Caitlin Ford

“Nordic nations have realized that it is in the best long-term interests of everyone, including businesses, to support families in raising children. After all, in the long run, happy family members are more productive, and businesses will have a wider pool of healthy, productive, well-adjusted workers to draw on in the future. So when it comes to granting parental leave after a baby is born, the Nordic approach is also quite different from the American.”
― Anu Partanen, The Nordic Theory of Everything: In Search of a Better Life

“According to a UN report from 2014 surveying 185 countries and territories, only two did not guarantee any paid maternity leave; Papua New Guinea and the United States. The United States is also one of only a handful of countries that don’t guarantee their workers any paid time off for illness—others include Angola, India, and Liberia.”
― Anu Partanen, The Nordic Theory of Everything: In Search of a Better Life

“By contrast, Nordic societies have decided to free parents from this burden as it is good for all the individuals and institutions involved: employers, parents, and—not least, of course—the children themselves. Thanks to the Nordic theory of love, every parent in Finland, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark has easy access to inexpensive, convenient day care, publicly subsidized and generally paid for on a sliding scale according to a family’s income. Access to day care begins as soon as parents complete their initial parental leaves, and day-care centers are regulated to ensure high quality. Privately run day care is certainly also available in many places, if parents prefer that option.”
― Anu Partanen, The Nordic Theory of Everything: In Search of a Better Life

“Nordic societies recognize that for individuals to give fully to their jobs as employees and as parents, they need time to rest, recuperate, and just enjoy each other’s company. This means giving workers—all workers, at the top and the bottom—substantial paid vacations every year.”
― Anu Partanen, The Nordic Theory of Everything: In Search of a Better Life