The Glenn Beck Program - Best of the Program | Guest: Jaco Booyens | 7/6/26

Episode Date: July 6, 2026

CNN blames President Trump for the current political divide in America, but Glenn points out all the divisive rhetoric from prominent Democrat politicians who have actively fueled America's divide. Glenn discusses the group "Patriot Front" and the recent viral incident involving a black woman on the Metro in Washington, D.C. Socialists will point to Denmark or Sweden when defending socialism, but Glenn lays out why places like Denmark aren't actually operating under socialism and exposes the intellectual dishonesty of conflating socialism with how these countries operate.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Wow. CNN is going to come as a surprise. CNN is wrong again. CNN, they believe America is 250. We are the most politically divided, you know, than we've ever been. Well, I'd say the Civil War was a little more divided. But that's not the problem. That's not why they're wrong. And I explain on today's podcast.

Also, blood and ink. The Patriots, that are, that came in with the masks and the flags and said they are patriots, they're an abomination. They're white supremacists and they're an abomination. I denounce them strongly, but I take it a step further. And I want you to play it for your friends who might be for some of the other, you know, Black Lives Matter or Palestinian.

I want you to listen because we are under, an illusion that these things are different and they're not. Also, Sweden, it's not socialist. Mabani, that's not what we're headed for. A very eye-opening podcast today. Don't miss a second of it. Here it is. You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck program.

So your electricity bill has gone up. Okay. And not because, you know, you ran the air harder or you added another room or you bought a hot tub or something. You did nothing different. You're living exactly the same way you've always, you've run the same numbers, you know, for air conditioning and heat, and the number at the bottom of your bill just keeps climbing. And nobody in your state capital will look you in the eye and tell you why.

So let me look you in the eye and tell you why. There's a new study out. If you live in a blue state and you're furious about what you pay, just to keep your lights on, stop cursing the weather. Stop cursing the power companies hold music. Here's the problem. It was a choice, and that choice is not yours. Never has been yours.

Well, it used to be yours. It's not now. It hadn't been for a long time. There's analysis out now, always on energy research and the Institute for Energy Research. And they're pulling right from the government's own numbers. and it lands on something, I mean, something that's so clear, it's almost rude to say it out loud. Of the states paying more than the national average for electricity, 86% of them voted for Democrats in the last two presidential elections.

Of the 10 cheapest states in the country, 80% voted for Republicans. Now, you could wave that off as a coincidence if you'd like, but there is a pattern with a cause, and the cause has a name, and the name is net zero. Renewable mandates, zero emission targets, portfolio standards, they order your utility to buy a certain amount of a certain kind of power by a certain date, whether it's ready or not, whether it's cheaper or not, whether it keeps the lights on in January or not, it doesn't matter. and your utility company is now fighting these mandates because your utility gets richer by building them. A power company makes its money spending money. Every new wind farm, every new line, every grand green promise is another mountain of infrastructure that it's getting paid to build.

And reliability doesn't pad the profit, doesn't matter. Affordability doesn't pad the profit. building the stuff does. So the mandate and the monopoly shake hands over your bill and you're the one holding the check. How does that make you feel? Who owned, who is actually in charge of your life? That is the thing that the whole declaration of independence was all about. Who is in charge of your life? You or a group of faceless people that you don't know. Now, you look at these numbers and you go, wait a minute here, Mr. Beck. Washington and Oregon seem to do pretty well. Uh-huh. They're both deep blue, both of them, and their power is cheap. Yes, it is cheap. Now, let's think that

through. Why is Oregon and Washington? Why is their power so cheap? It's called hydroelectric dams. It works with water and gravity. the cheapest most reliable electricity that God and engineering ever made together. So there is the exception. Blue states, cheap power. Two of them. Except here's what they've left off the postcard for you. That same coalition, the governors, the tribes, the green lawyers, the whole apparatus.

