Turning Carbon Dioxide into Stone in Iceland

One of the companies supplying technology to the new US plants is the Swiss firm Climeworks, one of several companies, along with Carbfix and ON Power, based in Iceland, doing pioneering work in turning carbon dioxide into stone. Several US senators visited Iceland in July 2023 to gain firsthand insights into these groundbreaking initiatives. Iceland, famous for having the lowest carbon emissions in the world, relies almost exclusively on thermal energy. Nevertheless, it has pushed into the field of carbon sequestration with innovative technologies.

The idea is simple: CO2 is mixed with water and injected deep into bedrock, where it mineralizes and forms calcite and is stored in the bedrock forever. When first tried in 2006, it was daunting, going from work in the laboratory to face the actual conditions on the surface and below—especially brutal weather conditions, malfunctioning equipment, and frozen pipes. The breakthrough came in 2016 and was announced to the world through a scientific paper. The title of the journal article in Science was appropriately stilted in science-speak, but the message was clear “Inject, Baby, Inject!” Carbfix scientists and engineers, for the first time, had demonstrated that CO2 could be permanently disposed as environmentally benign carbonate minerals in basaltic rocks. The researchers demonstrated that basaltic rock reacts rapidly with captured carbon dioxide. They mixed gasses generated by the Hellisheidi geothermal power plant with water and injected the mixture into volcanic basalt. Over 95 percent of the CO2 injected in the CarbFix site was mineralized in less than two years, much faster than the hundreds or thousands of years previously thought for such geological actions.

In a more recent paper, CarbFix geologist Sandra Ó. Snæbjörnsdóttir and her colleagues argue that carbon capture and storage has a fundamental role in achieving the Paris Agreement goals of limiting human-caused warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. Further, such efforts in Iceland need to be accelerated in other parts of the world to achieve these goals.

In May 2024, the biggest carbon capture plant in the world was opened in Hellisheidi. Dubbed “Mammoth,” the plant owned by Climeworks will remove 36,000 metric tons of carbon each year, the equivalent of removing 8,600 internal combustion automobiles.

Could the techniques and procedures found in Iceland be replicated in the United States? Major basalt formations in the United States are found in Georgia, Alabama, the panhandle of Florida, in Oregon, Washington, and Idaho. Indeed, a subsidiary of Occidental Petroleum plans to create a far bigger plant in Texas and estimates that it will remove 500,000 metric tons of carbon per year, roughly equivalent to the emissions generated by 119,000 internal combustion cars. Climeworks is designing an even larger plant, scheduled for Louisiana, that will capture 1 million tons of carbon, replacing the emission of 238,000 automobiles.

Sources: Juerg M. Matter, et al., “Rapid Carbon Mineralization for Permanent Disposal of Anthropogenic Carbon Dioxide Emissions,” Science 352 (6291) (June 10, 2016): 1312-1314, https://www.science.org/doi/abs/10.1126/science.aad8132. Sandra Ó. Snæbjörnsdóttir, et al., “Carbon Dioxide Storage Through Mineral Carbonation,” Nature Reviews Earth & Environment 1 (2020): 90-102, https://www.nature.com/articles/s43017-019-0011-8#citeas. Nicolás Rivero, “The World’s Largest Carbon-Capture Plant Just Switched On,” Washington Post, May 9, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-solutions/2024/05/09/climeworks-mammoth-carbon-capture/.

Carbon Pricing and Cap-and-Trade in the European Union

Carbon pricing comes in two forms. First, is a carbon tax, where government determines a price that firms must pay for every ton of carbon that they emit. The second form of carbon pricing is a “cap-and-trade” (or emissions trading) system. The European Union has implemented the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS), a “cap-and-trade” system for all thirty countries in the EU plus Iceland, Liechtenstein, and Norway). Economists Sanjay Patnaik and Kelly Kennedy of the Brookings Institution noted that “carbon pricing is the most direct and most efficient way to achieve the emissions reductions that are necessary to mitigate climate change. The U.S. will have to take drastic action if it is to meet its climate goals.”

Other countries have developed emission trading schemes: Kazakhstan, New Zealand, Mexico, and China; carbon taxes have been introduced in South Africa, Chile, Argentina, and Canada. Altogether, one-fifth of all carbon emissions worldwide are covered by some form of carbon pricing. The US federal government is the obvious exception.

The Obama administration attempted “cap-and-trade” legislation that barely passed in the House but was squelched in the Senate. Not waiting for the federal government to act, several US states have enacted carbon pricing systems. California was the first with a cap-and-trade system in 2013, followed by Washington state in 2021. Eleven northeastern states participate in the Regional Greenhouse Initiative, a cap-and-trade program covering some 18 percent of emissions in those states. The top recommendation of Hawaii’s 2020-2022 Tax Review Commission was the adoption of a carbon tax for the state; if adopted, it would help the state achieve its goal of sequestering more greenhouse gas annually than the amounts emitted, no later than 2045. If Hawaii adopted a carbon tax, it would be the first state in the nation to do so.

Source: Sanjay Patnaik and Kelly Kennedy, “Why the US Should Establish a Carbon Price Either Through Reconciliation or Other Legislation,” Brookings Institution, October 7, 2021, https://www.brookings.edu/articles/why-the-us-should-establish-a-carbon-price-either-through-reconciliation-or-other-legislation/.

