TOKYO MASTER BANNER

MINISTRY OF TOKYO
US-ANGLO CAPITALISMEU-NATO IMPERIALISM
Illegitimate Transfer of Inalienable European Rights via Convention(s) & Supranational Bodies
Establishment of Sovereignty-Usurping Supranational Body Dictatorships
Enduring Program of DEMOGRAPHICS WAR on Europeans
Enduring Program of PSYCHOLOGICAL WAR on Europeans
Enduring Program of European Displacement, Dismemberment, Dispossession, & Dissolution
No wars or conditions abroad (& no domestic or global economic pretexts) justify government policy facilitating the invasion of ancestral European homelands, the rape of European women, the destruction of European societies, & the genocide of Europeans.
U.S. RULING OLIGARCHY WAGES HYBRID WAR TO SALVAGE HEGEMONY
[LINK | Article]

*U.S. OLIGARCHY WAGES HYBRID WAR* | U.S. Empire's Casino Unsustainable | Destabilised U.S. Monetary & Financial System | U.S. Defaults Twice A Year | Causes for Global Financial Crisis of 2008 Remain | Financial Pyramids Composed of Derivatives & National Debt Are Growing | *U.S. OLIGARCHY WAGES HYBRID WAR* | U.S. Empire's Casino Unsustainable | Destabilised U.S. Monetary & Financial System | U.S. Defaults Twice A Year | Causes for Global Financial Crisis of 2008 Remain | Financial Pyramids Composed of Derivatives & National Debt Are Growing | *U.S. OLIGARCHY WAGES HYBRID WAR*

Who's preaching world democracy, democracy, democracy? —Who wants to make free people free?
[info from Craig Murray video appearance, follows]  US-Anglo Alliance DELIBERATELY STOKING ANTI-RUSSIAN FEELING & RAMPING UP TENSION BETWEEN EASTERN EUROPE & RUSSIA.  British military/government feeding media PROPAGANDA.  Media choosing to PUBLISH government PROPAGANDA.  US naval aggression against Russia:  Baltic Sea — US naval aggression against China:  South China Sea.  Continued NATO pressure on Russia:  US missile systems moving into Eastern Europe.     [info from John Pilger interview follows]  War Hawk:  Hillary Clinton — embodiment of seamless aggressive American imperialist post-WWII system.  USA in frenzy of preparation for a conflict.  Greatest US-led build-up of forces since WWII gathered in Eastern Europe and in Baltic states.  US expansion & military preparation HAS NOT BEEN REPORTED IN THE WEST.  Since US paid for & controlled US coup, UKRAINE has become an American preserve and CIA Theme Park, on Russia's borderland, through which Germans invaded in the 1940s, costing 27 million Russian lives.  Imagine equivalent occurring on US borders in Canada or Mexico.  US military preparations against RUSSIA and against CHINA have NOT been reported by MEDIA.  US has sent guided missile ships to diputed zone in South China Sea.  DANGER OF US PRE-EMPTIVE NUCLEAR STRIKES.  China is on HIGH NUCLEAR ALERT.  US spy plane intercepted by Chinese fighter jets.  Public is primed to accept so-called 'aggressive' moves by China, when these are in fact defensive moves:  US 400 major bases encircling China; Okinawa has 32 American military installations; Japan has 130 American military bases in all.  WARNING PENTAGON MILITARY THINKING DOMINATES WASHINGTON. ⟴  
Showing posts with label Crime. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Crime. Show all posts

October 04, 2015

Sweden - The Impact on Unemployment, Productivity, and Crime (Andrew Oates, University of Puget Sound, Economics Senior Thesis 2006)

Article
SOURCE
as marked



EXTRACTS

http://www.pugetsound.edu/files/resources/1359_ImmigrationInSweden.doc


Sweden

Immigration in Sweden

The Impact on Unemployment, Productivity, and Crime

Andrew Oates

Economics Senior Thesis

University of Puget Sound

Fall Semester

2006

Crime
Skeptics may argue that the increase in crime could easily be attributed to an increase in population, or that significant crime increases were experienced globally. The first argument is answered with simple data about population and crime.

The population in Sweden was roughly 7 million people in 1950. Today, there are roughly 9 million. Total crime increased by nearly 600%, while the population only increased by about 30 percent. It is unlikely that this increase in crime would have occurred in Sweden without outside influence. It is possible that an increased number of immigrants, with different cultural values, are the cause of the increased crime. Since 1950, there has been a net increase in population due to immigrants equal to approximately 1 million people (Benito, 2005). The increase in immigration accounts for almost all of the increased population in Sweden since 1950. It is important to note that not all immigrants commit crime in their new home; rather it appears that certain immigrants are accounting for a dramatic percentage of the increased crime rates in Sweden.

