from 2000 to 2014. Starting 2016, scores dropped below. Britain, using far less classroom tech, pulled ahead in the same window. Now Norway is spending millions to reverse it. Libraries run rollerskating and rap workshops to pull kids through the door, then hand them books. Several municipalities have removed tablets from early primary grades entirely. Norway has a $2 trillion sovereign wealth fund and 96% electric vehicle adoption. The same policy apparatus that executed one of the fastest energy transitions in modern history also executed the fastest literacy collapse in the developed world. Every country that adopted classroom tech got the same pitch: faster learning with modern tools. Norway just ran the experiment. The device sold as a learning accelerator broke the foundational skill all learning depends on."
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