Floating Wind Farms in the North Sea

In 2009, the world’s first floating wind turbine, Hywind Demo, was installed off the coast of Norway; then, in 2017, the energy company Equinor launched Hywind Scotland, the first operational floating wind farm. Since the beginning, Norwegian firms have been at the forefront of this floating technology. While there have been some supply chain hiccups, several large-scale projects have been completed sooner than anticipated and costs have decreased thanks to the economies of scale. It is projected that Norway may secure 20 percent of the floating wind market by 2050.

Such projects, many miles out to sea, out of sight by coastal residents, and able to capture the energy from even more consistent and powerful winds, might be an avenue worth pursuing.

Sources: “Norway is a Global Frontrunner in Offshore Wind,” Business Norway, n.d., https://businessnorway.com/articles/norway-global-frontrunner-offshore-wind-fow; “Policy Instruments to Realize Floating Offshore Wind in Norway,” Menon Economics, October 2020, https://offshore-wind.no/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Policy-instruments-to-realise-floating-offshore-wind-in-Norway-MENON.pdf.

Value Added Tax in the OECD

There is only one country in the OECD—the United States—that uses retail sales taxes as its principal consumption tax. There is no national sales tax in the US, only state and local sales taxes, and those taxes vary widely, from zero percent to over 10 percent. Instead of sales taxes, the rest of the OECD uses the Value Added Tax (VAT).

First introduced in France in 1954, by 1960 there were fewer than ten countries worldwide that implemented the Value Added Tax (VAT); by 2022, it had become an important source of revenue in 174 countries. The VAT is a common form of consumption tax that is due at every stage of a product's manufacturing from the sale of the raw materials to its final purchase by a consumer. The OECD notes that “the spread of VAT has been among the most important developments in taxation over the last half century.” The VAT is attractive because it is capable of raising enormous amounts of revenue. In the United States, with consumption close to 70 percent of the GDP, even relatively small tax rates could capture a great deal of money.

Source: Consumption Tax Trends 2022: VAT/GST and Excise, OECD, n.d., https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/6525a942-en/1/3/1/index.html?itemId=/content/publication/6525a942-en&_csp_=9be05a02fe0e4dbe2c458d53fbfba33b&itemIGO=oecd&itemContentType=book#figure-d1e568

Gun Confiscation in Australia

A mentally troubled twenty-eight-year-old man walked into a café in Port Arthur, Tasmania, opened fire with a semi-automatic weapon, killed thirty-five people and wounded another twenty-eight. The new prime minister, John Howard, knew that he had to act quickly. He came up with a clear conclusion, wrote Zack Beaucamp, “Australia had too many guns, and they were too easy to get.” In early 2013 just weeks after the Sandy Hook Massacre, Howard wrote an opinion piece in the New York Times, explaining how Australia was able to handle its crisis. He acknowledged the weak position of the national government: it had no authority over gun ownership, sale, or use; its only power concerned the importation of firearms. There was no right to bear arms in Australia nor was Australia’s gun lobby as strong as the NRA is in the United States, but gun control was up to the federation of states.

Given our decentralized system of government, I could reduce the number of dangerous firearms only by persuading the states to enact uniform laws totally prohibiting the ownership, possession, and sale of all automatic and semiautomatic weapons while the national government banned the importation of such weapons.

One month after the shooting, Howard had persuaded his own national parliamentary followers and state lawmakers to adopt a sweeping, nationwide reform of its gun laws, called the National Firearms Agreement (NFA). One of the most important parts of the NFA was the total ban on certain kinds of guns, particularly automatic and semi-automatic rifles and shotguns. Coupled with the ban was a year-long buyback of over 650,000 guns; those guns were then destroyed. City dwellers mostly approved of the gun ban and the buy back; rural citizens were the most upset. But it worked.

The Australian Institute of Criminology found that after the 1996 massacre and the buy back, gun-related murders and suicides fell sharply. The American Law and Economics Review found that firearm suicides were cut by 74 percent following the buyback. In his 2013 opinion piece, Howard concluded that “In the eighteen years before the 1996 reforms, Australia suffered thirteen gun massacres—each with more than four victims—causing a total of 102 deaths. There has not been a single massacre of that category since 1996.”

The title of the Howard’s essay in the New York Times was provocative: “I Went After Guns. Obama Can, Too.” Obama tried; he issued executive orders; he used the bully pulpit of the White House; he sent tough gun proposals to Congress. But little, if anything, changed. No substantial, sweeping legislation was passed Congress; the only changes have come at the state level. The year after Sandy Hook, some 1,500 gun violence bills were introduced in state legislatures, with 150 of them becoming law. Several states mandated stronger background checks, while several Republican-dominated states loosened gun restrictions, making it easier have armed volunteers guarding schools. In 2019, twenty-one states had expanded background check requirements and seventeen states passed red flag laws, allowing law enforcement to take guns away from individuals with mental problems or who might pose a threat to others. Twenty-eight states enacted laws requiring persons convicted of domestic violence to have their guns taken away. Yet, the murders continue. By August 2023, there had been 421 mass murders recorded in the United States, a record pace, along with at least 25,198 persons (118 each day) killed in non-mass murder situation. More than half of those 25,198 used a gun to commit suicide. Of those who died, 879 were teenagers and 170 were children. These figures also include 488 persons killed in police officer-involved shootings, and thirty-four officers killed in the line of duty.

