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Sweden’s spring budget: 45 billion kronor cash boost for healthcare, jobs and more

Sweden on Thursday announced its spring budget proposal in full, with measures to help the healthcare sector, job market and other areas such as climate policy amounting to 45 billion kronor ($5.3 billion) in total.

Published: 15 April 2021 11:06 CEST
Sweden's spring budget: 45 billion kronor cash boost for healthcare, jobs and more
Finance Minister Magdalena Andersson presented the spring budget on Thursday. Photo: Fredrik Sandberg/TT

Most of the measures are linked to the Covid-19 pandemic, with money set aside for the healthcare sector and business support, but there were also cash boosts announced to support rural areas, climate policy, and law and order.

“This is a budget for how we can work, together, to get Sweden out of the crisis,” said Finance Minister Magdalena Andersson at the presentation of the measures on Thursday. This comes amid a rise in newly reported cases and intensive care admissions for Covid-19, with Sweden one of the European countries worst hit by a third wave of the virus.

She said the government was expecting that Sweden will lift many of its coronavirus measures this autumn, such as restricted opening times for restaurants and limits on customer numbers in many establishments. But that depends on the development of the pandemic.

“We still have the restrictions in place now during the spring, but the restrictions might be lifted in autumn. But if the vaccination programme is delayed, then it will take longer before they can be relaxed and longer before the economy can ‘restart’,” she explained.

The 45 billion kronor is made up of a separate amendment budget as well as 22 billion kronor which are part of the spring budget.

Unsurprisingly, a large chunk of the money will go directly to the healthcare sector, including 1.65 billion for testing and contact tracing work, one billion for buying more vaccine doses and 700 million to Sweden’s 21 regions to help them carry out vaccinations. An injection of two billion kronor will not only support healthcare directly related to Covid-19 but also other care that has been postponed due to the pandemic.

“Money cannot, must not, will not be an obstacle in limiting the spread of infection or in caring for the sick,” said Andersson.

The Finance Minister also announced several other measures, including Swedish language courses, summer jobs and extending business crisis support and coronavirus sick pay rules. Here’s The Local’s in-depth explainer on what the budget means for you.

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NORTHVOLT

Northvolt warns work permit salary threshold could jeopardise Sweden’s green transition

Sweden’s minimum salary threshold for work permits has increased by almost 120 percent in less than a year, and there are plans to increase it again to the median salary next summer. Battery manufacturers Northvolt warns that this could stop the company from hiring and retaining key workers.

Published: 3 July 2024 12:32 CEST
Northvolt warns work permit salary threshold could jeopardise Sweden's green transition

“Northvolt’s extensive labour requirements in northern Sweden cannot currently be met by permanently established workers in Sweden or within the EU,” the company wrote in a response to the government’s proposal to raise the salary threshold to the median salary, currently 35,600 kronor.

“This applies in particular to machine operators and technicians, whose minimum wages under collective bargaining agreements are lower than the median wage, and therefore are particularly vulnerable in this context.”

The EU has highlighted qualified machine operators and technicians as professions which are particularly hard to source within the bloc, meaning companies often have no choice but to source these workers from non-EU countries.

Northvolt has the added complication of being located in northern Sweden, an area which in general often struggles to find key workers in a number of industries, and the company isn’t convinced that enough is being done to fix this.

“Northvolt does not believe that the government and the Public Employment Service’s measures to promote geographic mobility in the Swedish labour market is going to be able to cover the company’s need for labour,” it wrote, while adding that it believes the proposed hike to the work permit salary threshold could have “significant consequences” for its facility in Skellefteå.

“Aside from the direct effects on the company, Northvolt sees a risk that staffing in healthcare, services and infrastructure in northern Sweden could be negatively affected by the salary threshold, which would indirectly affect Northvolt’s expansion.”

In addition to this, the company deems the proposed exemptions to the salary threshold – these would be put forward by the Migration Agency and the Public Employment Service based on professions where there’s a labour shortage – to be insufficient and unpredictable.

Northvolt’s criticism highlighted the fact that the exemptions are based on a model which is currently under development and which may not be ready by the time the law is due to come into force, as well as the fact that professions with a labour shortage will be defined using a so-called SSYK code.

Some key roles for Northvolt to do with battery production do not have one of these codes, as they are relatively new roles.

“It remains to be seen how the proposed model would effectively be able to identify professions with a labour shortage when they don’t have an SSYK code,” the company wrote, adding that this all makes it harder for the company to plan, for example, will an employee who is granted a work permit once be eligible for renewal two years later?

“The employee in that situation would risk being deported from Sweden. If that were to happen, it would be deeply unfair for the employee who has contributed to supporting Swedish society in a role where there is a shortage, and a catastrophe for the employer who has invested years of education and talent in the employee.”

“This lack of predictability can be compared to earlier notorious so-called kompetensutvisningar (talent deportations), and will further complicate the recruitment or necessary talent,” it wrote.

TALENT DEPORTATIONS:

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