Trade and EconomySwedens perspective

Sweden – one of the richest countries• Sweden is one of the richest countries

in the world. • Population of approximately 9.5

million people • Swedes pay a lot of their income in

taxes, in a range between 30-50 % of your income. • We receive welfare in forms of an

almost free medical care, free education, free or reduced fee for elderly care and different types of contribution for the disabled, sick etc.

After the second World War

• Sweden had a good economy compared to the rest of the world since Sweden was one of the countries in Europe, which wasn't in ruins.

• Even though Sweden wasn’t really destroyed by the war, we too got economic support from the United States: The Marshall Plan

Local example: Vällingby

• Vällingby was the first so called ABC City. ABC is an acronym in swedish meaning labour (Arbete) housing (Boende) and centre (Centrum). • The purpose: the inhabitants would

not have to leave the suburb to go to work or to shop. • Vällingby is an icon of the 1950s

architecture and a fine example of the building of the Swedish welfare state as well as the most famous Swedish ABC suburb.

The million program

• The Swedish government in 1965 decided to build a million new homes, called “the million program”. • After Sweden's long time period of

a growing economy, we were hit by an industrial crisis in the mid-70s. It took form as a recession and was a period, which was characterized by unemployment, and had a very weak economic growth.

The 1990s and the crisis during 2000• In 1992, the fixed exchange rate collapsed due to currency

speculation. In order to defend the exchange rate the central bank raised the marginal rate to 500%. • Much of currency speculation was that ordinary businesses losing

confidence in the krona and brought precaution out money to hedge future foreign payments. • This insanely high rate only lasted for three days and thereafter went

back to 50 %. Sweden went through a tough economy.• Between 1995 and 2000, the ”dot-com bubble” occurred, which was a

historic speculative bubble in the stock market.

Local example: Kista

• The largest IT-centre in Sweden today, located here in the northern part of Stockholm.

• is a somewhat later example of the ABC City and is one of the last suburbs built according to the million program.

• In the year 2000 the politicians in Sweden launched new guidelines on how Sweden was going to be an IT society available for the whole population. The politicians believed that if we had a better information society, the democracy would be strengthened as well. To facilitate this policy, the authorities in Stockholm established the company Kista Science City AB