Sources: Chico Harlan and Ladka Bauerova, “What If Gun Owners Had to Pass a Test? Czech Republic Offers an Answer,” Washington Post, November 25, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/11/25/gun-rights-test-czech-republic/. “Conditions for Obtaining a Firearms License,” Trigger Service, https://www.triggerservice.cz/en/firearms-license/podminky-k-ziskani-zbrojniho-prukazu/. “Czech Republic: Gun Facts, figures, and the Law,” University of Sydney, Gunpolicy.org, https://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region/czech-republic; “Firearm Mortality by State 2021,” National Center for Health Statistics, CDC, https:///www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/sosmap/firearm_mortality/firearm.htm. Zack Beaucamp, “Australia Confiscated 650,000 Guns. Murders and Suicides Plummeted,” Vox, May 25, 2022, https://www.vox.com/2015/8/27/9212725/australia-buyback. John Howard, “I Went After Guns. Obama Can, Too,” New York Times, January 16, 2013, https://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/17/opinion/australia-banned-assault-weapons-america-can-too.html. Reid Wilson, “Seven Years After Sandy Hook, the Politics of Guns Has Changed,” The Hill, December 14, 2019, https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/474479-seven-years-after-sandy-hook-the-politics-of-guns-has-changed/; Kiara Alfonseca, “More than 25,000 People Killed in Gun Violence So Far in 2023,” ABC News, August 3, 2023, https://abcnews.go.com/US/116-people-died-gun-violence-day-us-year/story?id=97382759, citing data from the Gun Violence Archive. The Gun Violence Archive defines “mass shooting” as “four or more victims shot or killed.”

Czech Republic’s Firearms Examination

In the Czech Republic, citizens have a constitutional right to bear arms; they can also carry a concealed firearm for the purpose of self-defense. By European standards, the Czech gun laws are quite permissive. But there is one major hurdle that citizens must overcome: they must prove that they are competent to carry a gun.

The firearms examination is obligatory for anyone who wants a firearm, “including hunters, collectors, even someone inheriting a shotgun from a grandfather.” The examination has thirty multiple choice questions, and in order to receive the hardest-to-get concealed firearm license, an applicant can miss no more than one question. The failure rate for those seeking a firearms license is 40 percent.

Fifteen- and sixteen-year-olds in the Czech Republic can obtain hunting or sport licenses, but they also must be enrolled in a school where hunting is part of their curriculum or be a member of a sport shooting association. Registrants must be twenty-one years old for all other firearms licenses. In addition, they cannot have a criminal record, have a record of excessively consuming alcohol or drugs; they must be medically qualified, and present no danger to internal order or security. Once purchased, guns must be stored in safe places.

The 2021 population of the Czech Republic was 10.51 million; in 2020, there were a total of five homicides attributed to firearms. In North Carolina, with a population of 10.55 million, there were 1,839 such murders in 2021; in Georgia (population 10.79 million), there were 2,200 murders; in Michigan (population 10.05 million), there were 1,554 murders attributed to firearms.

Sources: Chico Harlan and Ladka Bauerova, “What If Gun Owners Had to Pass a Test? Czech Republic Offers an Answer,” Washington Post, November 25, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/11/25/gun-rights-test-czech-republic/;“Conditions for Obtaining a Firearms License,” Trigger Service, https://www.triggerservice.cz/en/firearms-license/podminky-k-ziskani-zbrojniho-prukazu/; “Czech Republic: Gun Facts, figures, and the Law,” University of Sydney, Gunpolicy.org, https://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region/czech-republic; “Firearm Mortality by State 2021,” National Center for Health Statistics, CDC, https:///www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/sosmap/firearm_mortality/firearm.htm.

South Korea’s Universal Health Care System

National Health Insurance (NHI) is South Korea’s public health care system. From 1977 to 1988, South Korea moved from a private, voluntary insurance program to government-mandated healthcare. InterNations, which identifies itself as the largest global community for people who live and work abroad, considers the Korean systems to be of “extremely high quality” and, as noted above, CEOWorld rates it the best system in the world. It is mandatory for all residents living in Korea for a period of six months or longer. It is a universal system, funded through payroll taxes, government subsidies, employer and employee contributions, and tobacco surcharges. Residents have the freedom to choose their own health care provider and facility. The NHI covers between 50 and 80 percent of the medical costs, including medical checkups, general procedures, accident coverage, and prescription medication. There is also a Medical Aid Program which is geared toward low-income individuals, who are exempt from copays and other charges.

Unlike the US, where about 18 percent of GDP goes to healthcare, South Korea invests 7.6 percent of its GDP on this important sector. Prescription prices are controlled by the government, resulting in drug prices that are less than half of what Americans pay. Infant mortality in South Korea and preventable mortality rate are both half of that in the US. Life expectancy in South Korea, as seen in the table above, is one of the highest in the world.

Further, South Korea received accolades for its response to the COVID pandemic, saving thousands of lives and serving as a model for the rest of the world. As reported in the medical journal The Lancet, beginning in February 2020, the South Korean government adopted “active epidemiological investigations, strict isolation of affected patients, and extensive public lockdowns, which were helpful in controlling spread until the end of 2021.” As a result, the mortality rate, 0.13 percent, was the lowest among the thirty countries with the highest case counts. “High vaccine coverage rate (87.7 percent), the efficient healthcare system, and active co-operation between private sectors and the central government seem to have contributed to this.” To put in another perspective, a writer from Connecticut familiar with the Korean healthcare system wrote that “though Korea’s population is fourteen times larger than Connecticut’s, it has suffered less than a quarter of the deaths of our state.”

