Scandinavian Labor market policies have always represented one of the strongest alternatives to those adopted by recent governments in the United Kingdom and the United States, and the ability of these countries to maintain such low unemployment is currently of great interest to economists. This book offers a comprehensive analysis of both wage formation in the individual Nordic economies and general aspects of Nordic wage setting institutions, in particular the relation between centralized bargaining and wage drift. This book will be of special interest to economists, policy makers, and trade unions.

Public finances in the Nordics are facing great future challenges due to demographic developments. Increasing longevity is changing the age structure of the population, significantly raising the share of older people and thus the old-age dependency ratio. Over the last two decades, there has been a strong international trend to strengthen fiscal frameworks by adopting more stringent fiscal rules as well as increasing transparency and accountability. A first aim of the report is to survey and evaluate the fiscal frameworks in the Nordic countries. A second aim is to review how long-run sustainability analyses of public finances are made - and communicated to policy-makers and the general public - in the Nordics, by Ministries of Finance as well as by other institutions. The report also concludes the severity of the fiscal-sustainability problems in the Nordic countries.