Flawed social models

October 26th, 2005 at 16:19 Björn Hallberg

Watching America - However solid and impressive the growth of the American market, such success has nonetheless allowed the development of what could be termed a “social anxiety.” According to professor Michel Aglietta, such anxiety results from the system “transferring the whole of the insecurity to those members of society least capable of assuming such a burden” - in other words, those at the bottom of the social scale.

Europe has no reason to be smug. Granted, E.U. citizens are better protected overall, but for most member countries that security comes at the price of lower growth and higher unemployment. André Sapir of Bruegel, a research institute in Brussels [Belgium], has just published a study which distinguishes between four European socio-economic models, only two of which he considers “efficient”: the Anglo-Saxon model (weak unions, a wide salary range, a minimum level of social security) and the Scandinavian model (high social spending, strong unions, a narrower salary range, freedom to lay-off workers coupled with generous unemployment benefits). Only the Scandinavian system is at once efficient and fair.

Touché!

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