Saturday, August 12, 2006
The Danes definitely got it down. With the unemployment rate nearing two percent, the working population (and that makes about everyone) are happy, well-paid, and well-fed – fed quite literally that is. It is a common practice for larger corporations to keep an in-house chef to cook for the employees throughout the day. Can you imagine?! We’re not talking cafeteria food either. These are well-paid restaurant chefs cooking top quality food. Quite the fringe benefit when you consider the prices in Denmark – a salad in the center of town will set you back $25. With their minimum wage at $15 an hour for unskilled labor and their professionals amongst the highest paid – a $25 salad is certainly no big deal.
Well surely they work hard these Danes, right? Well maybe hard, but not all the time. A 35 hour work week is standard and everyone gets six weeks, let me say that again SIX WEEKS paid vacation - that is NOT counting government holidays, not counting sick days, and, get this, not counting your children’s sick days. Parents are entitled to take a day off when their children are sick. Does all this affect company productivity? It seems not. Companies are thriving. Copenhagen is in a peak construction boom, interest rates are low, property values are soaring, and people in the streets cheerfully ride around on their bikes conserving energy and car costs. Copenhagen has almost as many bikes as Amsterdam, almost.
Now they do have one of the highest tax rates in the world, running as high as 59% income tax for some in comparison to our top bracket of 35%. But for this they have full medical benefits, retirement benefits, an excellent elementary and secondary school system, and free university, yes free. I think they are getting a little more for their money than we seem to be. Of course they don’t have any nuclear warheads…. Then there are the other little benefits – the entire city is single-female safe, anytime, day or night, the library is astounding architecturally and the largest library I have ever seen, the train system is excellent and the metro system growing, streets handle well what little traffic there is, and with the premier opera house that opened a few years ago and the new theatre that will be completed year after next, arts and culture options abound. Needless to say I was pretty impressed.
As if all this isn’t enough, Copenhagen is the land of cuties. Let me assure you ladies and gents, the next time you want to fetch yourself a new love interest, forget about the Caribbean – head to Copenhagen. Girls, this is the land of Brad Pitt. There are Brad Pitt look-alikes everywhere! Actually there are look-alikes for the whole ‘Legends of the Fall’ cast plus a few George Clooney’s thrown in. I haven’t seen so many good looking people in one place since Fernando’s party in Rome – and that could be accounted for by Fernando’s taste. This is an entire city of hotties. And guys, don’t feel left out, there is a blonde for everyone – tall blondes, short blondes, cute blondes, exotic blondes. Of course the Danes like the dark-haired girls better (rare things are always the coveted things) so you Americans and Brits don’t have to compete with the Brad Pitts for the blondies and you brunette babes have the leg up (literally and figuratively) on the blondes with the Copenhagen Cuties. Nothing like turning tables to make life a little interesting!
So how would you talk to the Danish dreamcakes? No worries. The Danes also win the prize for the most fluidly bilingual country I have been to. Before it was Austria, tied with Netherlands, but the Danes beat them both. English could be the national language here. Every person I spoke to switched not only from Danish to English, but to a virtually flawless, natural, and only lightly accented English no-less. The Danish accent is actually quite lovely in contrast to many others. University is actually taught in English here and most corporations require English as the “office” language.
The Danes are fiercely proud of the fact they don’t dub their movies – you will find the affirmation repeatedly in tourist information. You can walk into any movie theatre and see all movies in their original language. I had never noticed before the high correlation rate between the countries that don’t dub and the countries that speak English easily as a second language. The Italians, the French, even the Germans, all of whom dub, are all lacking in bi-lingual fluency, even in their tourists sections. The Swiss, Austrians, Danish, and Dutch are completely bilingual societies. Says something for subtitles doesn’t it? Says something too for the influence of Hollywood on the world. In Denmark, not only can you see movies in their original language, but you can watch them uninterrupted both in the movie theaters AND on TV. Networks are not allowed to interrupt a program for commercials. They can only play commercials between programs. Can you imagine? Network TV without commercials! The downside to this of course is that the stations make less money and can’t afford to buy the higher priced programs.
And how do those who have the most time on their hands to watch movies, the students, afford to watch them? Well if you are male you are in luck. For Denmark is the world’s highest exporter of sperm. Yep, those Brad Pitt look-alikes are filling the world with blondies one test tube at a time. I can think of worse countries to name this claim to fame. The system is actually quite interesting. They go in three times to, um, you know… and the sperm is tested for quality. If they qualify, they are given a card that is their identification and all previous information on them is destroyed except the vital statistics that are linked to the card. It is then impossible to identify them. When they go in to, um, you know… they are paid according to the quality of sperm. Low quality sperm gets you a nominal nil, good quality sperm will score you about $100 (pun intended). Yep, one hundred buckaroos, cash on the barrelhead, tax free (and that’s pretty significant in a country with one of the highest tax rates in the world). Once you are in the program, they prefer that you donate two to three times per week. Yes, boys, you got that right – upwards of $1,200 a month for doing what you do anyway. Not bad, huh? The down side? (There always is one you know.) You are paid by the quality of the sperm, not by production. If a man ejaculates more than once every three days, the quality goes down significantly. If you have to produce good quality sperm every three days, you guessed it – you ain’t pumpin’ spermies anywhere but the bank. Life is never fair. Of course you could look at it this way, it is just like paying $100 for each blonde you score. You can’t get prices that good in Vegas!
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