Useless Danes Named and Shamed

Following the famous 80:20 rule, I expect generally that any country I go to, I'll find 80% of people to be generally helpful, friendly and law-abiding, while 20% might be rude, unpleasant, criminal or generally otherwise best avoided.

During my time in Denmark, however, I found the reverse applied. Probably only about 20% fitted into the first category, while it often seemed like 80% were rude, unpleasant, disrepectful and criminal. The last category, the criminal one, is what amazed me most, beginning with the huge chunk of people who think it's OK to feign illness or an inability to work, so they can claim huge chunks of government benefits and other various freebies, right through to the builder, Ole Grønlund, who made an appalling job of restoring our house, before failing to return to finish the job, Morten Høgenhav, the worst bunch of cowboy painters even seen, and the children who stole our childrens' toys from our own garden, then proceeded to treat our garden as a playground for 2 weeks, destroying yet more, unstopped by the various adults who must have witnessed it, probably including their own, useless, benefit-claiming parents.

Next, a dishonourable mention must go to Ken Lynge Primby and his Connect Resourcing/Recruitment Agency. Ken has a nasty and previously proven habit of accidentally letting his business fall into liquidation once every few years, leaving the debts (like mine) with the unfortunate encumbents, while a new Connect rises like a phoenix from the ashes. It's now looking like I'm only going to get a few percent of what I'm owed.

Finally, who could forget the biggest thieves of all, the Danish government. Who through various taxes end up helping themselves to approximiately 70% of your income and a huge chunk of your savings.

Needless to say, if I ever see a Dane in distress, they can expect little help from me. And if any of the above should step out onto the road, not seeing the huge lorry chundering towards them, I can only hope I'm there to see the moment of impact.

A World First for Denmark...yippee!

In case you weren't so economically aware as to have noticed it, Denmark is officially the first country in the world to fall into recession. The way these things are measured, that means three consecutive quarters of negative economic growth. Well, you can only inflate the currency for so long before the balloon starts to lose some air. And in Denmark's case, given that 70% of the economy is owned and run by the state, the private sector doesn't really have much room for manouevre.

Of course, this would be the time to start cutting taxes and benefits big time, thus encouraging more productivity. I very much doubt all these socialists will do it though. Expect increased taxes, although income tax won't rise, it'll be inflated property values and "environmental" taxes that take the extra cut here. There isn't much scope to increase income taxes when they're already the highest in the world at 68%. Even the stupidest Dane going (and there about 5 million of them), would see through that one.