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EUROPIAN UNION
Taxi driver
Finland by Phil
& Others
►Work
sucks
Welfare
State
Phil
“…the most
successful welfare system in the world is a paid job.”
-
Madsen
Pirie,
president of the Adam Smith Institute
Yes, how obvious. After all, the
system has worked great all these years…

19.10.2006
Finnair strike
Phil
Finnair cabin crew are on strike as of 4am
this morning, the company are claiming it’s an illegal strike.
Since the state of Finland are the majority shareholders in the
company, it’s the Finnish taxpayer who gets screwed by all of
this.
Finnair’s cabin crew strike is
in protest over plans by Finnair to hire 500 new cabin crew
for its Estonian subsidiary Aero Airlines for lower pay than
provided for in Finnair’s labour contract. The pay level under
the national contract is 30 percent less than salaries under
Finnair’s own contract.
30% of a typical Finnish wage in
Estonia is pretty damn good considering the average monthly
salary in Estonia is $575 (US), while in Finland $3,026 (US).
And if you think the unions give a damn about Estonians, think
again. Their strike is just a bigoted ploy to keep Estonians
away. Because if they’re forced to pay Finnish
wages, might as well hire a Finn, and fuck all the
Estonians.
Phil
For the first time in history, an
Estonian company will be
handling the road maintenance
in a region of Finland…
The prospect of an
Estonian company maintaining roads in the area has raised a good deal
of curious discussion at the Finnish Road Administration and the
Finnish Road Enterprise. Raekallio understands the curiosity.
“For decades, Finns
have been businessmen in Estonia, and employees have been hired from
there to Finland. We are used to being the managers and bosses. Now
the setup is turning upside-down… Prejudices are so strong that many
were unwilling to take jobs with the company.”
MORE: I don’t get
this prejudice many Finns have towards Estonia, it’s as if Estonia is
still part of the Soviet Union or something. The people are poor
there, the place is dirty and unsafe, people are shifty, the vodka
will make you go blind, there’s lots of hookers….bleh!
I think those Finns
who dislike Estonia are quite jealous and see their country as a
threat. They worker longer, harder, and for less. There are exciting
changes and progress being made in Estonia, it’s an exciting place to
be - meanwhile Finland has remained stagnant, following the status quo
for what seems to be an eternity with no end in sight. Estonia has
been the dorky kid school that everyone picked on, but that’s not the
case anymore, and soon they’ll be picking on us!
A
liberal sees another country progressing so rapidly and sees this as a
very positive thing for their citizens and the rest of the globe.
Others see another country progressing so rapidly and sees this as a
threat their comfortable lifestyle. The welfare state is under attack
and the weapons fired are hard-working and inexpensive labour,
inexpensive goods, increased competition in the region, and
possibilities of policy reform such as flat-tax.
Estonia. Tallin
top
of page
21.8.2006
Phil
I have no idea why anyone would
possibly think about leaving Finland during the months of July
and August, the weather is just too perfect here. If the weather
could be like this all year round, I would forget this blog,
join the Social Democrats, and never criticize the welfare state
again - I promise.
Any tourist that visited Finland
this summer was treated with some amazing weather and no doubt
left thinking very highly of this country. But I wonder how many
of them toured Finland by bicycle? Probably not many. There’s so
many fine things about Finland that you’ll never see unless you
take a bike. Walking doesn’t get you far enough, and you’ll miss
soooo much if you’re just in a car or bus.
Finland’s residential building and
landscape architecture is very different from the states.
Finland has what I call “circled wagon” style, where the housing
layout is more circular rather than straight like in the states.
All the neat things to see are in the community yards and behind
the houses which you’d never see by car - In the states, you can
see just about everything from a car. So that’s where you need a
bike. I love to ride through these neighborhoods, discover new
neighborhoods you’d normally never drive through, get lost and
try to find out where I am.
The bike trail/road system of
Finland is just as comprehensive as the automobile road system,
bike trails are in the U.S. are basically non-existant,
Americans don’t know what they’re missing. Even though cars can’t
travel directly to each neighborhood, there’s always a bike path
that connects two neighborhoods - it’s amazing, I virtually
never run into a dead end while on my bike, the trails just keep
going and going.
