[chrismealy]

Finland's schools were terrible forty years ago.

[cadr]

Just wondering, has the wealth distribution changed in that time?

[jlmendezbonini]

A bit, not that much according to these numbers: Finland:

  Mid-2000s  2000   Mid-1990s  1990  Mid-1980s  Mid-1970s
  0.269      0.261  0.228      n/a   0.207      0.235

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=a...

For a more comprehensive data set see: http://www.lisdatacenter.org/data-access/key-figures/inequal...

If you happen to have access to an even more comprehensive data set, please share. I'm mainly interest on the Gini coefficient overtime and its relation with GDP or GDP per capita to answer questions like: Did Sweden, Belgium, Austria, Norway, etc developed maintaining a low income equality?, Which country has significantly lowered its income equality over the last 50 or so years? Are they highly developed now?, Has there been highly unequal countries that were able to successfully reduce and become developed?

[lautis]

More comprehensive data about income distribution in Finland over time:

http://www.stat.fi/til/tjt/2009/tjt_2009_2011-05-20_tau_002_...

Statistics Finland provide data about income distribution, but not much about wealth.

[lautis]

Wealth distribution did become more even from 60s to mid 80s, but after that the trend has reversed.

[nosse]

It has gone worse, the rich are richer, and the poor are poorer.