Do you know how many truck drivers we're going to need in 5-10 years for example? We're talking mid-five digit numbers. That's not unskilled labor as such but it's not a massive insurmountable obstacle either to educate these people to become truck drivers for example.
As im working in automotive industry i can say to you: "less each year".. Companies thinking ahead will try to decrease employment of newer drivers and probably sack off some percent of current ones.
If you think about moving to Canada - think twice - it has its own issues. Its better to know them before moving there.
The recession is comming taking big leaps. Dotcoms colapse - i just hope it wont be the trigger - still need few years to buy a house and get myself into opsition where i dont have to worry.
I feel like it's a great compromise to have a fair and equal society where almost everyone gets paid in a similar range. I'm a software engineer who earns almost half of what I did in the US.
On one hand, I feel happy living in a fair, and well educated, modern society. On the other hand, I feel like I'm missing opportunities and "settling" for comfort. I came to judge the attitude of Danish people for "just enough" thinking about jobs. In the sense that people are against being ambitious, competitive and pushing themselves. They're happy with what they do and enjoy life. It's a very different approach to life, that I'm intrigued about.
What do you think so far?
Cheers!
There is a tonne of support for startups, and I've had no issues raising money. After all the "free money" and taking into account the reduced cost of SWEs, the math works out to be the same as fund raising in the US.
I've been told, and now that I'm hiring have started to observe, that there is a category of new graduate who may be less ambitious than in other countries.
You get emails which to me read "I'm a newly graduated X, I'm now ready to join your company to continue my education". I would say there are fewer people who have applied themselves through hobbies and side projects during their education.
I get that not everyone thinks that you should need to have side projects, but honestly I learned to code writing bots for MMORPGs, not university.
The good news is that you have access to the whole European market, and because the jobs are more spread out good people in other countries are paying attention to whats available elsewhere.
I live in Odense. Feel free to reach out, [email protected].
We live in times where "rat race" is so prevalent we forget to take a step back and think about "what is really important".
It's realistic that financially I'll be where I need to be within the next couple of years. Sweden, along with Norway, has been on my list of potential destinations, so it's helpful to hear this perspective from somebody born and raised there. It's not going to stop me from continuing to consider, but rather make me dig a little deeper.
2) Apart from the fact that there's been a significant influx of refugees that entire point should be seen as pure opinion with little relationship to facts. It seems based on anecdotal stuff about a few individuals being deported on technicalities, and imo, it seeps with a disdain for non-economically viable refugees. That the big unions & the social democrats are generally hostile to skilled immigrants because of competition is also nonsense.
3) That it's a multi-year project just to receive permissions is hyperbole. However, I do agree with the solution here, apart from the need to abolish rent-control. That the state should plan & build rental apartments would also be a revert to how it worked before rather than a reform, and I agree with that. To abolish rent-control is a right-wing dream because it guarantees good housing in popular locations to wealthy people, to the detriment of working class people that have to move out due to the higher rents.
There are many fundamental issues that can only be solved by very unpopular political decisions, meaning nothing is done because it would be political suicide in the short/mid-term (the next 4-8 years).
1) While the Swedish state has strong finances, the Swedish communes (responsible for most of the practical welfare, like healthcare, education, and so on) are struggling significantly. Taxes likely need to be raised 5 percentage points over the next 10 years just to maintain the current level of welfare. And that is not factoring in the missing professionals, like teachers and nurses. These professions are very poorly compensated so a lot of them quit. On top of the issues with the communes, the Swedish households are among the most indebted in the world, due to cheap mortgages on houses and a housing bubble that is just slowly beginning to deflate. The next recession will be very tough.
2) Sweden has failed with immigrating all low-skilled refugees and economic migrants from third world countries. I think Sweden should be applauded for trying to do the humanitarian thing by helping people in need, but what has happened is that there have been too many low skilled people, too quickly for them to be absorbed into Sweden. This cohort of immigrants simply do not have the skills or education to not be an economic burden on the Swedish society. The costs are enormous. In Sweden the talk is about we've created an "ethnic lower class" that can only survive on welfare. The problem is a welfare state only works if a vast majority pitch in to the welfare state. This is a big contributing factor to many issues in Sweden right now. At the same time, the big unions and the Social Democratic party is hostile to skilled workers coming to Sweden because they may compete with the union members, leading to a lot of skilled engineers and similar being deported because of technicalities. So Sweden is basically doing the opposite of Canada: we are hostile to people who can contribute to Swedish society, but have been very welcoming to people who will never realistically contribute a dime to the Swedish welfare state.
3) There's shortage on housing in the big cities due to regulation and rent-control. There is absolutely no incentives to build new apartments because the return of investment is non-existing, and all the zoning regulations and similar makes it a multi-year project just to get permission to even start building. What happens is the only new apartment buildings being built are apartments that are so expensive only people the people who do not have a problem getting an apartment in the first place (due to being well off) can buy them. For the Swedish 99%, you either need to get lucky, take significant loans (which people have done due to almost 0% interest, which will be a catastrophe when the interests rates increase, which must happen within the next 5 years) or stand in the state apartment queue for 20-30 years. The only way to solve this realistically would be for the state to invest heavily in apartments, basically build away the shortage, and then remove the rent control. Finland did this. But it was highly unpopular.
If you are in the top tier of your profession and you can basically get a job in whatever country you please, I'd hang on moving to Sweden right now.