Along with the last administration, signing its name right there at the bottom, is in federal court right now trying to rip four of those dams out of the snake river. Four lower snake dams, working hydroelectric dams, making clean, cheap power for hundreds of thousands of homes sitting there, doing the one thing everybody claims they want, and those deep blue states want those gone. They want them blown apart, breached. They want to drain back into a river. river and they want to do it on purpose. But they've made a promise to you. No, no, no, no. Seriously, they've made this promise that's dressed up in a thousand different costumes. Don't worry,

we'll replace it and we'll replace the dam power with wind and solar and batteries and it'll be better and cheaper. Uh-huh. We're going to replace the barges with trains and we'll replace the water somehow. Trust the study. Trust the model. Trust us. I don't think I trust. I trust. I don't think I you guys. No, $30 billion a decade of faith to tear something out that already works, that already makes free power every single day because of a flowing river. I don't know. I think that that pleases my bottom line, you know, a cheap electric bill. That helps me an awful lot. Now here's a part that lands on my doorstep, maybe yours. I live in Idaho, half the year I live in Idaho. Idaho sits upstream of every one of those dams.

And the very same fight that once those gone has spent years now reaching past the state line for our water, the water held in our reservoirs to flush the system out for fish. Our stored water, the water, a farmer in Magic Valley, is already counted on to bring a crop in out of the dust because remember without water it's all dust they'll spend all of that water on salmon and call it science and then the man watching his field go brown gets told well your water was needed some more more virtuous than your field so don't tell me the blue states have cracked the code on cheap power cheap water they didn't crack anything except possibly the dam they inherited a river and the politics that run them is in court right now,

trying to break the very dams the river's turn and reaching then into my water while they're at it. Anyway, I just want to ask you, who owns your stuff? Really, honestly, who is in charge of your life? You know, cheap power exception is not proof that they were right. It's the next thing on their list to tear down, and all the numbers underneath of it are, ugly. No matter what your zip code is. Electricity prices in this country rose 27% from January 21 through

January of 25, then another 11% in just the nine months after that. And that's not a blip. That's a direction. Part of that is caused because green energy. The other part of that is caused because now we need more power. It ties into everything I said about the truck. Under the Federal Power Act, The states, not Washington, not the weather, the states have exclusive authority over what kind of power feeds their grid. Where it's built, what you get charged for it, exclusive, which means when your bill climbs, it is in fate, it is in bad luck. It's a room full of people that you can name, that you made the decision to hire, to elect people you can look up that reaches through your wall, And into that one outlet you thought was yours. Same exact hand.

So when you're electing the Socialists, this is what you're going to get. The same hand that sealed the hood of my truck so I couldn't fix the engine is the hand reaching into your wall to set the price of your own light and your own heat. And the same hand again reaching up to the river to drain the dam and take the water. It's the same instinct every time that somewhere, far beyond your kitchen, a body of experts and officials and activists know better than you know how to warm your house, how your, what your light should cost,

how long you should be able to run your lights, and whose water gets spent on what? And they'll say the same thing, it's the planet, it's the salmon, it's the future. They'll call it everything and anything. But what it is is control, just dressed up in a night suit for church, strip the robes off and it's the oldest question there is.

The only one that I really ask anymore, who owns the truck in your driveway? You were the men who locked you out of it. Who owns the power in your wall? Who pays for every watt? Is it you or the collective that priced it in a room you weren't invited to? Who owns the water and the dam and the river and the people who live and farm and raise their kids alongside of it,

or a distant few who've decided your whole way of life is just a rounding error against their vision. Who actually runs your life? Who gave you the right? Do they have the right or do you have the right? This is where the Declaration of Independence comes in, and you're not imagining the number at the bottom of that bill. You're not bad with money. You're paying month after month for decisions made,

in your name that you were never asked about, and some of the people making them are not finished yet. Be careful how you vote. The water on your land was supposed to be yours. It's always supposed to be. They just forgot to tell you that I guess now it comes with a landlord, a socialist one. You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck program. You know, can we ever find anyone on the other side that will speak honestly. I mean, CNN is so wrong once again. You know, here we are. 250th anniversary. CNN says, we're the most divided we've ever been.

We've been divided before. You think during the Civil War? You think? Yeah, but this one, this one is really bad. Worse of the Civil War, really? Yeah, you know why? Donald Trump. Whoa, now you completely took, you took me by surprise there at CNN.

I didn't wait, Donald Trump. What? That's a whole new theory. Yeah, Donald Trump, because he, he makes things worse because he's uniquely dangerous. He's uniquely dangerous. Yeah, yeah, because he picks it people. He picks it scabs. He, he mocks people.