Sources: “Health Insurance and Healthcare in South Korea Explained,” InterNations, n.d., https://www.internations.org/south-korea-expats/guide/healthcare#:~:text=Healthcare%20in%20South%20Korea%20is,Western%20and%20Eastern%20treatment%20options. Young Joo Song, “The South Korean Health Care System,” JMAJ (Japan Medical Association Journal) 52 (3) (2009): 206-209, https://www.med.or.jp/english/journal/pdf/2009_03/206_209.pdf. Global Health Blog of Professor Monica H. Swann, Georgia State University, “Beyond K-Pop: A Glimpse at South Koreas Healthcare System,” February 15, 2021, http://sites.gsu.edu/gsuglobalhealth/2021/02/15/beyond-k-pop-a-glimpse-at-south-koreas-healthcare-system/#:~:text=Though%20spending%20less%20on%20healthcare,–1.8%20and%205.7%2C%20respectively. Soo Lim and Minji Sohn, “How to Cope with Emerging Viral Diseases: Lessons from South Korea’s Strategy for VOCID-19, and Collateral Damage to Cardiometabolic Health, Viewpoint, The Lancet 30 (100581) (January 2023), https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanwpc/article/PIIS2666-6065(22)00196-1/fulltext#:~:text=From%20February%202020%2C%20the%20South,until%20the%20end%20of%202021. Sean Goldrick, “We Should Follow South Korea’s Example of How to Provide a Nation with Healthcare,” CT Mirror, May 6, 2020, https://ctmirror.org/2020/05/06/we-should-follow-south-koreas-example-of-how-to-provide-a-nation-with-healthcare/.

Switzerland and Private Healthcare

“Switzerland offers the best healthcare in the world,” was the conclusion of Pacific Prime, one of the world’s leading global health insurance brokerages. Switzerland ranked first in the 2018 European Health Consumer Index, while the World Health Organization ranked it twentieth overall in the world.

The emphasis on health insurance coverage comes from the government’s mandate that all Swiss citizens must have private health insurance, secured through government-approved private insurance providers. Who is eligible? That’s not even a question: healthcare insurance is required of every person residing in Switzerland. Patients have the flexibility of choosing their own insurance providers. The policies offered by private insurers cover all medical examinations and treatments and must provide a basic level of healthcare, at affordable rates, regardless of the citizen’s age, sex, or medical condition. Insurance providers are not permitted to make a profit of their basic insurance plans.

Patients pay up to 8 percent of their personal income toward the cost of their basic insurance plan. If the premiums are more than 8 percent, the government provides the difference through cash subsidies. In addition, low-income residents are eligible for reductions in their insurance premiums. Patients also must pay part of the cost of their medical treatment, in the form of deductibles, ranging from 300 to 500 Swiss Francs, ($338 to $564) as well as 10 percent of the cost of most medical appointments. Beyond the basic plans, there are complementary plans, which vary in price according to age, health, and other factors. Included in this coverage are alternative medicines and dental treatment, and upgrades on hospital rooms.

Sources: “Which Countries Have the Best Healthcare in the World?” Pacific Prime, July 5, 2022, https://www.pacificprime.com/blog/best-healthcare-in-the-world.html (access. Arne Björnberg and Ann Yung Phang, “Euro Health Consumer Index 2018, Health Consumer Powerhouse, 2019, https://healthpowerhouse.com/media/EHCI-2018/EHCI-2018-report.pdf. See also, Theodore R. Marmor, Richard Freeman, and Kieke G. H. Okma, eds., Comparative Studies and the Politics of Modern Medical Care (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009).

The Finnish Way of Education Performance

Finland is one of the few OECD countries that has been able to improve its educational performance, as determined by international standards and testing. For decades, the Finnish educational system was best described as mediocre and inaccessible to most students. As a key element to Finland’s economic recovery plan, education became a prime factor.

Finland’s educational results came to the world’s attention when it scored highest in reading in the 2000 PISA test. This was no fluke, no statistical aberration. Three years later, it was first in mathematics; in 2007, it was first in math, and in 2009, it was second in science, third in reading, and sixth in math, in examinations that tested nearly half million students worldwide.

What stands out in Finnish education? First, education is taken seriously by the national government and became an integral factor in the country’s economic plans. Second, the teaching profession is regarded as one of the most prestigious in the country, and teachers are selected from the top 10 percent of Finnish universities. Third, students from all parts of the country, from the bustling capital Helsinki to a rural village in Lapland, will get the same quality education. In fact, the differences among the strongest and weakest students in Finland is the smallest in the OECD. Fourth, there are no mandated standardized tests, except at the end of a student’s final year in high school. Fifth, schools, students, and regions of the country are not ranked against one another; there are no “best schools” lists. Sixth, every school has the same national educational goals and draws from the same pool of teachers graduating from Finnish universities. And seventh, Finnish teachers spend fewer hours at school each day and less time in the classroom than do American teachers. Children, who are not required to begin schooling until age seven, spend more time playing outside than American kids.

Altogether, Finland spends about 30 percent less per pupil than in the United States. Furthermore, the graduation rate from high school was 17.5 percentage points higher than found in the United States. As for college, 66 percent of Finnish high school students matriculate in colleges or universities, the highest rate in the European Union. In October 2021, the National Center for Education Statistics noted that 43 percent of recent high school graduates in the United States enrolled in four-year college while 19 percent enrolled in two-year institutions.

