Tag: money

13 Dec. – no money for gas

Yamal Peninsula, where your money will no longer be going
pic: siberiantimes.com

In order to support Swedish companies in their efforts to export goods and services, Sweden has offered export credits in the form of guarantees or loans. DN reports that in 2017, these export credits had a total value of 3 billion kronor. A small part of that money, about 0.5%, went to support the exploration and extraction of fossil fuels.

Not anymore. The government has directed the Swedish export credit system (Exportkreditnämnden) to look into how they can contribute to lessening greenhouse gases. To that end, all investing in exploring and extracting fossil fuels will be ended by 2022 at the latest.

This directive is to come even more into compliance with the Paris Agreement, which Sweden ratified in October, 2016. In this agreement, financial products were included in measures to be taken to lessen CO2 emissions.

Much of the 0.5% was spent in fossil fuel extraction in the Yamal Peninsula in Siberia, where the amount of greenhouse gases estimated to have been released was 5.3 million tons – almost a tenth of Sweden’s entire emissions (DN.se/greenhouse). This was first revealed by the TV4 news program “Cold Facts” (Kalla Fakta).

(Too bad TV4 is no longer able to be seen on TV by a full third of the country: Com hem (owned by Telia’s only competitor Tele2) hasn’t been able to reach a distribution agreement with TV4 (owned by Telia, which is 38% owned by the Swedish state). See this post. Let’s hope we can count on the state television news channels SVT1 and SVT2 to reveal similar news when necessary.)

“This is an extremely important step we’re taking, to show that we are the country to watch (föregångsland)” said Minister for Foreign Trade Anna Hallberg at a press conference earlier today (SvD.se/greenhouse). “It’s an important measure with which we can deal with the climate crisis in the world.”

20 July – how much did your party make?

hand over fist?
pic: barrons.com

Earnings reports are in for Sweden’s political parties. Hands up who knew this was a thing. SvD.se gave the following rundown:

The gold prize goes to the Social Democrats. They raked in 249 million SEK of which 55% (about 139 mil) came from public coffers. Main money-making source: lotteries (also donations from unions).

Silver to the Center Party, who made nearly as much, with 229 million SEK coming in (18%, about 41 mil, came from public coffers). Main money-making source: investments made with the money from a sale of their newspaper concern Randello.

Bronze goes to the Moderates, who made 176 million SEK – way more than last year, due to the sale of their previous offices in Old Town (Gamla Stan). The Moderates also got 109 mil from the state (us).

Finishing 4th are the Sweden Democrats with 96 million SEK. SD gets more money from its members than any other party by far. They also get 69% of their total income from the state, 66 mil.

In 5th place comes the Environment Party with a little under 64 million SEK. Sales have been a big part of their income but like all the other parties, they also get a huge chunk of change, 37 mil, from the state.

The Liberals come in at 6th place with an income of 57 million SEK. 55% of that, 31 mil, came from the state, while sales, and income from lower level party organizations, make up most of the rest.

78% of Vänsterpartiet’s income of 49 million SEK comes from the state. What’s left is what’s gotten via collection, donations and sales.

Dead last come the Christian Democrats, with an income of under 37 million SEK. All of 84% of it, nearly 31 mil, comes from public coffers too, while about 6 million is gotten via fees, sales and donations.

To some degree, party earnings match party standing seen over time. A huge difference is found in the Social Democrats’ lottery earnings. According to Wikipedia, only the Social Democrats, and recently the Sweden Democrats, have licenses to run big country-wide lotteries, and for the Social Democrats they are a huge part of their earnings (see “dream-trip lottery” and “motor lottery”). This has not gone unnoticed and uncriticized, particularly when they are the only ones who don’t have to follow a new law forbidding lottery ticket sales on credit. This allows the S party to sell lottery tickets to people who are already in debt.

None of this really makes sense, but it’s been going on for a long time and the Social Democrats have been in power for almost that long as well.