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Swedish Wage Earner Funds: A Glimpse of Our Future?*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 November 2009

Vaughan Lyon
Vaughan Lyon
Affiliation:
Trent University
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Abstract

At the end of 1983, after a long and bitter political struggle, the Swedes adopted a system of wage earner funds. The five regionally-based funds are directed by boards dominated by employees. Using funds transferred to them by government, they invest in Swedish companies, primarily by buying shares on the stock market. The fund scheme will enable employees collectively to own about 10 per cent of Swedish business by 1990. They could control far more. Only experience can determine the impact of this new form of social ownership. But possibly the Swedes have found a socially and democratically appealing means of retaining the advantages of a market system while integrating social and economic forces.

Résumé

À la fin de 1983, après une longue et virulente lutte politique, les Suédois mirent sur pied un Fonds de solidarité des travailleurs, constitué de cinq caisses régionales dont les conseils d'administration sont contrôlés par des travailleurs salariés. En se servant des montants que leur transfère l'État, ces caisses investissent dans des entreprises suédoises, principalement en achetant des actions boursiéres. D'ici 1990, ce système devrait permettre à la collectivité des salariés d'être propriétaire d'environ 10 pour cent des actifs industriels et commerciaux suédois … voire bien davantage. Seule l'expérience déterminera la portée de cette nouvelle forme de propriété sociale;il se peut toutefois que les Suédois aient trouvé un moyen séduisant de réunir les avantages d'une économie de marché et ceux d'une intégration de forces sociales et économiques par ailleurs souvent divergents.

Type
Notes
Information
Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique , Volume 19 , Issue 3 , September 1986 , pp. 573 - 583
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association (l'Association canadienne de science politique) and/et la Société québécoise de science politique 1986

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References

1 LO, Co-determination in Sweden (Stockholm: Swedish Trade Union Confederation, 1979), 1Google Scholar.

2 Swedish Institute, Labor Relations in Sweden (Stockholm: Swedish Institute, 1984), 2Google Scholar.

3 Ibid., 1.

4 Martin, Andrew, “Trade Unions in Sweden: Strategic Responses to Change and Crisis,” in Peter Gourevitch, et al., Unions and Economic Crisis: Britain, West Germany and Sweden (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1984), 254Google Scholar.

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