Sources: Pasi Sahlberg, Finnish Lessons: What Can the World Learn From Educational Change in Finland? (New York: Teachers College Press, Columbia University, 2011), 8; LynNell Hancock, “Why Are Finland’s Schools Successful?” Smithsonian Magazine, September 2011, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/why-are-finlands-schools-successful-49859555/. Graduation rates in the United States went up during the years of No Child Left Behind, but decreased after the programs ceased. Douglas N. Harris, “Are America’s Rising High School Graduation Rates Real—Or Just an Accountability-fueled Mirage?” Brookings Institution, March 2, 2020, https://www.brookings.edu/articles/are-americas-rising-high-school-graduation-rates-real-or-just-an-accountability-fueled-mirage/. LynNell Hancock, “Immediate Transition to College,” National Center for Education Statistics, 2021, https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=51#:~:text=In%202021%2C%20about%2043%20percent,from%20the%20rate%20in%202010.

Reduction of Homelessness in Finland and Japan

In Finland, there were roughly 16,000 people experiencing homelessness in 1989; by 2020, that figure had declined to about 4,000 persons. Finland is the only European Union country “that has experienced any decline in the number of homeless reported in the last ten years,” according to Greater Change, a UK-based homeless advocacy organization. Finland has considered housing as a fundamental human right that should be extended to every homeless person. In 2008, the Finnish government adopted the Housing First policy. The country has adopted several significant principles: (1) Homelessness policy transcends individual changes of government; (2) there is a broad coalition of national government, big cities, and NGOs working together; (3) at least 25 percent of housing in a Finnish city must be affordable, social housing; and (4) the adoption of the policy attitude that housing is a fundamental human right.

Helsinki, the nation’s capital and largest city (2016 population: 631,695) has had decades of progressive housing policy. The Municipality of Helsinki owns 70 percent of the land in the city, with over 60,000 housing units, with an increase of about 6,000 units per year. At least 25 percent of social housing is mixed in with housing in the private sector. Government reports have estimated that Finland saves about €15,000 a year when a homeless person is properly housed; otherwise, the expenses would be incurred through emergency health care, social services, and criminal justice interventions.

In Japan, the 2020 census of homeless persons was 3,992, or just 0.003 percent of the nation’s population. About 92 percent of all homeless persons are men over the age of fifty. Three overall factors contributed to Japan’s very low numbers: (1) its strict drug policies; (2) its mental health system; and (3) housing options. According to Tom Gill, a Japan-based social anthropologist, Japan has a much lower rate of homelessness than the United States because Japan has a much lower rate of drug use and drug addiction. One 2014 study showed that just 1.6 percent of Japanese had tried drugs (other than alcohol) in their lifetime; this compares with 50 percent of the American adult population having tried drugs sometime during their lifetimes. Illegal drugs in Japan are usually obtained only through gangsters and the black market.

The second key aspect of homelessness is mental illness. Homeless Hub, the web-based research portal of the Canadian Observatory on Homelessness, estimated that 30-35 percent of all people experiencing homelessness worldwide have mental illness. In Japan, a homeless person suffering from a mental illness is typically placed in a mental health facility, removing them from the streets. There are 269 psychiatric beds per 100,000 persons in Japan; in the United States, there are just 25 such beds. However, as the Borgen Project notes “a significant stigma revolves around mental health in Japan and the country sees one of the highest suicide rates in the world. Public insurance in Japan does not cover prescriptions for mental health medications such as antidepressants, and psychologists don’t always have enough training for their profession.”

The problem of homelessness in Japan dates to the collapse of the real estate bubble in 1990; the Japanese government did little to alleviate the problem at that time. But between 2018 and 2020, it took action. With the COVID pandemic and the widespread lockdowns, some of the refuges for homeless persons, cyber cafes, also had to close down. These facilities usually were open 24 hours a day, providing a wide range of services and conveniences, like television, computer games, food, and even showers. During the pandemic, the city of Tokyo, with the most homeless in the country, offered accommodations for homeless people in hotels that had reservation cancellations.

Sources: “Which Country Handlers Homelessness the Best?” Greater Change, September 21, 2022, https://www.greaterchange.co.uk/post/which-country-handles-homelessness-the-best#:~:text=In%20conclusion%2C%20while%20it%20may,that%20handles%20homelessness%20the%20best; Ella Hancock, “Helsinki is Still Leading the Way in Ending Homelessness—But How Are They Doing It?” World Habitat, October 2, 2022, https://world-habitat.org/news/our-blog/helsinki-is-still-leading-the-way-in-ending-homelessness-but-how-are-they-doing-it/. Sarah Eichstadt, The Borgen Project, “Japan’s Homeless Population,” Borgen Magazine, September 17, 2021, https://www.borgenmagazine.com/japans-homeless-population/. “Mental Illness,” Homeless Hub, https://www.homelesshub.ca/about-homelessness/topics/mental-health. Edwardo Bravo, “Homelessness in Japan: The Country with the Smallest Percentage of Homeless People,” Tomorrow City, December 13, 2022.

South Korea’s Ban on Food Waste

It is estimated that worldwide some 1.4 billion tons of food are thrown away each and end up in landfills. But in South Korea, food scraps have been banned from landfills since 2005. The ban means that 90 percent of discarded food is kept out of incinerators or landfills and that 98 percent of food waste is recycled. Local restaurants and apartment building residents are issued special stickers or cards that track the food waste that they dispose of in designated bins. Food waste is a major contributor to climate change, especially because of the methane produced when the food deteriorates, but also the energy and resources involved in the waste production and transportation. Local governments in South Korea have built about 300 processing facilities, resulting in 15,000 tons of daily food waste turned into biofuel, purified into potable water, or a feed supplement for chickens and ducks. Governments around the world have toured the South Korean facilities. One of those governments is the city of New York, which by Fall 2023 planned to require all residents to separate food waste from other trash.