An argument for the increase in crime due to a change in values in the last century can be refuted by comparisons of crime rates to the United States. “The percentage of foreign-born [in Sweden] is roughly equivalent to the highest percentage of immigrants the United States ever had in its history (on the eve of World War I)” (Caldwell, 2005). Thus, the crime rates in the United States are not influenced by the difficulties that arise due to the initial merging of differing cultures. If we compare the percentage increases in overall crime, rape, robbery and assault between the U.S. and Sweden, it will become evident that the case in Sweden is unnatural.

Several things are apparent from table 2.. First of all, the nature of the increased crimes in Sweden is of malicious motives, not monetary. The data shows that Sweden experienced an increase in assault crimes greater than the United States did. Robbery increased in the U.S. more than in Sweden during this time period. This reveals that the new crime in Sweden is unique, in that the increase in robbery can not be attributed to the clash of cultures in Sweden.

Most important, the percentage growth of malicious crimes in Sweden are greater than that of the United States, and therefore, a global impact explanation is insufficient at explaining the entirety of the increase in crime in Sweden. In fact, criminal evidence in Sweden shows that a large percentage of the crime is attributed to immigrants. Immigrants are three times more likely to commit assault, and five times more likely to commit sex crimes than Swedes (The Local, 2005). Almost forty percent of the 1,520,000 offenses recorded between 1997 and 2001 were committed by people born overseas, or by people with at least one parent born overseas (The Local, 2006). This number is especially dramatic since the immigrant population only makes up twelve percent of the population. It is not the case, however, that all new immigrants in Sweden are criminals. According to a Swedish newspaper, Aftonbladet (Fjordman, 2006), “9 out of 10 of the most criminal ethnic groups in Sweden come from Muslim countries.” Also, according to Nima Sanandaji (2005), “some immigrant groups have a very low crime rate (such as those from East Asia).” Immigrant youths seem to be the largest contributors to the increased crime in Sweden.

It is important to note that the most dramatic increases in crime are found in the crimes immigrants are most likely to commit. These particular crimes are committed to inflict pain to the native Swedish population, rather than for monetary gains. This reveals one possible motive behind the crimes: a hatred of the Swedish people. According to Åkesson’s interviews (Fjordman, 2006), immigrants feel as if they are looked down upon by native born Swedes. In return, immigrant youths have become hostile toward Swedes. An interview with one young immigrant in Sweden revealed a social war existing in Sweden. “Power for me means that the Swedes shall look at me, lie down on the ground and kiss my feet…We rob every single day, as often as we want to, whenever we want to.” This hostility, they explain, is retaliation against treatment by the native Swedes as being inferior. The clash of culture in Sweden is also apparent by the low rate of mixed marriages (Caldwell, 2005). There have also been “honor-killings”, in that family members are killing each other for dating native Swedes.

There are also underground immigrant crime syndicates functioning in Sweden’s largest cities. In the 1980’s, a Balkan organized crime network spread out across Scandinavia. Most of these mafia men come from the former Yugoslavia, and came to Sweden during the Bosnian and Kosovo wars in the 1990s (Fleishman, 2006). These crime syndicates traffic drugs, weapons, and prostitutes, and commit large scale robberies. In 2004, these organizations robbed more than $ 10 million from Norway’s central bank, and stole Edvard Munch’s “The Scream” and “Madonna” from a museum in Oslo. Although these particular attacks were against Norway, these criminals live throughout Scandinavia, and wars between organizations have publicized the underground network in Sweden for the last decade. “Even in relatively small Malmö, six Balkan mafia figures have been slain since 2002” (Fleishman, 2006). Sweden’s police force is doing little to combat this problem. With lenient punishment and strong privacy laws, the investigations of organized crime are making little progress. According to Bo Lundqvist, a detective in Malmö (Fleishman, 2006), “We need tougher laws, but that directly contradicts our open society…And we’re looking at individual crimes and not the larger picture.” Another police investigator who was to afraid to reveal his name said, “They brought this gangster mentality that wasn’t anything like the normal Swedish criminal.” These criminals have moved to Sweden because it is easy to commit crime, and punishment is lax. One mobster, Milan Sevo, received only a two-year sentence for weapons-related charges. He escaped from custody during one of his weekend passes to visit his family. When he was eventually recaptured, he served no extra time for running away. Another criminal, Naser Dzeljilji, received an 18 month sentence for drugs, weapons, and conspiracy offenses, but was released from an appeal (Fleishman, 2006). These cases reveal the leniency behind the Swedish penal system, and the attractiveness of immigrating to Sweden for foreign criminals.

