Swedish views on privacy don’t necessarily apply outside of Sweden.

Are income levels not deserving of privacy?

Except in Sweden, what this means in practice, is that you only see the income/cap gains taxes paid of ordinary middle class people.

Rich people in the Nordics hold their wealth in foreign companies as retained earnings, and thus that wealth accrues gains/dividends tax free and remains invisible until they sell off a small portion for the purpose of buying something.

It's "transparency" only for the plebs. Americans cannot do this, as they are subject to global tax and extra punitive taxation on foreign withheld earnings.

Also, Swedes don't have the same level of real estate transparency that there is in America (property tax assessments put a public value on everyone's holdings in the US). Wealthy folks holding real estate between different countries in Europe makes the whole situation more shadowy than you might think.

>> nobody ever saw it as the government being intimately entangled with anyone's life

Is that true? There's no one, not one person in Sweden, who sees that as government overreach?

Scary if true.

Uh plenty of Sweden see that as a huge invasion of privacy

Sweden also doesn’t have secret ballot

In Sweden, anyone can look up your address, phone number, social security number, your car registration etc etc

This is not cool or desirable

That you've "lived in sweden" implies you have the luxury of hopping to whatever country suits you most. Nobody wants to hear a cosmopolitan's take on how we have too much privacy and how the government should be more involved in our lives. If the government mistreats you, you can just go to a nicer country.