Sources: John Yoon, “How South Korea Puts Its Food Scraps to Good Use,” New York Times, June 14, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/14/world/asia/south-korea-food-waste.html#:~:text=At%20the%20biogas%20facility%20in,of%20methane%20and%20carbon%20dioxide. (accessed June 14, 2023). Andrew Jeong and Julie Yoon, “South Korea Recycles 98% of Its Food Waste. What Can It Teach the World?” Washington Post, August 9, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/08/09/south-korea-food-waste-composting/

Food Labels in Chile

In 2016, Chilean government passed a law, over the vehement objections of the food processing industry, that banned ads directed at children if those products exceeded standards for calories, fat, sugar, and sodium. Unhealthy products carry warning signs: “High in Calories,” “High in Saturated Fat,” and “High in Sodium.” The Washington Post notes that if Lunchables were sold in Chile, they would have to carry warning labels for high calories, high saturated fat, and high in sodium, based on analysis from researchers at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and Diego Portales University in Chile.

Could the United States impose such labels, right on the front of the package? In the Spring of 2023, the US Department of Health and Human Services proposed Front-of-Package Nutrition Labelling, but the proposal ran into strong objections from the Food Industry Association, which warned that such labeling would run into First Amendment and other legal challenges. The OECD reported that in August 2023, some forty-four countries, but not the United States, had adopted simplified labelling. Do such warnings work? A meta-analysis of 134 studies on the impact of color-coded nutrition labels and warnings found that on-the-front labels “do indeed appear to encourage more healthful purchases.”

Sources: “Front-of-Package Nutrition Labeling,” Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Office of Management and Budget, Spring 2023, https://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/eAgendaViewRule?pubId=202304&RIN=0910-AI80&itid=lk_inline_enhanced-template; Céline Giner, Daniela Rodriguez, and Armelle Elasri, “Developing Food Labels for Improved Health Outcomes,” OECD (August 2023), https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/docserver/c1f4d81d-en.pdf?expires=1709748444&id=id&accname=guest&checksum=0094FA076C644090F3547ECAA26838A7; Jing Song et al., “Impact of Color-Coded and Warning Nutrition Labelling Schemes: A Systematic Review and Network Meta-Analysis,” PLOS Medicine 18 (10) (2021); DOI: 10.1371/journal.pmed.1003765.

Ireland’s Abortion Referedum

The predominantly Catholic country of Ireland had prohibited abortions through the Offenses Against the Person Act of 1861, and it became the law of the land in 1922 after Ireland separated from the United Kingdom. In the mid 1980s, anti-abortion activists within the Catholic Church in Ireland, worried about the liberalization movements in other European countries, crafted a Pro-Life Amendment Campaign. It was a bitter fight, with low voter turnout, but the Pro-Life Eighth Amendment passed and became part of the Irish constitution. As American social work professor Gretchen E. Ely wrote, the Catholic activists “began promoting the idea of making Ireland a model anti-abortion nation by enshrining an abortion ban not only in law but in the nation’s constitution.”

The twentieth century battles for and against abortion policies were acrimonious, with court cases filed, constitutional amendments proposed, and intense advocacy on both sides. In 1986, an Irish court ruled that even abortion counseling was prohibited. Medical staff were at times restricted in giving life-saving assistance during pregnancy emergencies. Like seen in the United States, there developed an “abortion trail,” with an estimated 170,000 pregnant Irish women traveling to England, European countries or to the United States from 1980 to 2018 to receive care.

But a devastating event became the spark that led to a complete reversal of Ireland’s abortion policy. A thirty-one-year-old woman, Savita Halappanavar, seventeen weeks pregnant, went to an Irish hospital, where doctors determined she was having a miscarriage. But because they could detect a fetal heartbeat, the fetus was protected by the Pro-Life Eighth Amendment. Savita and her husband pleaded with doctors to intervene, but they refused. The heartbeat eventually stopped, Savita developed a massive infection, her vital organs shut down, and she died after four days in intensive care.

In reaction to Savita Halappanavar’s tragic death and the growing activism of pro-choice Irish citizens, the Eighth Amendment in 2018 was repealed through a nationwide referendum. This was the largest turnout for any referendum in Irish history, with 64.5 percent of its citizens casting their ballots. Voters in thirty-nine of Ireland’s forty counties approved of the repeal and it passed by a two-to-one margin, 66.4 percent to 33.6 percent. The only people not supporting this referendum repeal were those voters over age sixty-five. As Health Minister Simon Harris, who supported the repeal, said upon hearing the results: “Under the Eighth Amendment, women in crisis pregnancy have been told to take the plane, take the boat; today we tell them, take our hand. Under the Eighth Amendment, women in crisis have been told you’re on your own. Today we say: we will stand with you.”

Following repeal of the pro-life amendment, legal abortions are now permitted during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy (84 days); after 12 weeks, abortions would be allowed only it the women’s life is at risk, there would be serious harm to her health, or circumstances might lead to the death of the fetus before birth. If under age eighteen, girls are encouraged to involve their parents or another supportive adult; if over sixteen, and the young woman does not involve an adult, a doctor can offer an abortion if he or she thinks the girl can understand the information and gives consent; if under sixteen, and the girl chooses not to involve an adult, then the doctor can offer an abortion only under exceptional circumstances. The abortion procedure costs would be covered by the Public Health Service.

As Professor Ely observes, “In contrast to the United States, Ireland is moving away from political control over private life. Now that Roe has been reversed and abortion may be illegal in much of the US, pregnant people could face forced pregnancy, suffering and even death—as was the case in Ireland prior to 2018.”