One trail I highly recommend is
the one that runs from Tapiola to Kivenlahti, in Espoo. I
believe the length is about 16km and most of it is along the
shore. The scenery is breathtaking - on one side of you is the
sea and archipelago, on the other side you’ll see multi-million
euro homes that you and I will never be able to afford - you can
either admire them or loathe them, depending on whether you
voted for Niinistö or Halonen during the last election. You get
a true sense of Finland’s “classless society” when you tour the
south of Espoo, especially when the trail leads you away from
the water to make way for some gated community (that supposedly
don’t exist in Finland) of the uber-rich who have the beach all
to themselves.
18.7.2006
Phil
…in 1990, a real
problem arose wen a group of Somalis turned up at the Soviet/Finnish
border, uninvited, unsponsored and unexpected. Most Finns did not want
them to stay. This was little do with racism but more to do with the
psychological difficulty the Finns have with making room for others and
to share the hard-earned fruits of their labour.
Absolutely, it had little to do with racism - but it quickly turns into
racism when, against the will of the people, they’re allowed into the
country, and the Finns are forced to give the hard-earned fruits of
their labour to non-Finns. This is how the welfare state model creates
racism. The natives see their favorite social programmes diminish while
the money is being funneled elsewhere to burden the welfare state even
further. I hear this all the time, it’s got to be the #1 reason why
Finns are so against immigration. I do not believe that the Finnish
people are naturally racist at all, I believe it is the welfare state
which makes them (some of them) to be that way.
unemployment is around 25% for immigrants
While unemployment is around 7% in
Helsinki, it’s around 25% for us immigrants - Who has the answer to
fix the situation?
When will these trends be
reflected in the recruitment practices of the municipal labour
force? And what about public procurement? Municipal politicians in
Helsinki - if they are interested in the issue at all - still talk
about supported work schemes for immigrants. Why don’t they demand
that also private sector companies (who supply goods and services
worth of millions of euros to the city) take responsibility in
providing jobs for people of diverse ethnic backgrounds? After
all, the public, taxpayers’ money, that funds public procurements
comes increasingly from taxes paid by ethnic minorities. And
sooner or later it simply will make economic sense for these
companies!
Quotas. Some are not directly
saying it but what what they want is private companies in
Finland to have immigrant quotas - Companies over ‘x’ amount of
people must have ‘x’ amount of immigrants depending on the size of
the company or else they’ll be taxed extra or sued by the state or
something. And while I came back from vacation quite tan skinned, I
doubt I’m the kind of “immigrant” who would fulfill these quotas.
Immigrant/minority/racial quotas
may be a new concept in Finland but they’re very familiar to
Americans. While in the short-term it may provide jobs (not
necessarily good ones) for immigrants, Finland will see increased
sentiments of racism and anti-immigration in the long-term. Whether
they’re right or wrong, some natives will feel these immigrants are
“stealing” their jobs. More qualified people will lose jobs to less
qualifiied people simply because of the color of their skin or where
they come from. I know that the protectionist, racist, yet powerful
Finnish trade unions make it very difficult for immigrants, I just
think that using government force to fix this issue will do more
harm than good.
top
of page
Seems like my recent
appendectomy went well because my symptoms occurred while in my city of
residence…My girlfriend just received an e-mail from the girlfriend of a
good friend of ours. He’s in the hospital because his appendix burst. He was
experiencing pain in his stomach just like I was and went to his closest
hospital just like I did - I live in Espoo and went to my Espoo (Jorvi) -
However, the closest hospital to him (Meilahti, Helsinki) wasn’t “his”
hospital because he is a resident of Nummela. So he was transported to
Lohja, during the journey his appendix burst which is VERY serious and
life-threatening. If he would have remained in Helsinki, he would have most
likely been fine and had a routine operation just like I had.
This kind of nonsense is
typical with socialized medicine. When I go to the grocery store each week,
the girl at the cashier never says, “Sir, this isn’t your local grocery
store, you must go there if you wish to buy food.” …why does healthcare have
to be the same? It’s no wonder why Americans time and time again refuse to
implement socialized healthcare.
1.
So American goes to the hospital: Sir, we don’t take in people
without insurance…
Comment by Hank W.
2.
I’ve been complaining about this idiotic system ever since they
created it. It’s impossible to comprehend why the municipalities cannot
agree on intermunicipal compensations on patience costs. It’s completely
retarded!
