Eighth Straight Victory

Traditionally, the Socialists of Britain and West Germany have talked the old-fashioned language of nationalizing nearly everything, and nearly always lose elections; the Socialists of Scandinavia scarcely mention the word nationalization, promise plenty of welfare benefits to everybody, and always win. Last week the Socialists of Sweden, who in 28 years' rule have left 90% of the country's economy in private hands, were returned to office for an eighth straight time, and by an increased popular vote.

Once again, welfare was the vote winner. Last year the Socialists introduced an old-age pension for all workers starting at 67, which would pay them 60% of their highest lifetime wage. To pay for it, they decreed a sweeping 4% sales tax on everything from books to food.

But despite the cost of the most imposing set of welfare services in the world, Swedes are rich and getting richer. They own more cars per capita than any country in Europe. The Conservatives gamely demanded that both taxes and pensions be slashed. The Liberals could bring themselves to demand only tax cuts; social benefits, they said, should be left untouched. "You can have either left-hand or right-hand traffic in a country," said Socialist Premier Tage Erlander, whose country is the last in continental Europe where traffic still follows the British custom and keeps left. "Whoever insists on driving in the middle of the road will find life riskier than he supposed." Last week in a record 81.7% turnout of voters, Erlander's Social Democrats won exactly half, or 116 of 232 seats. With Communist support on some issues and Liberal support on others, they will have no trouble staying on in power. Once again, Sweden had chosen to stay on the left side of the road.

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