Bernie Speaks with the Finnish Ambassador: What Can We Learn From Finland?

Okay, Mr. Ambassador, thank you very much for coming to Vermont today and we had a great time at Harwood Union High School in Wartown. Let me start by asking you a pretty simple question. For five years in a row, it is now a small country of Finland. It has been recognized by International Studies as the happiest country on Earth, why do you think this is so? I think you obviously don't have any obvious easy explanation, it can't be the weather, it can't be the happy neighborhood, so I think the reason we've been trying to study that, I think one of the indicators that we've seen is that there is a high degree of trust in institutions and in other people, so people feel that they belong to a society and they feel that the society is also working for them and I think there is also an element of being relatively stress-free because we have a system that covers some of the basic elements and needs of your life, so you can really count on support. in many important fields like education or health care social services so I think it doesn't make our life problem free but I think it reduces the stress that most people have and this is the reason so I don't think it's happiness, it means we laugh all the time, but it means we're basically pretty happy with life.

One of the things that I think we don't discuss enough here in the United States is the incredible degree of happiness. of the stress that people live under and anxiety is simply not good for your health, people worry about how they are going to pay their healthcare bills, they worry about how they will send their children to college, they worry about how They will be We are going to get by with salaries that in many cases are not adequate. So let's review

what

's happening in Finland. Let me start well. In the United States we do not have paid family and medical leave, something I am fighting for.

Not having it means that there are women in this country who can give birth and a week or two weeks later they are forced to go back to work. How does paid family and medical leave work in Finland? Our system is based on universal permission. Maternity leave package, which means for the first three months you receive 100 of your salary, so you have a baby, yes you have a baby, for the first three months you receive 100 of your salary and then up to a year and even. furthermore, you have 60 70 percent of that salary, so actually your financial security is being taken care of, in that way, so of course it is very important in our society also the fact that parents can divide how they use that time so it's actually also a father who can stay home so the mother can go back to work and then the father gets the compensation so not only is he very dedicated to the mother.

In our country there are hundreds of thousands of people who go bankrupt due to outrageously high medical bills, how much does medical care cost for the person? In Finland, if I am sick and end up in the hospital,

what

kind of bill do I pay? When I go out? I think in our case, if you get sick and go to the hospital, then the bill you receive is basically only a small fraction of the actual cost because that is taken care of by the state health insurance, so after a while in the hospital you may end up paying a few hundred dollars depending on Of course, on some of the things, but it is a symbolic cost, not close to the real cost.

When a mom and dad go to work, they worry, you know, their babies tell me about the childcare system that exists in Finland. Well, our child care. The system is mainly, we have municipal childcare centers, so, it is a public system, we also have private kindergartens, but in my case, I cannot tell my experience in Helsinki, basically, the payment range starts from 30. Euros , which is now basically 30 dollars these days, that depends, 30 per month, yes, per month, it depends on your income, so the maximum rate for high income people is 300 dollars per month, okay, three hundred dollars per month is thirty-six hundred dollars. a year in this state of Vermont, which is almost average for the nation, is about fifteen thousand dollars a year.

Okay, let me ask you another question, and that's the topic of education and higher education in particular, if you were interested. to become a doctor in Finland I have to go to university I have to go to medical school or in this country it is not uncommon for people to leave medical school with a debt of three or four hundred thousand dollars, how much debt do I leave behind? medical school and university in film, well basically, there are no fees for their own tuition freeze fees, which means that if you don't pay for the education itself, you get state student financial aid for your living expenses, so basically it depends on a number of factors if you need to borrow some money if you don't have time if you really want to focus on your studies you don't want to supplement your income by working as a sort of part time then Of course you can borrow money and then you can have some debt, but still, in many cases, people graduate debt-free, and so do I, so I was lucky in that sense, in the United States and I know it everywhere.

In the world, people can make a good living and do important jobs without a four-year college degree. What is done in terms of technical education to make sure that people can become good construction workers or whatever? Yes, we have a vocational school system, so usually people go to vocational school after comprehension school, that takes two years, three years and then they graduate and usually start in different types of professions. I think it's a really important path in our education system because we know that skilled workers are also needed, but not only skilled workers need to have a good basic education so that they can be retrained in the future because needs and professionals change, for which we always try to make sure that they then receive a good basic education. vocational training that is broad and sufficient for demanding professions, but Tenka can also retrain later in their lives, okay, I'm not going to involve you in American politics, that's something I can't do and you can't do . that and you won't, but what interests me is political, the nature of the system, in this country right now, billionaires can spend hundreds of millions of dollars electing the candidates they want, tell us a little if you can. about the nature of the political system in Finland and you know, can someone spend millions of dollars to get elected?

How does it work in Finland? Well, basically, it is a parliamentary democracy. We have several parties in parliament. We have several games. Yes, we have several parties, I think nine parties now in parliament, so they come with different profiles. We have parliamentary elections every four years. We have certain rules to control the financing that candidates receive. and we have certain limitations on how it works and of course I also think we have a culture where outsized contributions are made, I think that maybe wouldn't be good news for the candidate, so there's a I think people expect this types of contributions are kept within certain limits, okay, in the United States today we have more income and wealth inequality than I think, maybe in the history of this country there are three people who have more wealth than the bottom half of the United States Joined.

The top one percent owns more wealth than the bottom 92 percent. A study recently came out in which the CEOs of large corporations do not earn 400 times what their workers earn. What is the problem of income and wealth inequality in Finland, I think it is a cause for concern and it is a topic of discussion also in our society. I know that if you take international comparisons, we are still one of the most egalitarian societies. I think the differences have been growing over the last few years, but I think if you compare it I think we are still doing well.

I think people think it's important that income disparities don't grow too big and that we're more or less on the same page. there are differences You can live better you can get rich in Finland you can become a millionaire that's all possible, it should be possible but of course in our case we also try to make sure that those who earn more also have to contribute more. you have a progressive tax, we have a progressive tax system, our Finland shares an 800 mile border with Russia and obviously around the world, and in Finland there has been deep concern about this horrible invasion of Ukraine by Putin. tell us a little about Finland's attitude towards the war in Russia, the Russian war in Ukraine at the moment, obviously we totally condemn the illegal attack and of course we have started helping Ukraine from the beginning, we believe that we cannot accept this guy. of an illegal attack, the idea of ​​annexation of a sovereign country that is its neighbor, so obviously we are totally against this and of course we support Ukraine also in terms of military assistance.

I think for us it means that we must remain united against This is not just a question of the Americans or the US, also the Europeans are contributing to this joint effort. I think it's a question of principle. We can no longer live by these kinds of old rules. We have to respect international law and international law. The rights of Ukrainians and all these disputes that may arise must be handled peacefully, so I think that until now we are in a long and difficult situation with Russia on a bilateral level. If I look at the border we have with Russia, everything has been like that.

Quiet and unstable, I think one of the reasons is the fact that Russia has to focus on Ukraine, it trains all the resources it has at the moment, but obviously we have been, we have one of the strongest armies in Europe. we have mandatory military service so we take this very seriously, okay, anything else you would like to add, then I'm okay with this, yeah, yeah, okay, okay, once again, thank you for joining me in Vermont, Uh, and everyone, thanks for watching.