A new year, a new beginning?
The year 2006 has arrived. How quickly the time has flown. One full year has passed since the last New Year’s resolutions were made and just as quickly pushed aside.
What does the new year hold in store for those of us who are fortunate (or unfortunate) enough to live in Sweden? My first inclination is to say that the year will be as good as we make it.
As I reflect on the past year and the one that has just begun, some questions that must concern every businessman – or woman – in this country spring to mind.
How many more employees will be on near-permanent sick leave because they broke a leg skiing off-piste in the Christmas winter, or have the ‘flu, or a headache, or are stressed out due to marital problems, or any one of a thousand reasons that have nothing to do with their work-related situation? How many more insecure, flat-chested nymphettes will decide to augment all parts of their bodies on the weekend so as to stick their employers with the added cost of recuperation come new year?
And here’s the 15% sick-leave daylight robbery tax question: how to get rid of them – and quickly? We may be in for a very rough year.
On the bright side, our prime minister and his ever media-savvy finance minister say that everything is just peachy in Sweden at the moment. Sweden is flourishing, companies are making more profit than ever before. One of the biggest oversights of the past year has been that this huge spurt in profitability has largely been at the expense of employment. Companies, large and small, are fleeing to safer, more viable shores. Those that remain are downsizing as fast and as far as possible.
People are simply afraid to employ staff.
Why is that? Well, to arrive at the answer to that question, let us ask another question: who wants to work hard to build up something from which one can never make a decent living or achieve a reasonable measure of security?
No-one wants to die a pauper after a hard life’s work.
There must be greater incentives to get people to take the risk of not only starting and running a business, but even employing people and working to expand said business.
Simply put, people – young and old – must feel that the sky is the only limit to the extent of their possible success when they start a business, and they must be allowed to enjoy the fruits of their labour.
Failure to realise that will only push this country further down what is already a very slippery slope indeed.
This year, I did not make any new year’s resolutions. I prayed instead for good sense to return to the ruling masses.
Let us all hope that this one wish comes true.
The year 2006 has arrived. How quickly the time has flown. One full year has passed since the last New Year’s resolutions were made and just as quickly pushed aside.
What does the new year hold in store for those of us who are fortunate (or unfortunate) enough to live in Sweden? My first inclination is to say that the year will be as good as we make it.
As I reflect on the past year and the one that has just begun, some questions that must concern every businessman – or woman – in this country spring to mind.
How many more employees will be on near-permanent sick leave because they broke a leg skiing off-piste in the Christmas winter, or have the ‘flu, or a headache, or are stressed out due to marital problems, or any one of a thousand reasons that have nothing to do with their work-related situation? How many more insecure, flat-chested nymphettes will decide to augment all parts of their bodies on the weekend so as to stick their employers with the added cost of recuperation come new year?
And here’s the 15% sick-leave daylight robbery tax question: how to get rid of them – and quickly? We may be in for a very rough year.
On the bright side, our prime minister and his ever media-savvy finance minister say that everything is just peachy in Sweden at the moment. Sweden is flourishing, companies are making more profit than ever before. One of the biggest oversights of the past year has been that this huge spurt in profitability has largely been at the expense of employment. Companies, large and small, are fleeing to safer, more viable shores. Those that remain are downsizing as fast and as far as possible.
People are simply afraid to employ staff.
Why is that? Well, to arrive at the answer to that question, let us ask another question: who wants to work hard to build up something from which one can never make a decent living or achieve a reasonable measure of security?
No-one wants to die a pauper after a hard life’s work.
There must be greater incentives to get people to take the risk of not only starting and running a business, but even employing people and working to expand said business.
Simply put, people – young and old – must feel that the sky is the only limit to the extent of their possible success when they start a business, and they must be allowed to enjoy the fruits of their labour.
Failure to realise that will only push this country further down what is already a very slippery slope indeed.
This year, I did not make any new year’s resolutions. I prayed instead for good sense to return to the ruling masses.
Let us all hope that this one wish comes true.
posted by Adolf R | 00:29
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home