That's 560 days. A year and a half you get off from work, WITH PAY, for having a kid.
I'd be curious to see how many of them then spring for day care so they can go about and play for a year and a half and not really raise the kid. Or, since this is Sweden, have the government day care take care of the kid while they take a 16 month vacation.
Anybody from Sweden know if people do that? They get the 1.5 year maternity leave, but then send the kid to day care and loaf around for 16 months?
Sounds like a great career... 1.5 years off for each child.
ReplyDeleteIf you produced 10 children, not unrealistic from the perspective of our grandparents generation.. You would have 15 years paid leave...
Although our welfare system sounds a little more lucrative... get a raise for every kid you produce..
Study Abroad Program to-do List:
ReplyDelete1) Study Latin in London
2) Study French with some French Chick
3) Attend nude beach
4) Sell nude beach photos to disreputable websites
5) Use money to visit Sweden
6) Knock up some Swedish professional
7) Take 16 month vacation
8) Flunk out of college despite passing Latin and live off Governmnet handouts
9) Attack Captain Capitalism with an anonymous website and call him a fascist.
10) Vote for Barack Obama
11) Twice
12) Brag about everything to whomever will listen at the local coffee shop where you do your panhandling.
That's insane. Why does any company in Sweden hire women?
ReplyDeleteMy sister-in-law is Swedish. The incredibly long materntiy leave was created as an incentive to reverse the declining population growth in Sweden. For years Swedes were having one or no childen at all (I know you would applaud that) Among her friends and family with children no one does anthing with the time off other thar raise their children. It seems to be working since last time I was in Sweden I saw baby strollers everywhere.
ReplyDeleteGiven how beautiful Swedish women are I think we can all agree motiviatiung Swedes to have more children (especially girls) is a good thing.
But the annual birth rate in Sweden is still only 11.3 per 1,000 (157th in the world) and well below the US (14.0, per Wikipedia). Only Iceland and Ireland ranked higher than the US (14.3 and 15.5). Imagine how low their birth rate might be without this subsidy. I think it could be argued that the Swedes are trying to keep from going extinct (not that I support this "solution").
ReplyDeleteBecause they'll get sued for discriminative hiring policies.
ReplyDeleteAlso for the Captain: Most mothers wouldn't do that due to the biological need to tend to their young. Hypothetically and hopefully.
Here's an idea to bolster their population;
ReplyDeleteLOWER YOUR EFFING TAXES!!!!
Then maybe people could afford to have children.
Cripes.
CIA World Factbook (Which I take as a much more authoritative source than Wikipedia) has their birth rate at 1.67 children born/woman. (10.15 births per 1000 population). They're slowly depopulating themselves. This will quickly accelerate, as their average citizen is aged 41.3 years old. Wonder who is going to be left to earn wages to pay for all their retirement benefits in the next 15-20 years. Just plain 0 population growth requires a fertility rate of 2.1 per woman.
ReplyDeleteHow are these countries going to re-populate themselves? Importing immigrants? Mark Steyn wrote a lot about the de-population of Western Civilization in his book "America Alone" and what the upcoming consequences of these declining birth rates will mean to the world.
it's nice to stay at home for 18 months to look after one's baby, but after that the pressure to return to the workforce is unbearable - you have to start contributing to the tax base again. there are hardly any 18 months to 5 year olds being looked after in their own homes and homeschooling is illegal. daycare standards in Sweden are slipping and youth delinquency on the increase http://www.thelocal.se/discuss/index.php?showtopic=42013
ReplyDeleteI´m from Sweden, so I can answer your question (better late than never). You don't get 1,5 years paid leave for having a child. You get nothing for having the child. However, each parent is granted up to 8 months parental leave with allowance to care for the child (yes, the father gets as many days to stay at home as the mother does). Government day care is not offered at all for children under one year of age, and obviously not for children with a parent on parental leave. You recieve the allowance for taking care of the child, not for having it. This means, for example, that if you after three months take 1/4 of a day off and leave the child to someone else because you feel you need a vacation, you only get 3/4 allowance for that day. If someone were to take a 16 month vacation after having a child, that would make them ineligible for the allowance. I hope I've cleared some things up :)
ReplyDelete