Sweden is also grappling with serious economic problems (as is most of Scandinavia in fact).

For example, in dollar terms Sweden's economy hasn't expanded since about 2007.

They have a ~7.8% unemployment rate.

They have about twice the household debt to income ratio of American households, and have a present debt crisis among those households:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/11/09/sweden-economy-idU...

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-04-23/sweden-s-d...

7-8% is bad but not as bad as it would be elsewhere. The natural rate of unemployment is pretty high. Also, labour force participation is high, which helps.

The household debt is exclusively housing, simply because interest rates have been low for many years and mortgages in Sweden were traditionally not 30 years but rather 100 or infinite (interest rate only), and interest is deductible making it even cheaper to borrow. We also didn't see the bubble burst after the 2008 crisis, unlike many other countries, so many predict a bursting bubble now. That said, the mortgage market has tightened swiftly now, down payments have gone from 0% to 15-25, mortgages are repaid 1-2% per year etc, so the market is at least better prepared for a dip now than it would have been in 2008.

Although Sweden has a long history of giving away natural resources virtually for free to private interests, while Norway has made sure to get paid adequately, and then put that money into funds. As a result, Norway now owns 1% of all global stocks.