(hs.fi/english) We are supposed, of course, to be so grown-up these days that we don’t spend all our time wondering anxiously what the world thinks of us, but when a serious and influential newspaper like the Financial Times turns the spotlight on Finland, it is hard not to take a look. Wednesday’s FT carried a lengthy Special Report on Finland under the headline “Rich, happy and good at austerity”.
With some reservations, the tone was generally positive. “Like Greece, Portugal and Ireland, Finland is on the geographical periphery of the eurozone, but it has little else in common with these three, which have all received international bailouts in the past two years. Richer, happier and better educated than the OECD rich nations’ club average, Finland is also one of only a few countries that all the main credit agencies still judge as triple A-rated.”
The paper examines the main points of Finland’s relative success story, and a few of its curiosities, looking at the forest industry and Nokia, at attempts to keep people in the workplace longer as the population ages, at such things as sauna and the Finnish passion for tango, and it also casts an eye over the Angry Birds phenomenon, wondering if it could become a new growth cluster.
Read more about FT Finland special or download the full report in: http://www.hs.fi/
