A = Sweden B = Norway C =
Finland In which country can you find
A Sweden
With the value of exports amounting to 30 percent of its GDP, Sweden is
highly dependent on free international trade to maintain its living standard. In
1991 Sweden attached its currency to the European Currency Unit (ECU), and in
1995 it became a full member in the European Community (EC). Sweden also has to
cope with problems of competitiveness that have caused industry to invest much
more abroad than at home. Most of Sweden’s large industrial companies today are
transnational, and some employ more people abroad than in Sweden, where
production costs are high. Employment in agriculture, forestry,
and fishing has declined since the mid-20th century. Employment in industry
reached a peak in 1960, but the tertiary sector (including services and
administration) has become the main growth area, the expanding public sector
being one of its major components. Female participation in the workforce
is high compared to most other countries. Sweden is noted for
its liberal employee benefit plans. The normal statutory work week is 40 hours,
but actual work hours per employee in Swedish industry is among the lowest in
Europe. The minimum amount of annual paid vacation is five weeks and two days.
In addition, there are other legal grounds for paid absence. Employers pay
additional fees of more than 43 percent of gross wages for statutory social
benefits, including pensions.
B
Norway The Norwegian economy is dependent largely on
the fortunes of its important petroleum industry. Thus, it experienced a decline
in the late 1980s as oil prices fell, but by the late 1990s it had rebounded
strongly, benefiting from increased production and higher prices. Norway
reversed its negative balance of payments, and the growth of its gross national
product (GNP) --which had slowed during the 1980s--accelerated. By the late
1990s Norway’s per capita GNP was the highest in Scandinavia and among the
highest in the world. In an effort to reduce economic down turns caused by
drops in oil prices, the government in 1990 established the Government Petroleum
Fund, into which budget surpluses were deposited for investment
overseas. Only about one-fifth of Norway’s commodity imports are
food and consumer goods; the rest consists of raw materials, fuels, and capital
goods. The rate of reinvestment has been high in Norway for a number of years.
This is reflected in the relatively steady employment in the building and
construction industry. Rapid growth, however, has been registered in commercial
and service occupations, as is the case in most countries with a high standard
of living. Fewer than 5 percent of the industrial companies in
Norway have more than 100 employees. Nonetheless, they account for half of the
industrial labour force and for more than half of production. The smaller
companies are usually family-owned, whereas most of the larger ones are
joint-stock companies. Foreign interests control companies accounting for about
10 percent of total production. Only a few larger concerns are state-owned, and
even these are usually run with almost complete independence. However, the
government traditionally has had a significant ownership control over major
economy sectors, such as oil, telecommunications, power, and transport, but from
the end of the 1990s many such companies were partially or fully
privatized.
C
Finland Finland’s economy is based primarily on
private ownership and free enterprise; in some sectors, however, the government
exercises a monopoly or a leading role. After World War II Finland was still
only semi-industrialized, with a large part of the population engaged in
agriculture, mining, and forestry. During the early postwar decades, primary
production gave way to industrial development, which in turn yielded to a
service and information-oriented economy. The economy grew especially rapidly in
the 1980s, as the country exploited its strong trading relations with both
eastern and western European countries. By the early 1990s, however, the country
was experiencing economic recession, largely because the collapse of the Soviet
Union in 1991 deprived Finland of its chief trading partner. The economy began a
slow recovery in the mid-1990s, as Finland refocused its trade primarily toward
western Europe. The Finnish government derives most of its
revenue from taxes on income and property, sales taxes, and excise duties. About
two-fifths of the government’s expenditures are for education and social
services, including housing and health care. This pattern of expenditure
is markedly different from the years following World War II; then much of the
Finnish annual budget went to paying war reparations and to rebuilding the
nation’s infrastructure. Finland has subscribed to the General
Agreement on Tariffs and Trade since 1949 and to the Organisation for Economic
Co-operation and Development since 1969. It became first an associate (1961) and
later a full member (1986) of the European Free Trade Association before leaving
that organization to join the European Union in 1995. Finland also became a
member of the constituent European Community (until 1903 called the European
Economic Community), with which it had maintained a free-trade agreement since
1974. ·by the late 1990s its per capita GNP was the highest in Scandinavia
71. ______. ·employees
can enjoy at least five-week-and-two-day annual paid vacation
72. ______. ·its economy is largely dependent on
how successful its petroleum industry is 73.
______. ·the employment rate of its women workers is higher than most other
74.
______. countries
·it
gained its European Union membership in 1995
75. ______. ·there has once been high reinvestment rate in the
building and construction 76. ______. industry
for many years ·its economy was gradually converted from traditional
to service-oriented 77. ______. and
information-oriented only after World War Ⅱ ·economic recession occurred in
the early 1990s as the result of the collapse 78.
______. of the Soviet Union ·more and more privatized state-owned
companies have sprung up from
79. ______. the end of the 1990s ·40% of its annual
government budget has been spent on education and
80. ______. social services