>I was in Stockholm in August. It definetly was one of the most beautiful
>cities on our tour and it certainly did appear to be properous. One
>question. Our travel guide noted that in 1980 the Swedish workers
>compensation was the 3rd highest in the world and that it had dropped to
>about 13th by the mid-90's. Does anyone know if this has changed the
>last few years?
The BLS has international comparisons of manufacturing compensation at <http://stats.bls.gov/news.release/ichcc.toc.htm>. Table 1 expresses compensation "costs" (these stats are collected for employers!) in U.S. dollar equivalents as an index number, with the U.S. at 100. Sweden was 113 in 1975, fell to 74 in 1985 (at the dollar's peak), rose to 138 in 1996, and fell to 122 in 1997. Problem is that these figures are heavily dependent on exchange rates. In national currency units (table 5), Swedish wage growth has exceeded U.S. in nominal terms in every period since 1975. I think I'll do up a chart of real wage growth in national currency units for the next LBO.
Doug