How your income stacks up

[Malthus]

*Your* sex object of choice is *my* penis?

Objection.  When the evidence was introduced the word "your" was not there.  I direct your attention to the original post.  As they say in court "I call shenanigans!"

Shenanigans?

So THATS what you call it.

[Pat]

I disagree. What sort of debt does a $100K earner have compared to a $30K earner? 

A student loan.

  I get *paid* about $300/month to study law at Stockholm University, one of the hardest-to-get-into educations in the country (though Hortlund once argued law at Uppsala is better and Stockholm is only more popular because it's Stockholm, but I can only assume he studied at Uppsala). I will accumulate some student loans, but they are subsidised and very beneficial as the interest is not much more than inflation.

[Fate]

And when you graduate 50%? of your income will belong to big brother. 

[Pat]

Probably more than 50%, but I don't mind. Big brother paid my education, after all. I like my big brother.

[Malthus]

I disagree. What sort of debt does a $100K earner have compared to a $30K earner? 

A student loan.

  I get *paid* about $300/month to study law at Stockholm University, one of the hardest-to-get-into educations in the country (though Hortlund once argued law at Uppsala is better and Stockholm is only more popular because it's Stockholm, but I can only assume he studied at Uppsala). I will accumulate some student loans, but they are subsidised and very beneficial as the interest is not much more than inflation.

Woah, that's a great deal.

I thought I had it good in Canada, when I could by working all summer pay tuition on law school for the year (sadly, tuition has tripled since and I don't think that is possible any more).

What are the financial prospects like for a lawyer in Sweden?

[Pat]

I might add that the Swedish system is immensely preferrable, for the following reasons:

1) It is more meritocratic, because admission is based only on merits, and in no way on how much money your parents have (which I personally find quite disgusting).

2) In the American system, the educated are made slaves to the free market, because they accumulate large student loans they can only pay back by making money in the free market. There is no free market of ideas for educated americans; at the very least, it is subject to very strong incentives and punishments.

3) I assume it's more cost-efficient from a societal stand-point. I would be interested in a comparison of years of education/capita and cost of education/capita between Sweden and America.

4) At the very least the quality of education isn't worse. The best education in a country of 9 million will never be as good as the best education in a country of 300 million, but I think we do alright for our size, and I would be very interested in hearing an argument of why our system leads to lower quality of education - I've never heard such an argument, and I don't think it could be made.

[Pat]

The system works the same way for students of law and students of other subjects (including stuff in no way beneficial to society like feminist studies etc, I'd be first in line to propose some harder regulations )

I'll dig up some stats for you on prospects of lawyers Malthus

[Pat]

OK been checking out the official statistics of the Central Bureau of Statistics (which Slargos would tell you can not be trusted, I might warn).

According to the report "Work force barometer of 2009", students of law is the group of students in highest demand by employers. (Link in Swedish: http://www.scb.se/statistik/_publikationer/UF0505_2009A01_BR_AM78BR0905.pdf (p. 9, "Störst har efterfrågan varit på jurister." / "Lawyers have been in highest demand")

A lawyer in Stockholm, aged 37 years, with 9 years experience, earns in average 42.224 kr/month (70 644.9744 U.S. dollars/year, at current exchange rate. This is before tax.)

[Josephus]

What are Sweden's immigration policies and what are the job prospects for an old-fashioned print journalist who only speaks English? 

[Slargos]

SCB is reasonably reliable as long as you're not expecting truth about our precious lottery winnings in which case even lying through your teeth isn't able to make the situation look good.

[Pat]

With 42.224 SEK/month, living in Oscar congragation in Stockholm, which is where I live, and not being a member of the Swedish church, which I am not, one would pay:

Resultat: Du får 29 330 kr i månaden efter skatt
Kommunalskatt: 7 197 kr
Landstingsskatt: 4 982 kr
(Jobbavdrag: -1 422 kr)
Statlig skatt: 2 108 kr
Kyrkoavgift: 29 kr
Total skattesats: 30,5%


In translation:

Result: 29 330 kr/month after tax
Communal tax: 7 197 kr
Landsting tax: 4 982 kr
(Work deduction: -1 422 kr)
State tax: 2 108 kr
Church fee: 29 kr
Total tax burden: 30,5%

The commune is the lowest level of societal organisation, the landsting is the mid-level and the state is the top level.

To this is added VAT, but the VAT is different for different things (at most 20-25%, but as low as 8% for books, for example).


I forgot to translate into dollars. 29 330 SEK is 4 089 USD. This is what you keep every month.

This is the distrubution of income, presented graphically:

[Slargos]

What are Sweden's immigration policies and what are the job prospects for an old-fashioned print journalist who only speaks English? 

Are you white?

Would you be interested in work?

If the answer to any question is "yes" then I'm afraid you're gonna have a hard time immigrating legally. 

[Pat]

What are Sweden's immigration policies and what are the job prospects for an old-fashioned print journalist who only speaks English? 

'


I'm not sure if there's any statistics to be found for journalists who only speaks english, but I know work prospects for journalists are poor in Sweden, as they are is in most places nowadays. Being a journalist is something I'd consider becoming, but I'd never go through the Stockholm school of journalism; a law degree would be better for me even if that's what I'd want to be. The competition is very fierce.

[Pat]

What are Sweden's immigration policies and what are the job prospects for an old-fashioned print journalist who only speaks English? 

Are you white?

Would you be interested in work?

If the answer to any question is "yes" then I'm afraid you're gonna have a hard time immigrating legally. 

I believe he's british, which is to say we share a common market and he could even study here for free if he'd like to

edit: I share your concerns for well-educated non-european immigrants though, we should make it a lot easier to let them in

[Pat]

I might add that not all the above statistics is from SCB (SCB doesn't provide nice graphical presentations, for example) - some of it is from random sites I've never visited before (but have no reason to believe to be biased)