For years, Socialist Senator and two-time Democrat presidential candidate, Bernie Sanders, has been asking Americans to look away from the horrific nightmare unfolding in the Socialist, oil-rich nation of Venezuela. Look at the Scandinavian countries, he said. “Take a look at Finland,” he said, they’re “the happiest country in the world.”

Unfortunately, for Finnish citizens, U.K. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was correct when she once warned, “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money.”

Bernie Sanders, the Socialist who owns three homes and never worked outside of government, frequently uses Scandinavian countries like Sweden, Norway, and Finland as examples of how well socialism or socialist policies work.

When Bernie Sanders was running for president in 2016, he raved about the success of Finland’s free health care program for its citizens:

Last year, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders pointed out that Finland is “the happiest country in the world” because of all of the free stuff their government (taxpayers) gives them. The Socialist-Democrat candidate for President in 2020, shared this tweet and video, singing the praises of government handouts.

Take a look at what Finland, the happiest country in the world, is doing. If Finland can provide everyone with health care, send everyone to college for free and provide affordable child care, why can’t the US? (featuring )

Now, the Washington Free Beacon is reporting that the government of Finland collapsed Friday due to the rising cost of universal health care and the prime minister’s failure to enact reforms to the system.

Prime Minister Juha Sipila and the rest of the cabinet resigned after the governing coalition failed to pass reforms in parliament to the country’s regional government and health services, the Wall Street Journal reports. Finland faces an aging population, with around 26 percent of its citizens expected to be over 65 by the year 2030, an increase of 5 percent from today.

Sipila’s reforms “intended to remove power from the 295 municipalities that currently oversee health and social care, and place responsibility within a leaner, more efficient system of 18 elected regional authorities,” according to the Journal. The prime minister also wanted patients to be able to choose from a range of public and private providers.

Sipila said “there’s no other way for Finland to succeed” besides these reforms, which could have led to $3.4 billion in savings for the government.

Finland’s aging population is increasing the financial strain on its health care system.

Reuters reports that other Nordic countries have also grappled with the need to cut costs. Sweden is to gradually raise its retirement age and has opened up parts of the healthcare system to the private sector in a bid to boost efficiency.

Denmark will gradually increase the retirement age to 73 – the highest in the world – while cutting taxes and unemployment benefits to encourage people to work more.

Finland’s socialist “Basic Income” program was also a huge fail and an embarrassment to the people like Bernie Sanders who think it’s okay for people who don’t want to work to rely on working citizens to support them.

Socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (I., Vt.) “Medicare for all” proposal would cost the U.S. over $32 trillion over ten years, according to an analysis by the Mercatus Center. It would also require enormous tax increases as “a doubling of all currently projected federal individual and corporate income tax collections would be insufficient to finance the added federal costs of the plan.”

Far-left U.S. talk show host, David Parkman sang the praises of Finland’s “Basic Income” program. According to Parkman’s predictions in 2015, Finland would eliminate welfare by giving every citizen a basic income of $870 per month. The proposal would entitle each Finns to 800 euros tax-free each month, which according to Bloomberg, would cost the government 52.2 billion euros a year.

Watch:

Only two years after implementing Finland’s “basic income” program in Finland, the government was forced to pull the plug on the disastrous program.

The Guardian reports:

Europe’s first national government-backed experiment in giving citizens free cash will end next year after Finland decided not to extend its widely publicized basic income trial and to explore alternative welfare schemes instead.

Since January 2017, a random sample of 2,000 unemployed people aged 25 to 58 have been paid a monthly €560 (£475), with no requirement to seek or accept employment. Any recipients who took a job continued to receive the same amount.

The scheme – aimed primarily at seeing whether a guaranteed income might incentivize people to take up paid work by smoothing out gaps in the welfare system – is strictly speaking not a universal basic income (UBI) trial, because the payments are made to a restricted group and are not enough to live on.

But it was hoped it would shed light on policy issues such as whether an unconditional payment might reduce anxiety among recipients and allow the government to simplify a complex social security system that is struggling to cope with a fast-moving and insecure labor market.

Despite their failed attempts to make socialism work, their quest for socialism continues. 

The Finnish finance minister, Petteri Orpo, told Hufvudstadsbladet he was looking into trialing alternative welfare schemes, including a universal credit system similar to that being introduced in the UK, when the basic income pilot ends.

In 2015, Bernie Sanders conducted a townhall-style meeting with Pekka Lintu, Finland’s Ambassador to the U.S., to promote the benefits of socialism to American citizens:

What do you think? Will the media hide this story in an effort to keep our youth in the dark about the dangers of socialism? Will any of our so-called journalists in the media force Bernie to address the crisis in Finland? We’d love to hear what you think in the comment section below.

 

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