He is keeping political divisions. wide open. Donald Trump is. Wow. Wow. Okay. All right. Let me give you CNN. Let me give you every bit of that. I don't agree with that. I think Donald Trump has done some really divisive things. Yes. And that's unfortunately kind of the way he is at times. He gets pissed and he'll do things like that. And I don't like it. So I'm going to give you absolutely every bit of that. I'll say Donald Trump is really divisive. Will you give me that your side is saying exactly the same things? September 1st, 2022. Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic. Why?

Because we don't like socialism? Why? Because we believe in small government? Why? Because I believe in the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. Don't assign, you've made me, you've made me into a MAGA Republican. I don't know what a MAGA Republican actually is, other than somebody goes, yeah, I think Donald Trump is doing pretty good and believes in the country.

That's all I know that that means. But now I'm a threat to democracy because I believe in the republic. Wow. Okay. All right. And he did that over and over again and said that MAGA Republicans are, fascists. I don't know. That seems a little divisive. I mean, maybe it's just me. You know, it's usually not done, you know, not said, you know, in polite company. Hey, Bill. Oh, man, good to see you,

you fascist. It's usually not a compliment. It's usually a little divisive. Hillary Clinton, quote, you can put half of Trump supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, and Islamophobic. Half of the people who voted the way that you didn't vote, half of them are all those things? I don't know. Sounds a little divisive, a little bit, a little bit. Yeah, but you started it.

2008. Small town Americans cling to their guns or their religion, religion or or to their antipathy to people who aren't like them. What, I don't have a problem with that. I don't cling to my God and my guns.

What? By the way, he was saying that as he was claiming that we engage in voter suppression and attacks on democracy. That's in 2008. By the way, Nancy Pelosi said Republicans are enemies of the state. Chuck Schumer warned Gorsitz and Kavanaugh, you've released the whirlwind and you'll pay the price.

Kamala Harris said, Pearl Harbor and September 11th are just like January 6th. You mean the one you hyped up and had a bunch of FBI that we now know had all kinds of government operatives at? You mean that one? Yes, but he is suppressing free speech. Donald Trump. Donald Trump, Donald Trump,

suppression. Have you ever heard of the Twitter files? Have you ever seen the litigation that, you know, showed the communication between the FBI, the White House, and social media companies? Just on the 2020 election, that's not even, that's just the beginning of it, because that went through the Hunter Biden laptop,

where we were called deplorables, we were called crazy, we were called conspiracy theorists, we were a danger to the republic. The FBI, said that we were in bed with Russia. If we believed the Hunter Biden laptop stuff, you mean that kind of stuff that was so uniting? Or was it the COVID stuff that was so uniting? You know, where we said, hey, I don't think that we should rush into this COVID vaccine. And because we

wouldn't, we wouldn't take the vaccine. We were going to kill everybody, every grandparent on earth that we shouldn't we shouldn't have medical care because we were crazy and deplorable we were killers because we said hey i think our own government not not the republicans democrats our own government was involved with the covid vaccine and we were called hate mongers for saying that anti-government people wait what what now that that's all proven Now, do we get an apology? No, nobody apologized. Or for the masks that you told us was science and we shouldn't question science and we now find out.

No, that was arbitrary. In fact, it made things worse. Or the vaccines that we said maybe we shouldn't rush and people lost their jobs, their livelihood were called all kinds of names. And now it shows that the vaccines might be part of the problem. No, this one, this one will make, you don't have any immunity. You have no natural immunity. For the first time in all of human existence, you have no human, no natural ability to fight this and create your own defense against it. Your body has no.

Really? Wow. Wow. No, no. You got to take it. And you better listen to those teachers unions, you know, significant learning loss. increased mental health problems, greater impact on lower income students, but we were the hate mongers for saying it.

Oh. And I haven't gotten into the Russian collusion thing or the parents at the school board meetings here in Virginia that were monsters, monsters. I didn't even get into the censorship. I mean, forget the 2020 censorship. How about the censorship with the White House and the social media companies on COVID? How about any of those? I don't know.

CNN. Seems like you might be wrong yet again. May I suggest something? The answer is found in our founding documents. What is this really all about? Because I'm going to take on those dirtbag, Patriot Front,

white supremacists, those guys that were down here in Washington, D.C., over the weekend for Fourth of July, dirtbags. All of them, dirtbags. Dangerous dirt bags. Stupid, pathetic, dangerous dirtbags. I'm going to take them on because that's an embarrassment to our nation.

