Stone Age Stone Age people survived not because they were the strongest or fastest, but because they could cooperate and care for each other in unlimited numbers. Researchers have found graves that show that even people with disabilities were cared for and buried with respect. This tells us that society depended on everyone…
Category: Austerity policy
The Mother of Bubbles 2025 – a comment on Cervenka
The mother of bubbles – but what is the basis? Economic journalist Andreas Cervenka accurately points to the risk of a Mother of Bubbles in 2025 after the US AI fever in 2024. The stock market is run by a few companies such as Apple and Nvidia. The "mother of all bubbles" is starting to be warned about, and history teaches us that bubbles burst sooner or later. Often every eight years…
Social Democracy's challenge
In Movement, Johan Sjölander raises an important and pressing criticism of the Social Democrats. Sjölander puts his finger on a painful truth – that the party has long been accused of drifting to the right. Now the party has actually drifted far too far to the right. But Sjölander's criticism is too mild. The reality is that the Social Democrats, together with their allies…
Nobel Prize on Power and Progress
An ideology in power that favors workers must guide technological development. It determines whether we get a fairer world. Technological progress has not always meant better working conditions or higher wages for everyone. We need to develop innovations that help workers become better at their tasks, not just replace them with automation. Then the technology would…
Taiwan and China are part of globalization
The tension between Taiwan and China is a charged issue that could have major global consequences. Sweden, like many other countries, follows the USA's "one-China policy", which recognizes the People's Republic of China but not Taiwan as an independent state, although at the same time it maintains unofficial ties with Taiwan. China, on the other hand, claims that the “one-China policy” and their own “one-China principle” are equivalent, which means…
How neoliberalism breaks us down
The oil crisis gave rise to neoliberalism. I believe that the oil crisis of 1973 was largely based on misinformation and exaggerated fear, something that both Clara E. Mattei and Sven Grassman have highlighted. Mattei describes how the crisis was used to legitimize austerity policies and neoliberal reforms, while Grassman showed how Sweden manipulated its national accounts. The bourgeois government painted a…
Lack of routines causes system errors
Dan Davies' ideas from the book The Unaccountability Machine see the whole of neoliberalism as a complex system with built-in errors. Jan Wiklund believes on the blog Gemensam in the article "All failures are due to bad routines" 2024/09/18 that crises and failures are not due to individual scapegoats but to a system error that is integrated into the structure of neoliberalism. Sure can…
Increased mortality in 2024
Increased mortality in Sweden 2024: Effects of austerity measures and lack of environmental policy Intro Deaths in Sweden have increased significantly in 2024, even exceeding the levels from 2020 during the pandemic. The austerity policy in healthcare and a deficient environmental policy are pointed out as contributing causes. **Main text:** In 2024, mortality in Sweden has risen significantly, even though the pandemic is now…
The long-term unemployed and workers receive a tough blow from the new unemployment insurance fund
Devastating for the long-term unemployed On 18 June 2024, the Riksdag decided to implement significant changes in unemployment insurance (a-kassan). Devastating for the long-term unemployed, the disabled, immigrants and many vulnerable professional groups. Save the unemployment fund! Vote here. For the Unemployed: The new reduction in benefits may lead to financial difficulties for the long-term unemployed. These are often disabled or low-educated immigrants. Critics say that…
Defend democracy and progressivity in the 2024 EU elections
THE LAST DAY TO VOTE IS JUNE 9. Democracy at Games The 2024 EU elections offer an opportunity to influence Europe's future. The red-green parties, such as the Social Democrats, the Left Party and the Green Party, stand for democracy, human rights, more equality and a more humane asylum policy. The left party also wants to change EU rules so that apartment rents in Sweden can fall. To vote for…