[kwhitefoot]

The current government wants to sell off the Flytog (Airport Train). This is a state owned enterprise that even the seriously capitalist Norwegian financial magazine Kapital says is one of the best run companies in the country and should not be privatised. There have been serious suggestions that Statoil should be sold off completely. The electricity system has been privatised even though most of the energy is generated by rain that can hardly be said to be owned by anyone.

[tyfon]

Regarding Statoil. The government currently owns about 1/3 of it. The oil income for the state does not come from the profit of the company but the taxes they put on the companies that extract oil (which is about 80%) and the sale of licenses through Petoro. Selling Statoil (and the other ones) have absolutely no comparison to what Thatcher did in the 80s if that is what you are insinuating.

Regarding the power, the majority of the plants are owned by Statkraft, a 100% government owned company and is most definitely not privatized.

Flytoget runs well because even though it is owned by the government, they have had a very hands off approach and let them operate without interference. The same can be said of Statoil, the only reason it has done so well is that the government has been mostly hands off. My father was in the top management before retirement and has been very clear on this. Whenever the government tried to interfere it just made problems.

In essence, as a fellow Norwegian i disagree with you on these subjects (and some of what you write is simply not true).

[JupiterMoon]

So if companies are well run and profitable in their current state owned but hands off form why not keep them that way?

[kochthesecond]

Why sell off the train if it's earning money? Plenty of government run ventures don't.

[uola]

Because they are jelous they can't make as bad a deal as Stockholm did with Arlanda. Express?

More seriously, to finance populistic reforms to increase the power of their own party.

[cm3]

What's the background on Arlanda Express. I've used it and wasn't too impressed but it wasn't late or super slow. Though I wouldn't consider it an express connection from the airport to central station compared to what's possible on rails.

[uola]

Basically the government put up much of the financing but gave a private company monopoly on traffic until 2040. It was sold to venture capital which because of tax planning are paying little to no tax.

The Wikipedia article is fairly complete. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arlanda_Express

[cm3]

And since 2014 it's owned not only by an Australian corp but Aussie and Chinese.

[e12e]

Liberal economic policy states that profit is the domain of the private enterprise, infrastructure that can't turn a profit is the domain of the state. I think it's a crazy idea, but that's the gist: if there's money to be made the government should leave that to private business and trust the invisible hand to make things right.

[tyfon]

Because the government should run the country and not small companies. If the company is exploiting strategic resources like oil it should be taxed, not owned as far as I am concerned.