So give me a second before I get there. But I want you to think about something all throughout the show today. I just want you to think about one thing. What is the real problem? What is the real problem? Well, it's Marxism. Okay, what is Marxism boil down to? The individual exists for the state or for the class, okay?

It's one class against another. It's that class that is keeping you down so this class can wind up. And the individual is for the state. Fascism. Same kind of idea. The individual, there is nothing beyond the state and everything. thing is the state. So fascism is saying the same thing. The individual doesn't matter. Go get the Jews. Go get the handicapped. Doesn't matter. It's for the collective good. White supremacy.

White supremacy. Go get to blacks. Go get the Jews. Go get to Hispanics. Go get anybody who's different than you. Because whites are the real solution. Whites should have all the power. what's the difference between that and some of the extremists on BLM and DEI that are saying whites are the problem, blacks are the ones, the minorities? And what's the difference between that and the Palestinian crazies that are saying, you know, the real problem is the Jews? All these have one thing in common. Collective. They've all become about the collective. and who are the enemies? Who are the enemies? The ones who believe

all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights who actually believe that, not playing the game, who actually believe in the power of the individual. What is the other target? The other target is those who believe God knows you by name, not some collective crazy, not Barack Obama's collective salvation, but actual salvation that Jesus came for the individual. You don't have the crime of your father. He doesn't take on your crimes. You don't take on his crime. You're judged as an individual. Isn't it interesting that every group that we are seeing right now that is trying to pit us apart, they all have a different definition of the collective, but they all arrive at the very same conclusion. Your rights

come from the group. Your value comes from the group. Your duty is to the group. The American experiment says, no, your rights come from God. Your dignity comes from your creator. The state exists to protect your liberty, not to define your worth. You see, it's really not that hard. We're really only arguing one thing, and we're arguing the same thing with the white supremacists that we're saying to the Palestinian crazies, that we're saying to the BLM people,

that we're saying to the fascists, that we're saying to the communist, that we're saying to Zoran Mamdani, that we're saying to the Republican progressives, that we're saying to the Democrat, progressive, socialists, saying the same thing. It's the same argument. I think we should get a little smarter

and we should just boil it down. I think we should be able to go, oh, we know your argument. You're just wearing a different uniform. Oh, you're wearing the red, white, and blue with the black uniform and the mask and you're marching. Why? Because whites are supreme.

Yeah, I put you in the same box as those people over there who are marching and saying that the Palestinians are supreme and we should wipe out all the Jews. You two, you actually have a lot in common. It's the same argument, which then should lead you to, why does everyone hate us? Why do all of these groups hate us? What do we believe that we have in common. The founding documents. That's what they're really after, that man can rule himself, that we don't need an overlord, that we don't need somebody telling us you can't fix your effing

truck, that you have to follow religion my way, that you have to keep your temperature at this temperature because whatever it is, it's always good for the collective. What we have in common on our side is we believe in the power of the individual. And not in some irresponsible way where we say screw everybody else. We know because the American experiment proved it to be true. Man can rule himself and he can change the world for good. More in a minute. This is the best of the Glenn Beck program, and don't forget, rate us on iTunes.

Hello, America. You know we've been fighting every single day. We push back against the lies, the censorship, the nonsense of the mainstream media that they're trying to feed you. We work tirelessly to bring you the unfiltered truth because you deserve it. But to keep this fight going, we need you. Right now, would you take a moment and rate and review the Glenn Beck podcast? Give us five stars and lead a comment because every single review helps us break through. big tech's algorithm to reach more Americans who need to hear the truth. This isn't a podcast. This is a movement. And you're part of it, a big part of it. So if you believe in what we're doing, you want more people to wake up. Help us push this podcast to the top. Rate, review, share. Together, we'll make a difference. And thanks for standing with us. Now let's get to work. I can't believe it's been four

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As we mark 250 years, what do we see? We see a city of contradictions within a nation of contradictions. We see the wealthiest country in the history of the world, one where children go to sleep hungry, while the world's first trillionaire hungers for more. We see monopolies that dominate every industry, and oligarchs who buy elections. We see mass agents' terrorists.

terrorizing our streets, eating food cooked by our undocumented neighbors before spiriting them away in unmarked vans. We see a nation whose immense wealth has been built by those with calloused, dirt street hands, those who toil on factory floors and chisel into stone. And we see a nation that has allowed so much of that wealth to be held instead in the soft hands of a precious few. The soft hands of a precious few. Let's just use Leon Musk. Has he not earned his money? I mean, I don't know how you earn a trillion dollars quite honestly. But does he not deserve what he has brought to the world through speech and technology, communications,

what he has done for the world where they can now communicate freely in countries where you could not be free to speak. He's got the satellite system up. He's reinvented the car and given all of the tech. He didn't put a patent on it. He gave the patent. away for free so anyone can use it. He is transforming the idea of space.

