Article in Finnish: https://www.hs.fi/talous/art-2000010043398.html
To put it in perspective, the total number of Teslas sold over the entire history of Tesla in all of the Nordic countries is less than half of how many Teslas were sold in the US in 2023 alone.
While the rest of the world looks on in envy, wondering why it is seemingly so impossible to replicate elsewhere.
What from the outside looks "irrational", from the inside may look like "not compromising on principles".
Money is not the main variable that Musk is trying to maximize at this point.
which almost always is immature behavior, whereas adults think solution-oriented, which sometimes is called "Realpolitik" (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Realpolitik).
Doesn't get better in this particular case where musk is opposing to officially agree to common worker protection rules, wages, ... he already follows. Just another case of "dumb behavior".
Yes, I'm not talking about money here. Irrational means making bad decisions. The bad decision here is to continue playing with a bad hand against someone who isn't going to fold. Sweden is not going to fold so either Musk folds now to avoid more embarrassment & costs, or keeps going and folds in the future. It'd be more rational to just pull out of Sweden than fight a losing battle, as you said money isn't that much of a factor here.
Not compromising on free speech worked well... Until he started banning journalists from Twitter.
I would actually like to know if there have been any. I'm quite open to criticising things that he has actually done, and have made criticisms of him plenty of times. But I'm not aware of any journalists that he's kicked off twitter/X. The closest to such a scenario that I'm aware of is him (so far) not allowing Alex Jones back on, but he didn't actually kick him off.
https://www.theverge.com/2022/12/15/23512004/elon-musk-start...
> Twitter has suspended the accounts of several prominent reporters who cover Elon Musk, including Ryan Mac of The New York Times, CNN’s Donie O’Sullivan, The Washington Post’s Drew Harwell, The Intercept’s Micah Lee, and Mashable’s Matt Binder, Aaron Rupar, and Tony Webster.
I would like to know if there are any journalists he has permanently banned. As used to happen quite often on twitter, pre-Musk acquisition.
Checked his handle [1] and yeah, it's still "suspended" over 6 months later. And while it only says "suspended" there, according to this thread [2], the message he originally got was that he had been "permanently suspended", which does imply a ban. And is also somewhat disingenuous because a suspension should imply temporality.
Appreciate you providing the link. Perhaps I've been living in a bit of a bubble because I hadn't heard of this.
[1] https://twitter.com/dellcam
[2] https://twitter.com/stevanzetti/status/1648785112748662784
This distinction is meaningless until someone is un-suspended.
But what I think people in the US (and many in the UK) don't grasp, is that someone (plucking an example out of the air) who is a manager of a retail shop in a small town in Sweden could afford a car like a Tesla. Partly because of the strong democratic socialist economic historical context underpinning decades of economic and workplace policy, and partly because of the decades-long subsidy and support of EV sales and supporting infrastructure in these countries making them cheaper and more practical than in many other countries.
This couldn't be further from the truth in the USA, because work life there has been going in the opposite direction effectively since the cold war.
Tesla is the problem. It’s a good idea to not destroy your market and the means to facilitate. More workers rights are needed by the rest of the world.
Own your opinions, maybe.
No.
> unions are no more corrupt than the business itself
No way.
No, this is an issue for other smaller companies too (with less media coverage)
> Maybe the rest of the world needs to catch up to the societal norms of Sweden when it comes to worker's rights.
I hope not. I kind of want a flying car ASAP. Not never.
Sweden might rank top for happiness and health but that's not going to make my bank numbers get higher for my annual two week holiday.
The US seems to expect service workers to pretend to be happy in the hopes of receiving enough money to get by. Whereas the Nordics seem to take the approach of "let's make sure your service worker is happy" first and foremost.
The Nordic model seems more stable and less stressful for all parties involved.
I prefer the Nordic model so far!
Edit: I forgot the best one - unemployment insurance. If I get laid off I get my salary covered at 80% for 6 - 12 months (depends on the policy). This is through the union. Such a nice relief with all the layoffs happening in tech nowadays.
Nordic model is such a great success.
This might still be true tho. We'll see.
The workers are in charge, and they are also the ones buying Teslas (Yes Americans, in Sweden/Denmark/Norway Teslas are affordable enough for normal people who are in unions because they are paid correctly).
Maybe it's a good idea not to destroy your entire market while also destroying the means to facilitate the market.
Maybe Tesla is the problem here.
Maybe the rest of the world needs to catch up to the societal norms of Sweden when it comes to worker's rights.