Memes

In post-soviet countries these products aren’t actually cheap relative to their own incomes, they have to pay a significant portion of their wages to afford them.

Have you lived there? Because it sure as shit talk about it like you have, except you clealy haven't because if you did you'd know how disingenuous your point is. Obviously post-soviet countries don't have the buying power of countries that generally have existed for more than a century. Like you should be aware, post-soviet countries had to restart their economy following the collapse of the union. You're rubbing in the fact that people had to live through the collapse. But it doesn't mean you couldn't afford those cheap products. I was able to buy Coke and Mars back in 1994 despite the economy being probably in its worst state ever and most people probably could until the start of this year. The looming recession is killing buying power right now, so this year really isn't a good comparison on how big part of the wage goes into actually living.

I’m working my way through Red Hangover, and that really doesn’t seem to be the case. Maybe 1 in 10 people living in the post-soviet sphere have benefitted.

I guess my parents, me, my friends and most people I know just happen to live in some magical bubble where we're the 1 in 10? I know not everyone is well off, but it's not like everyone in the Nordic countries are well off either. It's definitely not 1 in 10 who have benefited.

Neoliberalism is nightmare.

Maybe the only statement we mostly agree upon. I wouldn't call it a nightmare but I agree that we could do better. However soviet era socialism is definitely not better.

So there you go. Sweden benefits from Western militarism.

And this is where you go off the deep end. At no point was western militarism even a point of discussion. The discussion was the welfare state of Nordic countries and western militarism has nothing to do with that.