If the situation in Sweden is not as idyllic as assumed, why is it that immigrants continue to come to Sweden? There are several reasons to immigrate into Sweden, even with the knowledge of the current economic and social problems. Most important, immigrants are attracted to Sweden because of the promise of welfare (Caldwell, 2005). Foreign citizens immigrating to Sweden are given free medical care, free schooling, decent housing conditions, and free lessons in the native language. Also, Denmark and Finland have become stricter on their immigration policies, so current citizens in these nations will move to Sweden in order to bring in their family as well. “Danes under 25 who marry foreigners no longer have the right to bring their spouses into the country. Many such half-Danish couples now live in Malmo” (Caldwell, 2005).

Conclusions

The decrease in productivity due to immigration has a large impact on the economy in Sweden. Take, for example, a middle aged woman who runs a restaurant business in Halmstad. She feels the effects of the labor protection laws in Sweden. She has less than ten employees. If one of them becomes sick, or takes maternity leave, she needs to find someone to replace the employee. However, now she is paying twice as much for the same level of productivity. Moreover, if the employee is absent for more than six months, the woman must debate between locking another employee into an unbreakable contractual agreement and incuring the transaction costs of hiring and training another employee.

Hiring an immigrant is also a nuisance for companies. The social democratic reaction to immigration was to protect its labor unions, and enact a reform that requires companies to provide 240 hours of full pay while the immigrant receives language training. The government effectively increased the transaction costs for hiring immigrants, and to such an extent that immigrants became left behind. Because the government neglected to incorporate the increased population into the economy, Sweden no longer has any effective means for absorbing them into the labor market.

Currently, Sweden is a boat, sailing near a whirlpool. They are caught in the current that will eventually lead them to disaster, but haven’t noticed. If they could foresee the problem, there could still be time to steer clear. Unfortunately, the crew is below decks, lounging on Ikea furniture. This analogy accurately depicts the present state of Sweden. The government in Sweden is handling immigration by forcing the migrants into situations where they cannot find work. They are then handing out generous welfare payments to these people, to preserve the idea of equality in the nation. Native Swedes are upset that immigrants are taking up so much of the tax money that they pay, while not working, and committing crimes. Therefore, Swedes are not working as hard; causing productivity to decrease; resulting in smaller profits and tax revenues. Meanwhile, the immigrants are committing crimes due to a feeling of separation from the Swedish culture, with little or no punishment from the institution. In fact, immigrants may realize that by committing crimes, they actually receive more handouts from the government.

The impact of this will be the eventual collapse of Sweden’s welfare state. It is arguable whether or not the social democratic government is responsible, by not incorporating the new labor force into the economy. According to Johan Norberg (2006), “[Sweden] has been critically weakened by the system it helped create. Far from being a solution for the new sick men of Europe, Sweden must face serious and fundamental challenges at the heart of its social model.” If so, a major problem in solving this issue is the population’s reluctance to reform the government. The social democrats were just voted out of office in September, in favor of a more moderate government. However, in order to win the election, the moderate government had to change its policies on welfare to be consistent with the social democrats. The population is afraid of change, because they have become dependent on the welfare system. They are reluctant to vote for a reform that might limit the handouts received from the government. Apparently the furniture is really comfortable, because nothing is being done to handle the crisis.

The irony of this situation is that countries are looking to Sweden as the model for successful government intervention in a globalizing world. Perhaps they do not see that if Sweden had continued its level of productivity during the fifties throughout the century, they would have higher growth and greater efficiency than any other nation in Europe. Perhaps they don’t see the hidden information that places the unemployment rate at 12%, rather than 6%. Maybe they don’t see the dramatic increase in crime levels, the incentives to commit these crimes, and the lack of indication that it will stop anytime soon.

It was the immigrants that brought this change, but the ideals of the social democratic government that caused it. The policies of this government are not bad. They were successful in Sweden for almost sixty years. However, in the face of immigration, the values of the social democracy have created a mess, and need to be reformed, or done away with. There is no way to be certain if a Social Democratic ideal will ever be successful in the future. It worked in Sweden because of the homogeneous state of its society. There might never again be an environment of this nature, for which the implementation of a socialist ideology would be possible.

EXTRACTS

SOURCE

http://www.pugetsound.edu/files/resources/1359_ImmigrationInSweden.doc


---------------------- ꕤ ----------------------


COMMENT



Nooooooooooooo, it's the end of the welfare state!