I was
near Riihimäki few years back on sunday when all the sudden half of my body
went numb and started to paralyse. I got shit scared because it included
massive headache and tinnitus. Luckily my gf was there and she rushed me to
the local hospital. She carried me with wheelchair to the reception, as i
was unable to move at that point.
They took
my wallet and checked me for id. They didn’t even check my current condition
expect that i was still conscious. The minute they figured out that i was
from Helsinki they threw us out, telling that i have to take a cab from
there to Helsinki and report to hospital. After telling us that, they closed
the reception and refused to talk to us any more.
We waited
for three hours outside the hospital too scared to travel incase my
condition would continue to radically worsen. Luckily after that i was able
to limb back and curse at them for ten minutes.
Comment by Kras
3.
Medical horror stories are not in any short supply in the U.S. Why do
you think that the lawyers are specializing in malpractice suits over there,
and making dough hand over fist?
Comment by Petteri
4.
4 Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into
Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of
the house and family of David;
5 to enroll himself with
Mary, who was pledged to be married to him as wife, being pregnant.
6 It happened, while they
were there, that the day had come that she should give birth.
7 She brought forth her
firstborn son, and she wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a
feeding trough, because the Bethlehem Hospital told her to get her ass back
to Nazareth.
Comment by Hank W.
top of page
top
31.3.2006
Under the table, better than nothing at all

It’s so amusing to read about “under
the table” jobs as if the participants were committing murder.
This is a huge difference in attitude between the Finns and
Americans. The article uses words like “shady”, “wrestles with his
conscience”, and “temptation” to describe the people involved in
this practice. Pleaseee….
Young
people increasingly offered untaxed grey sector work
|
 |
Offers of illicit
untaxed work are becoming an increasingly frequent temptation for
young people starting their working careers.
"Some friends tipped me off about a job, or then they told
their own employers that they could call me", says 24-year-old
student
Jussi (not his real name), who has
done a number of short stints at a night restaurant in the south of
Finland. He is paid in cash, and the income is not reported to tax
authorities.
Work in the grey sector can be especially attractive if the
student’s official income is starting to approach the limits for
eligibility for student grants. Fast money is also an attraction:
Jussi is paid cash on the same evening.
Jussi does not belong to a labour
union, but offers of untaxed work also come to young people who are
union members. An estimated 8,000 young members of the Service Union
United PAM (under the age of 25) - about one in six - have been
offered untaxed work.
PAM reports that its Helsinki office is contacted about once a
week by someone who has been offered undocumented work.
The information comes by telephone. "They want to remain
faceless. Common sense dictates that these kinds of things will not
bear the light of day", says
Irmeli Mäenpää, head of the office.
Jussi sometimes wrestles with his conscience. "But I will have
time to pay plenty of those taxes when I get a regular job."
The restaurant business is notorious
for paying workers under the table. Inspections in 2003-2005
revealed the payment of EUR 11 million in undocumented wages.
However, even more went into the pockets of restaurant owners in the
form of hidden dividends.
Restaurants in Finland put away an estimated EUR 32 million in
illicit earnings.
Young people are recipients of illicit
wages in other fields than the service sector. A survey by the
Central Organisation of Finnish Trade Unions (SAK) reveals that nine
percent of the younger members of its affiliate unions have been
offered untaxed work. It is not known how many actually yielded to
the temptation.
PAM feels that offers of grey work to young people are a
serious matter. "It is unfortunate if employers do not meet their
obligations in the first job that a young person has. It can lead to
a cycle, when the habit turns into a practice", says the union’s
vice president
Kaarlo
Julkunen.
In addition to young people, immigrants
are newcomers to the Finnish labour market, and as such, are subject
to offers from shady characters.
When a trade union official explains rules of Finnish labour
practice to new immigrants attending an orientation course,
listeners can have quite different experiences.
"What if work is always offered by people saying that you can
come, but without a tax certificate?" Irmeli Mäenpää has heard
people say.
The trend for untaxed work appears to
be increasingly common. Five years ago, four percent of unemployed
SAK members had been offered undocumented work. This has now risen
to seven percent.
Helsingin Sanomat
|
|
Comments
1.
These under the table jobs are mostly temporary anyways, few people do
this work for long periods of time. And you usually get paid daily, so if the
boss screws you over, you just tell him to suck it…and you never return.
How would you
know.. .?
2.