He is building a space, a space economy, which you won't understand for another five to ten years, but when that thing hits, you will understand. He may have soft hands, but he's done the intellectual plowing of almost every field. I don't want to get this. You know, I'm just tired of socialism. I'm tired. I just wish we could have an honest conversation.

But we are dealing with so many people that are so uninformed. Yes, there are great disparities in wealth. Yes. And you say, and while they're buying elections, yes, like Soros, do you mean Soros? Or is he exempt? Because I would like the money to get out of politics as well. But it's not an honest fight. most people who are saying that's not honest

if you have a problem with all the money in politics good good so do I if you have a problem with corrupt capitalism so do I but the answer is not bigger government but socialism will work let me tell you America has been told a really simple story for a very long time if America could only be more like Denmark

now we're not even talking about Denmark or Sweden or Norway anymore. We're not talking about that. They are talking about a different kind of socialism now. But let's just say they're talking about, we just want to be like Norway and Sweden. It's the favorite exhibit in almost every debate about capitalism and government. The Nordic countries, they're proof. Socialism works. But before you remodel your house after somebody else's blueprint, let's walk through the front door first. Okay? Because the story that almost everyone tells you about Scandinavian nations leaves out the part that actually made Scandinavia successful. The leaders themselves reject the label socialist. Don't believe me, look it up. The former Danish

Prime Minister, Andres Rasmussen or something, came to the United States and addressed it directly. He said, Americans associate Denmark with socialism. Then he added, and I'm quoting, Denmark is far from a socialist planned economy. Denmark is a market economy. Where are the posters for that? That's a remarkable statement. Imagine somebody insisting Texas is a communist state. While the governor keeps coming out and going, we're not.

We're not. We're Texas. We're not communist. And yet the myth survives somehow. So what's really happening? The Nordic countries have built generous welfare states. That part is absolutely true. They provide universal health coverage.

College is subsidized, heavily subsidize or free. Parents receive paid leave. Safety nets are extensive. But those benefits sit on top of economies that depend on capitalism every single day. Not just capitalism, competitive capitalism. Strong property rights, private ownership, entrepreneurship, open trade. innovation, businesses that are expected to compete in the marketplace rather than survive on government protection. Those days are long gone. And this is the part that never makes it to a campaign speech.

According to the Index of Economic Freedom, Denmark has consistently ranked among the freest economies in the entire world. The country most often used to argue against capitalism scores routinely as the world's freest capitalist economy. Wow, does that make you curious at all? At all? I mean, should we look into that? During the post-war decades, Sweden dramatically expanded government spending,

the taxes, the regulation. By the 1970s and into the 1980s, economic growth slowed way down. Investments weakened. Entrepreneurs left. some of Sweden's most successful companies and business leaders moved. They just moved out of the country. IKEA relocated ownership to the Netherlands.

Tetrapak moved to Switzerland. Sweden's relative standing among wealthy nations fell sharply for two decades. And then everybody turns away and doesn't say, so what happened next? Sweden didn't double down. They didn't double down. It reversed course. Governments from both the left and the right reduced regulations. They reformed the pensions.

These are things we're not doing. They introduce private competition into education. That'll never happen, right? Today, more than 800 independent schools operate with public funding. Private companies run a substantial share of the Swedish primary health centers. taxes were restructured, markets were liberalized. The reforms were not a rejection of the welfare state. They were an acknowledgement that somebody first has to create the wealth to pay for it.

It's really hard to redistribute prosperity after you've regulated prosperity out of existence. And that's what New York is doing. And here's another fact that surprises most Americans. the Nordic countries, they don't finance their governments primarily on taxing billionaires. Did you know that? Nope. They tax everyone. The cashier, the plumber, the teacher, the nurse, the mechanic, not just the billionaire,

everyone. In Denmark and Sweden, value-added taxes of around 25% apply to everyday purchases. So that means, if you want, this, your taxes are going to go up at the very bottom, and you're going to get a 25% VAT tax. You buy shoes, furniture, television, dinner at a restaurant, a significant amount of that. 25% goes to the government. Income taxes are broad, payroll taxes are broad, consumption taxes are broad, meaning everybody pays them.