So this is maybe why all those neocon puppet politicians are so keen on immigration? It's to bust up the welfare state?


That was really interesting reading.


I've only focused on the extracts above, as I'm not that into information about the economy itself ... I'm more interested in the social (and maybe not so social) aspects.

______________

NOTE:  

Earlier highlights are lost.

Had to ditch the formatting because I'd pasted directly to Blogger from a Word document, which was screwing up my template codes.



March 11, 2015

SWEDEN: 'Sweden is not some kind of equality paradise' vs "When Journalists Rape"


SWEDEN


OFFICIAL LINE



'Sweden is not some kind of equality paradise'
Published: 10 Mar 2015 10:43 GMT+01:00
Updated: 10 Mar 2015 12:25 GMT+01:00

It's time to challenge the image of Sweden as the world's gender equality frontrunner, writes Cecilia Schelin Seidegård, head of the Swedish government's special inquiry on gender equality.

Swedish governments often boast about gender equality in Sweden. Government upon government has claimed that these advances have given Sweden a strong international position. The latest is the feminist government, spearheaded by Stefan Löfven, which insists that Sweden is and ought to be a frontrunner in the area of gender equality. On its home page the government writes that Sweden has great international reputational capital to maintain and develop.

I believe it is high time to challenge the image of Sweden as some kind of equality paradise. Even though Sweden has a good position in many international rankings, it does not mean that the country is equal. Rather, it could be understood in relation to insufficient progress in many other countries. Nor does it mean that things are moving forward in Sweden. The country's position in the Global Gender Gap (World Economic Forum) ratings has gone from the top in 2006 to fourth in 2014. The same tendency is visible in the Inter-Parliamentary Union's list of the number of women in national parliaments, where Sweden can nowadays be found as number six, after having enjoyed a leading position for a long time. It is problematic that progress in Sweden is more or less standing still. As Sweden now has a feminist government, it is time to assume a strategic and long-term approach to gender equality policies.

Since April 2014 I have led a special government inquiry to follow up and analyze the progress of equality between women and men over the past ten years. The inquiry will also analyze the implementation of equality policies and assess how efficient political measures have been in relation to the equality political objective – that women and men should have the same power to shape society and their lives. Against this background the inquiry should propose a direction and organization of future equality politics.

On March 8th, International Women's Day, the inquiry released some of the research that has been produced within the scope of our remit. Our preliminary results do not make for a merry read.

1. We can conclude that male dominance in positions of power in politics, state and businesses has not been broken in the past ten years. The number of men in parliament has instead gone up in two consecutive elections, as has the number of men in parliamentary committees and as committee chairpersons. Three-quarters of all board members of listed companies are men and 77 percent of professors in higher education are men. Our reports show that the more hidden the positions of powers in politics and private business are, the greater is the gender gap. Private business has not succeeded in bridging the gender gap by voluntary incentives.

2. As far as financial equality is concerned, the employment market and businesses still have a clear lack of equality. A strong gender divide is still prevalent in the jobs market and a large number of women work part time. But despite a slight decrease in gender segregation – women's work hours have increased and women's levels of education are higher than men's – it has only had a very small effect on wages. Even taking various parameters such as age, education, work hours and that women and men are found in different sectors and work groups, women's salaries have stayed at 93 percent of men's salaries. This figure has remained much the same since the middle of the 1990s. Income inequality between women and men is still 93.500 kronor a year, or about 3.6 million kronor for 40 years of work. [I'm no statistician, but if women largely work part-time, higher education or slightly more part-time hours aren't going to bridge any gap in wages -- which, given a large portion of part-time women workers, doesn't look a significant hardship to me.]
Cecilia Schelin Seidegård heads the Swedish government's equality inquiry. Photo: TT
3. Even though differences between the sexes have decreased in the past decade, women still carry out a greater part of unpaid home and care work. Men continue to claim less parental leave than women and they also take less leave to care for ill children (VAB, 'vård av barn'). In 2013, men claimed 25 percent and women 75 percent. Moreover, our research shows that women generally carry out more unpaid work, but have on average just as long working days as men. In the past ten years, however, men have increased their unpaid work by 12 minutes on weekdays and 15 minutes on weekends. The unequal divisions of unpaid home and care labour lead to lower incomes for women and by extension lower pensions than men. [So what does the govt propose to do, enter Swedish households (like part of a kinky threesome) and assign household chores on some more equitable basis?]