No, Phil, the state would rather want to see immigrants and young people
work and pay their taxes and demand the same from the small shops and
restaurants as well. And this is for the benefit of all of us. I don’t
remember by heart whether that article was translated into English (and am too
lazy to check) but the Sunday issue of HS some weeks ago ran a lengthy article
about two Turkish men exploited by their employer here. Too much work, illegal
working hours, far below standards pay and so on. Really a sad story. Rather
than a situation where both the employer is saved from the evil state and the
employee given more flexibility, this is what the grey market is more all about.
3.
I’ve read that story about the turkish men, why is that so sad? No one
was forcing them to work those hours or take that pay. If it wasnt for that low
pay and long hours, they would probably never have been brought to finland and
would be back in Turkey working even longer hours for even less pay.
Comment by Phil —
4.
Phil… the Turkish men were brought to Finland under false pretences that
they would be working a 37.5 hour week. They worked six days a week, roughly 12
hours a day, and could do nothing much about it as they were:
a) unable to speak either Finnish or English,
b) (as a result of a)) completely dependent for information on their employer,
who apparently fed them a crock of shit,
c) initially unaware of Finnish workplace legislation or the rights and
obligations of employees and employers, and
d) scared that they would be sent home if they bitched about the job and the
hours.
These men were mercilessly exploited by one of their own, for his own profit.
The pattern is being repeated in similar (and much worse) circumstances in many
other ethnic communities and in many other countries besides Finland. But never
mind, the exploiters are themselves exploited by the evil überstate.
So that’s alright then.
5.
I would stress the little sentence: “Work in the grey sector can be
especially attractive if the student’s official income is starting to approach
the limits for eligibility for student grants.”
This is all too true. If you
are approaching the earning limit, the only ways to improve your economic
situation is to get money from your parents or do an under-the-table job. If the
tax authorities do not know, KELA won’t know either. It is the state’s fault
that it does not provide people a way to improve their economic situation by
earnest open-market work.
For those who think that the
limits are not too thigh, I must stress they are personal. If there is a pair,
and only one works part-time to finance their living, the limit is still
single-person limit for the working one. That the other does not have time or
chance to work, does not raise the limit for the other. So, in effect, the
limit/person is halved for them.
6.
Thank you, Lawyers, guns and money, you replied before I could have. This
is no funny issue at all. The merciless employer really exploited them, used
their lack of language skills and knowledge of Finnish society and legislation
to get a huge profit for himself. It’s not a question of doing one quarter of an
hour of unpaid extra work per day for a meager salary, it was a question of
hundreds of hours of unpaid work for an illegally low salary plus other
illegalities, all this done consciously exploiting people’s ignorance (which the
Turkish guys are not to blame for, they didn’t know). This is all called
exploitation. I don’t understand how someone can support the conscious
exploitation of other, ignorant human beings for his own profit. Disgusting,
honestly.
Liber Al, what I meant by for
the benefit of all of us is wrote I wrote above. It’s in the interest of
everybody that situations like that with the Turkish men don’t exist. If you
think what happened with them is OK, please feel to do so but I hope I’ll never
live in a society ruled by people with such ideals.
7.
Phil
do you remember when you first came to finland ,how hard and frustrating it was
, now imagine that without your girlfriend to translate and guide you.
this is one of the best countries in the world to live in but also one of the
hardest to establish yourself in , but i think most on this board would agree
its worth it in the end but please dont belittle these guys troubles, just
remember your own troubles and multiply it
8.
People who get paid under the table work in jobs that they don’t keep for
long. On the other hand it can be a stepping stone to a job that pays wages that
feed into the economy. If you were stranded and looking for work, and had little
options open to you, would you rather take a job that paid under the table until
you found “decent” employment or would you starve?
9.
Ms. NJ. It depends who would offer me a under-the-table job.
If it was a wealthy person, I would do what I could to bring the person to
justice. I think it is possible in Finland to get a fair trial even if you are
poor. If it was a case where the employer can not afford fair pay, I might take
the job. But decisions are not usually that simple.
10.
I completely agree that what was done to those turkish men was wrong, but
c’mon, Turkish men cant count? they agreed to 7.5 hours but worked 12? don't be
such a sucker.
If I want you to shovel my
snow, and we agree on a price of 10 euros, and it takes you 4 hours to do it, so
you get paid 2.50/hr…is that illegal?
Comment by Phil —
11.