Sources: Gretchen E. Ely, “Abortion: The Story of Suffering and Death Behind Ireland’s Ban and Subsequent Legalization,” The Conversation, May 16, 2022, https://theconversation.com/abortion-the-story-of-suffering-and-death-behind-irelands-ban-and-subsequent-legalization-182812; “It’s Yes: Ireland Has Voted to Repeal the Eighth Amendment,” The Journal (Dublin), May 26, 2018, https://www.thejournal.ie/yes-ireland-votes-to-repeal-eighth-amendment-4034416-May2018/; “Unplanned Pregnancy,” Citizens Information Board (Ireland) https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/health/health-services/women-s-health/unplanned-pregnancy/.

Canada’s $10-a-day Childcare Program

“Childcare is not just a social policy—it is an economic policy, too. Affordable, high-quality childcare will grow our economy, allow more women to enter the workforce, and help give every Canadian child the best start in life.” This is what the Canadian government’s FY 2022 budget stated when introducing an “historic and transformative investment” of $30 billion ($24 billion in USD 2023) over five years, $9.2 billion of which would be invested in childcare. The federal government reached an agreement with all thirteen provinces and territories, so that by the end of 2022, Canadian families would see their childcare fees reduced an average of 50 percent. A total of 250,000 new low-cost spaces are to be created, principally in nonprofit or public daycare centers, and family-based providers. By 2025-2026, the average childcare fee in Canada would be $10-a-day ($7.60 in USD 2023) for all regulated childcare spaces throughout the country. In several of the provinces, plans to implement a $10-a-day program were already moving faster than the federal government required.

There were earlier attempts at universal childcare within the provinces, but with mixed results. An analysis of Quebec’s 1990s universal and highly subsidized childcare came in for significant criticism. Three economists writing in the National Bureau of Economic Research stated that they had found “striking evidence that children are worse off in a variety of behavioral and health dimensions, ranging from aggression to motor-social skills to illness.”

Nonetheless, the new nationwide program is based on the Quebec model. In Quebec, nearly 90 percent of women are in the workforce, the largest percentage of any of the Canadian provinces. Further, the childcare program has strengthened the provincial economy. According to Pierre Fortin, emeritus professor of economics at the Université du Québec à Montréal, Quebec’s GDP is 1.5 percent higher than it would have been without the childcare program.

One of the major hurdles, however, is the program’s popularity. In Toronto, for example, childcare centers serve 270 children; but there is month’s long waiting list to enroll children. It is exacerbated by the lack of qualified staff and the prospect of relatively low pay for those workers. The federal government is optimistic:

High-quality, affordable, flexible and inclusive early learning and childcare is important for the future of children. Access to childcare also promotes greater gender equality by allowing more parents, particularly mothers, to participate in the workforce and achieve greater economic security. It also improves and grows the female-dominated early childhood educator workforce.

Sources: Budget 2022, Chapter 4: Creating Good Middle-Class Jobs, Government of Canada, n.d., https://www.budget.canada.ca/2022/REPORT-RAPPORT/chap4-en.html. “Toward $10-a-Day: Early Learning and Childcare,” Government of Canada, July 24, 2023, https://www.canada.ca/en/employment-social-development/campaigns/child-care.html; Vjosa Isai, “Day Care for Less Than $10: How Canada is Easing the Burden for Parents,” New York Times, July 5, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/26/world/canada/canada-child-care-fees.html; Jackie Mader, “What America Can Learn for Canada’s ‘$10 a Day’ Childcare System,” Washington Post, September 23, 2023), https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2023/09/24/canada-child-care-universal-system. Michael Baker, Jonathan Gruber, and Kevin Milligan, “Universal Childcare, Maternal Labor Supply, and Family Well-Bring,” National Bureau of Economic Research, December 2005, https://www.nber.org/papers/w11832 (accessed September 23, 2023). The authors further conclude that “our analysis also suggests that the new childcare program led to more hostile, less consistent parenting, worse parental health, and lower-quality parental relationships.”

Four Countries with the Best Parental Leave

Finland, Germany, Iceland, and Norway. The international human resources consulting firm Global People Strategist (GPS) views a country’s parental leave policy as often “a reflection of how the country views gender equality. By dividing responsibilities between both parents, a country encourages gender equality and breaks free from traditional gender roles.” GPS considers these four countries to have the best of parental leave policies:

Finland: Beginning in 2021, both parents are entitled to parental leave of 164 days, or twenty-six weeks, each. Parents can transfer sixty-nine days from their quota to the other parent. A parental allowance is paid until the child is thirteen weeks old. Single parents are entitled to use the parental allowances of both parents. Out of those weeks, 70 percent of the employees’ salaries are paid; for the remaining weeks, there is a flat rate. GPS notes that “despite these generous leave allowances, fathers in Finland do not use their allotment, reflecting a still stubborn gender imbalance in the country.”

Germany: Workers are entitled to parental leave for their natural or adopted child and can request up to three years of parental leave until the child reaches three. While on parental leave, an employee may work up to thirty hours a week. During twelve months of parental leave (fourteen months if both parents take leave), the government pays 67 percent of their average monthly income (but no more than €1,800 or less than €300--$1,980 and $330 in July 2023 exchange rates). If the employees have two children under the age of three years, or three or more children under the age of six, the allowance is increased by 10 percent.

Iceland. Parents are given thirty-nine weeks of paid leave, given out of 80 percent of the worker’s salary. Thirteen weeks are given for each parent, and the remaining thirteen weeks can be split however the parents choose.

