All Nordic countries have market economies. The share of small businesses of all economic activity is relatively small. Large corporations generate most of the GDP along with public services. Labor union membership is nearly universal and collective bargaining with employer's unions is the norm. It is common for trade unions, employer's unions and the government to engage in regular tripartite negotiations that tie together public fiscal policy and wages. Labor unions and their central organizations and the Social Democratic parties in each country have very close ties and accusations of illicit forms of fundraising crop up regularly. Correspondingly, employer's unions have close ties with the right-wing pro-business parties in each country.

All have mixed public/private health care systems. There are public health clinics but most working people have general health care paid for them by their employees. The public health care sector runs municipal hospitals in large cities, provincial central hospitals and university hospitals that provide the most advanced/specialized care. Public clinics and hospitals charge nominal fees from their patients. It is fairly common for working people to buy health insurance packages for their families but these are fairly cheap as they do not need to cover anything expensive. Most people purchase them to be able to go to private clinics instead of the public clinics in case of minor illnesses. This is how it works in Finland but I don't think it's very different in the rest of the Nordic countries.

From what I've heard, the tax system is fairly simple compared to Germany or France. For most people, filling their tax returns takes about five minutes. It can get complicated but mostly it's very simple.

Society is much less family-centric than in the south of Europe. In this regard, the Nordic countries resemble the UK and its former colonies. The welfare state can get a little intrusive at times. Child welfare is a high priority. In comprehensive school (grades 1 to 9), the parents of each pupil get a questionnaire with questions about the health of the child and the family environment in first, fifth and eighth grades. Their occupations, smoking and drinking habits, whether or not dad helps around the house, employment situation etc. etc. are asked. I read that the questionnaire is based on some American statistical child abuse risk analysis tool. (Did you know that a smoking parent is statistically more likely to abuse their child than a non-smoking one?) Finland has the second highest proportion of children placed outside of home (after Australia) among OECD countries. That might or might not be warranted by actual facts on the ground. I've read somewhere that in spite of alcohol consumption going down every year and general well-being among children and youth improving, the distribution of child and youth welfare has become somewhat more polarized than in the past.

The political system in all Nordic countries is a parliamentary multi-party democracy with division of powers into legislative, judicial and executive branches. The judicial branch is relatively less important than in the UK and its former colonies as the Roman-German judicial tradition is followed. Finland used to have a strong presidential institution but since the late 1980's that institution has been weakened through constitutional reforms. Sweden, Denmark and Norway are kingdoms with the monarch as a ceremonial head of state. Finland and Iceland are republics with the president as the head of state. The executive branch also has fewer powers than in the USA. Presidential decrees are nowadays very seldom used for any kind of active political purpose in Finland as opposed to the Cold War period. In Finland, seats in the parliament are allocated using the D'Hondt method leading to, sometimes prolonged, negotiations between multiple parties in an effort to find a majority coalition after the election. In contrast, Sweden uses a coalition system where voters have an opportunity to vote for coalitions decided prior to the elections.

The dominant political parties in Finland are National Coalition (pro-business centre-right party), Social Democratic Party and Centre Party (a centrist party with voter core made up of rural middle class). Two of these parties have formed the cabinet with additional parties without exception in the post WW II era.

Any questions, David or anyone else?