And I think poor people and poor companies shouldn't pay any taxes
whatsoever. Go after the rich companies offering the under the table work.
Comment by Phil —
12.
As we all know the culprits are always ulkomainen. Proving that Finns are
more moral than immoral foreign parasites who come to Finland to steal “our”
wealth.
The HS sings the same song
(indoctrination) Recently they ran an article screaming about the fact that most
ethic restaurants were commiting fraud. The cat was unintentionally let out of
the bag later on in the article. Those conducting the investigation had
apparently made a conscious decision to focus their enquiries, on yes you’ve
guessed it……ethnic minority run restaurants. What did they expect!!!!!
The real story went
un-reported. The Finnish media and the role it promotes in encouraging racism in
Finland.
Use of Estonian temp agencies to continue as
restrictions on new EU members end
Representatives of temp agencies in Estonia expect Finnish employers to use
their services more eagerly than before for the purpose of recruiting
Estonian workers. Citizens of Estonia and other new member states of the European Union
are to have full access to the Finnish labour market from the first of May.
That date marks the end of the interim period, in which citizens of new EU
member states were required to have work permits, in spite of the principle
of free movement of labour in the EU. During the interim period, many Finnish employers have managed to use
Estonian labour by taking advantage of a loophole provided by Estonian temp
agencies. Estonian citizens nominally employed by the Estonian companies
have actually been working in Finland. The Central Organisation of Finnish Trade Unions (SAK) has expressed
the hope that with the open labour market now formally extended to Estonian
citizens, Finnish employers would start hiring Estonians directly, without
resorting to any intermediaries. However, there are indications that this
will not happen any time soon. "At first we were afraid that there would be fewer offers, and that
companies would recruit their workers directly", says Riin Kilk of the
Tallinn temp agency Personalipunkt Extra. In fact, the opposite seems to be true. The temp agencies Adecco, Uniq
U Eesti, and Varumeesteenidus have noticed an increase in inquiries from
both Finnish employers and Estonian job-seekers. Finnish employers are looking for people to work in construction,
manufacturing, customer service, logistics, and industry.
The news does not come as a surprise to Riitta
Wärn, a labour market expert at the Confederation of Finnish Industry (EK). "I have warned about this for over a year - ever since EK said last
year that the whole interim period should be cancelled quickly, because the
market was becoming distorted." When Finland placed restrictions on the free movement of labour from
the countries that joined the EU in May 2004, there were no restrictions on
the movement of services; temp agencies were seen as part of the service
sector, and Estonians started to come to work in Finland as employees of
temp agencies or subcontractors. The wages of such workers are paid by the
Estonian company, which is paid a fee by the Finnish company using the
service. It has been difficult for Finnish officials and labour unions to
monitor the pay and terms of employment of such workers; the activity has
been seen to distort competition in certain fields. Estonian temp workers
have also been used to replace Finns.
"I see no reason why the market should be
rectified, considering that people have had two years to get used to this
system. Service in Tallinn has been good", Wärn says. During the interim period, a Finnish employer wishing to hire an
Estonian without an intermediary has had to wait for up to six weeks for the
prospective employee's work permit to be processed; those who are nominally employees
of a temp agency have been available at a day’s notice. Klik believes that Finnish employers want to continue to save in
personnel and bookkeeping costs. SAK’s Matti Viialainen does not feel that the interim period is the
reason for the popularity of subcontracted labour. He blames the fact that
the restrictions did not extend to services, as the SAK would have liked. Viialainen also points out that temp work and subcontracting are on
the increase otherwise as well. Statistics Finland reports that employment
exchange services are the most rapidly-growing part of the service sector in
Finland. Minister of Labour Tarja Filatov (SDP) is
aware of the situation. She notes that the use of temp agencies has also increased in Sweden,
which did not impose an interim period for workers from other EU countries. She added that it would be very difficult to get rid of the practice
in seasonal work. "And with a shortage of labour starting to hit Estonia, employees
there can better choose how they want to go abroad, if they want to." The labour shortage is already being felt in Estonia. "Demand is growing primarily in local markets. The labour shortage in
Estonia is getting to be critical, as people are wanted in every sector",
notes Heigo Kaldra of the
Estonian branch of the international temp agency Manpower.
