EU Digital Driver's License, Budget Savings & Rewriting Denmark's History: LWID S3E10

Narcis and Kalpita is gathered this week to discuss the new EU-wide digital driver's license, a surprising large budget surplus in 2024 (savings of 133B DKK), moves to preserve the danish language and a bronze stamp found in Tåsinge that may rewrite 5th-century Danish history.

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Transcript

NARCIS:

Hello, everyone. Here is a new edition of the Last Week in Denmark podcast. Today, me, Narcis George Matache, I will be your host, your anchor, together with Kalpita.

KALPITA:

Hello!

NARCIS:

Hello, Kalpita. How are you doing today?

KALPITA:

I'm doing okay. I have a little chocolate muffin to go for the weekend, so I'm in good spirits.

NARCIS:

That's great. Especially considering that today we are covering uniquely four subjects in half an hour. Don't get scared, that doesn't mean that you have to spend more time with us, like the previous episode, where I was part of it, when we went for almost an hour. Well, what can you do? If it's an interesting subject, it is an interesting subject. But with Kalpita here, I'm sure we will be able to respect the time that we have on hand. So, what are we going to talk about today? Very simple. First, about the EU driving rules around Europe. Then we're gonna go into language laws. It's just a proposal from one political party. So, it's interesting just to look at it, not necessarily that it's very serious or something that we should be concerned about. Then we can talk about Denmark's budget surplus. We in Denmark are doing better than ever. And then the last thing we're gonna discuss is how a small bronze stamp found on a small island in the south of Denmark might rewrite Danish history. So, Kalpita, what should we start with first? What's your favourite subject of the four of them?

KALPITA:

I mean, I don't drive, so maybe the EU driving laws could be interesting to start with.

NARCIS:

Would you be surprised if I told you that the EU does not have common EU driving rules?

KALPITA:

No, I won't be surprised because I've heard of that before. But I'm also aware that you can use, like, a Danish driving license to drive in the EU.

NARCIS:

Yes, that is correct. But it's more like it's funny that we don't have common rules. Like we all can see small or maybe larger differences between different EU countries in terms of how you drive, which rules you need to follow. And that can be confusing, especially that more and more of us are maybe taking a driving license in one country and then maybe during our lifetime we get to use it in almost many, many other countries.

KALPITA:

Yeah.

NARCIS:

So, the question here is: Why it took so long to think about common EU rules on driving? It's not like, oh my God, we're losing our sovereignty if we do that, right? Our roads, our rules, you know?

KALPITA:

Yeah. I mean, luckily, the UK is not part of the EU. So, that would have been a complete nightmare because in the EU, we have right-side road rules, while in the UK, everything's left-side. Plus, we drive right hand on the right side and in the UK, people drive on the left side. Oh, I'm confusing one of the two, but basically, both are opposites. We follow opposite street rules. We follow opposite driving manufacturing thingies as well. So luckily, we are not doing that. So, it should be a bit easier to transition to holistic, the same EU rules. I think it's also interesting to see how that extends to other laws as well, not just limited to licensing, but also traffic rules. I understand that there are many things in the works for controlling that, as well as bringing traffic accidents down.

NARCIS:

Yeah, I mean, it's a bit sad to know that in 2021, 20,000 people lost their lives on the European roads. So we clearly need to do something about it. And I'm really happy that we're going in the direction of a unitary set of rules. And it's really interesting to see that in Denmark, we already got the digitalization right ahead. We already have the driving license as an app.

KALPITA:

Yeah.

NARCIS:

Well, now EU has mandated all the other EU countries to do the same so that the app driving license is valid everywhere. Because you should know a Danish driving license as an app is only valid in Denmark. The moment you go abroad, you need to have your physical one.

KALPITA:

Yeah.

NARCIS:

So, don't get fooled by that small change. And then there is the fact that in the first two years, there should be zero tolerance to driving while having any sort of alcohol or any other euphoric substances in your blood. In Denmark, you know, we have 0.5, so you can have still depending on your, you know, body mass, one or two beers or whatever before you drive. But with the new rules, it means that it will be zero tolerance. But you should know it's only for like the first two years of having a driving license. So it will mainly affect the young people, who, it seems, are hugely responsible for most of the deaths that are happening on the roads in Europe.