And the system works there because almost everyone contributes. Now, do you think Americans are going to accept that? Because I don't. Would you trade that? Another myth deserves some attention here. Many people believe Scandinavia punishes wealth more aggressively than America. Nope, nope, nope, no. The reality is that several Nordic countries actually have abolished their wealth taxes because they don't work. Sweden, get this one, no longer has an inheritance tax.

Norway is debating and reducing its wealth taxes because the high net worth individuals are leaving the country. That's what's happening in California. Where are they going? They're leaving New York to go to Florida. They're leaving California to go to Texas. If it was all countrywide, these extensive socialist taxes, they'd leave America.

Because the policymakers understand something every country eventually discovers, but we just don't. Capital moves. entrepreneurs move investments move governments compete as well and here's one of the biggest misunderstandings we have it's it's on health care health care is free it's not free it's never free nothing's free nordic health care systems are financed through the taxes that every remember I told you everybody pays taxes citizens pay throughout their working lives many systems also include

co-payments for doctor visits, prescription drugs or specialist care. Look at Canada. You're paying for private insurance on top of it. Now different countries use different arrangements. Some are good, some are not. The point is, it's not that their systems are bad. The point is that they're paid for by the taxpayer and not the billionaire. Somebody always has to pay. The bill doesn't just go away. it just arrives in a different envelope. I'll give you this. This is even more interesting. Nordic countries are filled with private companies. Filled with private companies.

Global companies, innovative companies, successful companies, Volvo, Erickson, Lego, Spotify, Cone. They all compete around the world. And their governments expect them to succeed because those companies generate the tax revenue that supports the welfare system. Why do you hate successful companies if they're expected to pay taxes? But our taxes, everything is so screwed up here. We've made special exemptions for everyone. Everyone should pay taxes. No successful business, no generous welfare state. It's that simple. You get rid of business. You don't have the welfare. Another ingredient that economists often point to, and that is trust, something we don't have.

Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, consistently are the highest trust societies in the world. People generally believe their neighbors will obey the rules. Now, that's changing because of the border situation. Government corruption is relatively low. It's not here. Institutions enjoy broad public confidence. Not here. Look at the fraud that's going on.

That kind of social capital is incredible. valuable because it lowers the transaction cost. It simplifies regulation. It allows systems to function with fewer layers of enforcement. Trust, you cannot legislate trust. It develops over generations and once it's gone, it's gone. And that's why culture matters and institutions matter and history matters. I'm not I'm not selling the Nordic model down the river and I'm not saying it's perfect. It has its strengths it has its weaknesses, like every system designed by human beings. The real lesson here is not about socialism versus capitalism. The real lesson here, I think, is about intellectual honesty. If somebody proves or points to Denmark as proof that socialism works, now you have the information.

You have to say, would you acknowledge the Denmark's commitment to private enterprise and taxes? If somebody praises Sweden's welfare system, you want to mention Sweden's market reforms after 1990? Well, Finland, they're public services. We want to mention Finland's strong support for private business and global competition. You know, good ideas don't travel alone. Neither do bad ones. The danger comes when we import only the policies we like while ignoring the conditions that make them possible.

It's like pointing to a championship football team and deciding the secret to winning is a fancy stadium. No, no, no, it's not. Yeah, but look at the stadium, it's visible. Yeah, but the years of practice? I don't see that. Well, but they may not be visible. Well, it's really the secret is the trophy.

No, it's the discipline that you don't see in the case. The welfare benefits are visible, but the productive economy underneath often isn't. And every society eventually faces the same question. How much can you distribute? The answer depends on the other question that comes first. How much can you produce?

That's the question that humbles governments. History is filled with nations that become wealthy and then debate how to share the prosperity. History is also filled with nations that try to distribute prosperity before they've created it. And those stories always end the same way. The pie shrinks. Everybody receives a smaller slice.

The Nordic companies remind us something worth remembering. Markets create wealth. Governments redistribute that wealth should you choose. But you can't redistribute wealth that no longer exists. And that's what New York needs to learn.