Helsingin Sanomat
Finlandforthought
20.4.2006
At the beginning of 2006, Stockholm began
charging cars a tax
for driving in and out of the city,
they’ll vote later this year to keep or drop this new tax - as of March,
the
majority polled are against it. The tax
hopes to drop the amount of traffic and pollution in the city, London
saw a 15% drop in traffic when they enacted this in 2003. Fortunately,
Finland’s transportation minister isn’t
so keen on this yet…
Susanna Huovinen (soc dem), the Finnish
transport and communications minister, said Wednesday that although
Stockholm’s experiences with its congestion charge scheme were
encouraging and should be monitored, she had not warmed to the idea of
setting up a similar system in the Finnish capital region.
A report drafted by a ministry working
group concludes that road tolls and congestion charges are not
realistic policies in the near future.
There are some serious privacy concerns
with this system, the state will know exactly when and where you enter
and exit the city. I don’t have a real problem with a tax for using the
roads, people who use something the most often should pay the most for
it. And being a lover of Espoo city, I’d hope less Espoo residents would
visit Helsinki, and Helsinki shops would suffer and be forced to move to
Espoo.
But when 15% of the traffic stays off the
road, what kind of people are those 15%? Yeah, it’s the poor. The poor
will take their little polluting rust buckets off the Helsinki streets
to make room for Finland’s wealthy, zooming around in their bigger, more
polluting SUVs. At the very least, these bigger more polluting cars
should be taxed more, but this isn’t done in Stockholm.
Comments
1. Again, where does this “poor
15 %” come from?
According to you, people seem
to either drive cars or stay at home. Bikes and public transport just do not
seem to exist in your universe, save for the rusty former milkvan that passes
your neck of the woods twice a day.
And how can someone love Espoo?
On the same note, how can someone call it a city? It’s more like a myriad of
motorways that combine various patches of residential areas.
1. I like the idea, however I
feel that it should be an “impulse” measure. there would be immediate impacts in
certain areas like real estate (prices and rents on the edges of the city going
up, prices going down -or growing less- in Espoo , Vantaa, etc).
And as for the privacy, many
other countries use a registry system to pay highway fees (there’s an identifier
in your car and it checks when you go in and leave) and no privacy issues have
surfaced, AFAIK. Back home they couldn’t even have the police check your medium
speed when it’s obvious that some guys do 300 klms in less than 2 hours.
3. In Helsinki they always say
Espoo is not really a city and in Espoo they want to make a big deal about
Vantaa not being a city. How many people live in Espoo? 250,000 or what? Many of
them love Espoo. Since I think it’s the city in Finland that has the highest
number of people moving in each year, there are plenty of people outside of
Espoo who would want to live there. I wouldn’t since I’m more than happy in
Helsinki but really since so many Helsinkians are anti-Espoo the whole
anti-name-your-city-you-love-to-hate thing is getting boring. I like it here
since there are probably more people like me here than in Espoo and in Espoo
there are more people like Phil. I wouldn’t want everybody everywhere be like
me. I also know people who have moved from Helsinki to Espoo and say they’d like
to move back. Other people who’ve moved to Espoo are very satisfied with where
they’ve made their new home.
4. I’m a car owner living in
suburbia, and while I think that driving to the heart of dowtown during rush
hour is a nightmare and I’d much rather take the train, shopping with a car is
far more convenient. It’s not a lifestyle for me, rather a necessity. All the
decent shops are downtown and when I do go shopping, I buy a trunkful of stuff
at once.
So I see that a congestion
charge might hurt business downtown, which is a thing to avoid. I’m not a big
fan of strip malls.
5. Have you been to central
London, before and after the congestion charge? It’s made a good difference, but
I suspect your idea that it keeps the poor off the road is pretty much bollocks.
The amount is big enough that most people avoid it if possible, most of the
traffic is delivery trucks etc that need to be there. The buses run better
because of less delays and a mate who cycles says the areas with the charge are
safer to cycle in before.
Isn’t it just a market solution
to a problem? People need to decide what value they place on access to that
(actually rather small) part of London.
I don’t see why Helsinki would
need one though. Helsinkians have no idea what congestion can really mean!
6. I don’t see why Helsinki
would need one though. Helsinkians have no idea what congestion can really mean!
I do think that quite a few
Helsinkians have visited London and other similar cities. I agree that it’s a
completely different scale, but have you driven through Mannerheimintie at 4 pm?
It takes a bloody hour! One wonders if all those cars really need to be there.
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