4. As far as the target of ending men's violence against women goes, close to every third woman in Sweden has been the victim of serious physical or sexual violence as an adult. One in five women has at some point in her life been subject to physical violence, sexual violence where physical violence or the threat thereof has been involved, or to repeated and systemic psychological violence by a current or former partner. Almost 40 percent have been exposed to harassment, including sexual harassment. The figures painfully speak for themselves; men's violence against women has not been eliminated in the past decade, even though the problem has been given a lot of attention.  [Without the details on how the figures have been obtained & the demographics, the figures don't speak for themselves, and this may not be a case of men's violence -- as in ALL men -- but a case of violence perpetrated by men in some demographic or other of Swedish society.]

During the last two parliamentary terms a substantial 2.6 billion kronor effort was made to carry out specific policy initiatives. While there of course were several deliberate and thoughtful measures within the strategic framework, such as putting the spotlight on the issue of men's violence against women, our analysis shows that there were also serious flaws. That there was no overall comprehensive strategy is one example. The work was also generally linked to a project organization that would be dissolved when the specific targets had been met. [I'm going to hazard a guess that there may not be a one-size-fits all strategy, as violence can be due to any number of things:  drugs, alcohol, poverty / poor socialisation, cultural factors and so on.]

This notwithstanding, we note that there is a long way to go towards an equal society. The latest gender equality inquiry from 2005 concluded that there has been progress from 1995-2005, but it has happened slowly. Ten years later it seems that this inquiry, too, can conclude that there has been progress, but it has happened slowly. With the addendum: in some cases it has also moved backwards.  [Utopia.]

The gender equality inquiry ('Jämställdhetsutredningen') now works to outline proposals for the government on how equality politics can become more strategic, long-term and efficient. We urge the feminist government to put the leader's jersey back on and take responsibility for and control of the gender equality work, once and for all.

This is a translated version of a piece written by Cecilia Schelin Seidegård, head of the government's special inquiry into gender equality, and originally published by Dagens Nyheter.

To limit the overwhelming burden on our moderators, it will not be possible to comment on this article. Feel free to join the conversation on our Facebook page. [They're just dodging the negative comments they'd get.  Comments should be unmoderated, anyway.  Otherwise, what you get is a lie by omission.]

http://www.thelocal.se/20150310/sweden-is-not-some-kind-of-equality-paradise



SECTOR OF PUBLIC OPINION

When journalists rape


'Julia Caesar' (pen name), described as a journalist who originally wrote and published this article, translated from Swedish to English in the article linked above.

It is a confronting article of the kind that we don't see published in mainstream media and this article, also refers to figures (outdated from 15-20 years ago, that the government purportedly relies on); it draws attention to mass immigration and violent crime as a social problem in Sweden, that is being ignored and even covered up by Swedish politicians and media; and it, too, calls on feminists.

The impression I have of Sweden is that there is a sector of Swedish society that feels politically disenfranchised and that there is genuine dissatisfaction with the political and social status quo.

I've not read widely on the subject, but from what I've encountered so far that's certainly the impression.

In the above article, journalists stand accused of covering up crime committed by ethnic minorities and passing those crimes off as committed by the Swedish (right down to using misleading identikits), endangering those who are unaware of the prevalence of violence perpetrated by immigrant minorities; and it charges the journalists of doing so, while hiding behind 'ethical press guidelines' and assuming a position of know-best superiority over the 'peasantry' who are denied the right to information, vital to risk assessment and self protection.

The article refers to a 'public Sweden' and indicates that the state and the media is silent on all that would show the negative consequences of mass immigration policy, if I understand correctly.  By extension, journalists commit 'rape' of the public denied information and politicians, who are policy makers, are deemed the worse 'rapists' who sacrifice many thousands of women each year on the altar of multiculturalism rather than doing the obvious:  curtailing immigration.

The official line article is on feminism and society.  However, this state feminism glosses over the gritty types of issues the second article voices, while paying lip service to a blanket state of Utopia that Swedish government intends to impose on civil society.

While the second article is a hard-hitting social and political commentary not usually encountered in politically correct mainstream media offerings, I think it raises some interesting and starkly contrasting views relevant to Swedish foreign (and other) government policy, immigration, crime, feminism and the press.

Analysis of the 'feminist Swedish government' (whatever that is) and of the gritty, contrasting conditions and opinions at grassroots level, in opposition to the status quo and official line (government and press), would probably be a sociologist's dream.


...........................................................................

Other:


* Note: 
lenient sentencing in respect of serious violent crime (assume youth was a factor).

Note:  I'm not a journalist or sociologist.  These are just my impressions on articles that caught my attention.