Norway. A worker is entitled to a leave of absence for up to twelve weeks during her pregnancy. After childbirth, the mother will take a leave of absence for the first six weeks. The parental benefit lasts 49 weeks (15 weeks for each parent), with 100 percent wage coverage or 59 weeks (19 weeks reserved for each parent) with 80 percent of wages covered. Parents have the right to take leave until the child reaches three years of age.

Source: Four Countries with the Best Parental Leave Laws,” Global People Strategy.com, March 23, 2021, https://www.globalpeoplestrategist.com/4-countries-with-the-best-parental-leave-laws/.

Gender Quotas for Elective Office

By 2006, forty countries had adopted some form of quota system, guaranteeing a minimum number of women in elected office. Scandinavian countries were at the forefront of using gender quotas for women in elected office, with legislation enacted in the 1970s and 1980s. Even before the quota legislation, women occupied about 20-30 percent of the seats in Scandinavian parliaments, the highest percentage in the world. In Finland, for example, the law requires that at least 40 percent of each sex should be represented in decision-making bodies.

Argentina was the first South American country to adopt gender quotas, now requiring 30 percent of women on electoral lists. By the 1990s, eleven other Latin American countries had adopted laws requiring between 20 and 40 percent of women’s participation in national elections.

By 2022, Rwanda topped the list of countries with female participation in parliament. Rwanda has been the most ambitious of African countries to bring women into elected office. The 1994 genocide saw roughly 800,000 Tutsi and Hutu tribesmen killed, with organized violence, including the systematic raping of Tutsi women. Part of the reason that so many women are in the parliament is because of the reaction against the genocide, but also because of the policies of President Paul Kagame, who backed ambitious policies of gender equality. In 2003, the Rwandan constitution was amended to require that 30 percent of the parliament and cabinet seats be reserved for women.

The International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) maintains a database of countries that have gender quotas. In 2022, some 132 countries have established some baseline of gender equality for representation in elected office. Some of the quotas aim to have women constituting a “critical minority” of 30 or 40 percent; some countries have adopted a quota that states that neither gender may occupy more than 60 percent nor less than 40 percent of the legislative seats.

The United States has no quota system to ensure women’s participation at any level of politics. At the same time, there are no formal or legal barriers preventing women from participating.

Sources: On quotas, see Drude Dahlerup, Women, Quotas and Politics (London: Routledge, 2006), and the Quota Project, a global database on quotas for women, http://www.quotaproject.org; Lenita Freidenvall, “Women’s Political Representation and Gender Quotas – The Swedish Case,” Department of Political Science, Stockholm University (2003), www.statsvet.su.se/quotas; An Act on Equality between Women and Men (609/86) (1987), as amended in 1995. Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, “Overview of Gender Equality Issues in Finland.” From Socrates Grundtvig website, http://www.gender-equality.webinfo.lt/results/finland.htm; Tricia Gray, “Electoral Gender Quotas: Lessons from Argentina and Chile,” Bulletin of Latin American Research 22 (1) (2003), 52-78 at 54, http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1470-9856.00064/pdf; Stephanie McCrummen, “Women Run the Show in a Recovering Rwanda,” Washington Post, October 27, 2008; “Gender Quotas Database,” International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA), together with the Inter-Parliamentary Union, and the University of Stockholm, https://www.idea.int/data-tools/data/gender-quotas/country-overview.

Affirmative Right to Vote

Election expert Richard L. Hasen noted that “unlike the constitution of many other advanced democracies, the US Constitution contains no affirmative right to vote.” The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms provides, in Section 3, that “every citizen of Canada has the right to vote in an election of members of the House of Commons or of a legislative assembly and to be qualified for membership therein. In Germany, the Basic Law of the Federal Republic, Article 38, states that for elections to the Bundestag, “any person who has attained the age of 18 shall be entitled to vote.”

Some countries have gone further, adopting compulsory voting for its citizens. Currently twenty-seven countries (including Belgium, Brazil, Australia, Argentina, Ecuador, and Peru) require eligible citizens to vote, or face a variety of penalties, from fines to loss of government benefits. During his last year in office, President Barack Obama concluded that compulsory voting would be “transformative”: “The people who tend not to vote are young, they’re lower income, they’re skewed more heavily towards immigrant groups and minorities. There’s a reason why some folks try to keep them away from the polls.”

Compulsory voting in the United States would be a tall order, facing constitutional issues and political hurdles, especially from those bent on suppressing voting. It would further go against the grain of many who would rebel against such an obligation imposed upon them.

Sources: Richard L. Hasen, “The US Lacks What Every Democracy Needs,” New York Times, January 16, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/16/opinion/voting-rights-constitution-28th-amendment.html. See also, Richard L. Hasen, A Real Right to Vote: How a Constitutional Amendment Can Safeguard American Democracy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2024).Obama quoted in Dennis W. Johnson, Campaigns and Elections: What Everyone Needs to Know (New York: Oxford University Press, 2020), 15. See also, “The Case for Compulsory Voting in the United States,” Harvard Law Review 121 (2) (December 2007): 591-612, https://www-jstor-org.proxygw.wrlc.org/stable/40042668?seq=3; and Emilee Booth Chapman, “The Distinctive Value of Elections and the Case for Compulsory Voting,” American Journal of Political Science 163 (1) (January 2019): 101-112, https://www-jstor-org.proxygw.wrlc.org/stable/45132465?searchText=&searchUri=&ab_segments=&searchKey=&refreqid=fastly-default%3A46bf896a27e07f355da5be2ed40795b3.