KALPITA:

I mean, I think that's a very fair law to consider and bring into action as well, because most road accidents and traffic accidents are happening because of the use of substances and alcohol, especially around the times when partying in summer, and Christmas as well is like the season for traffic accidents as well. That also puts pressure on the healthcare system at the same time. But it also affects border control as well, especially German and Danish borders. I mean, most people also take weekends to go shopping for alcohol and pack their cars with all kinds of drinks to bring into Denmark because it's cheaper. So, all of these things we need to consider. and I think it's a great law as well. I mean, if a 17-year-old or an 18-year-old is allowed to drive a heavy vehicle, then I think these laws are just fair and should be in place already. If they're not, then it's just about time.

NARCIS:

It's funny that you mentioned the heavy trucks, because as we know, you need to be 21 to drive a truck in Europe and in Denmark as well. Well, Denmark is Europe. But the point is that the idea is that they wanted to go from 21 to 18 because we don't have enough truck drivers. To be honest, that one raises a bit of a question, because it is very hard to drive a truck. You have a lot of blind spots.

KALPITA:

Yeah.

NARCIS:

Much more difficult than driving a normal car. Letting such young people to drive trucks; I don't find it smart, in my opinion. I find it very, very dangerous. But at the same time, I understand the idea behind it—we need more truck drivers now. Where should we get these truck drivers from, right? So one way would be to let younger people to enter the workforce faster. I don't know, it's a tricky one. It's a dilemma.

KALPITA:

I mean, Denmark needs labourers, whether it's a truck driver or a construction labourer or I don't know what other labour work, but we do need more labourers, and we need people who are going to take the jobs that an average Dane doesn't take. And let's face it, that is the reality. So, it's not that we are only missing people, we are also missing workforce across the labour market, and truck drivers are just one of them. So, I think Denmark can do a better job. They have really smart, overpaid people sitting in the system who could think of much more innovative things than having 16- and 18-year-olds driving trucks on the streets. But at the same time, not very long ago, they also had this retail thing that we also discussed whether they were getting a bit more extra money for putting in hours and also the young ones were going to get more responsibility to feel that they were doing something more worthy of the money that they were getting paid. So, it's across industries. It's just slowly, slowly we get to hear about retail, and now we're getting to hear about being truck drivers and stuff.

NARCIS:

I mean, we need the workforce because we are growing a lot, and now we can slowly move to the second subject as well. Denmark is doing very well. We have the lowest unemployment in history and the highest employment in history. Very few people are still unemployed out there, fewer than 80,000 people. It's incredible how well we're doing. And that is reflected in the budget for last year. For example, we had a surplus of what was it—133 billion?

KALPITA:

Yeah.

NARCIS:

We, we're doing really, really well. Like, we haven't had such a good year since before the 2008, when the whole world economy failed. Right.

KALPITA:

Yeah.

NARCIS:

In 2008. So in 2007, you can, you have to go that far to find a year that went as good as now. So, that means what? Why does Denmark have so much money, right? It's because more people are employed, which means more people pay taxes. If more companies hire more people, that means they make more profit. That means they pay more corporate tax. So everyone pays more.

KALPITA:

Yeah.

NARCIS:

You know, the more people are involved in this whole doing any sort of economic activity on the territory of Denmark, it's creating money for the state. So, the state is in a really good spot right now. We have 133 billion extra that we were not accounted for. What should we do with it?

KALPITA:

I mean, the whole year so far we've been talking about defense budgets and increasing defense budgets. So, I can clearly see that this is probably going to strengthen our defence capacities. And there are requirements not just for the NATO contribution, but also for the EU budget for defence. So I'm very sure that this is going to be used and saved up. I think most of this money is also hopefully being put away for all the crisis preparedness that we are supposed to be aiming for and preparing for. So, I would assume that is also something that's going to be part of this surplus budget. But having said that, there is a growing concern for me, and maybe I'm just playing devil's advocate. For how long is this going to last, right? Because this is almost 20 years ago, when we had a better year, and after 20 years, we're having one now, and maybe this lasts until companies like Novo and Maersk are doing well. And this is also an indication of an excellent recovery after COVID. Having said that, for how long is that going to last, considering now that—much as I hate to bring it up—Trump is inducing recession in the US, and that's of course going to cascade into the rest of the world. But at the same time, we have the Russian issue, and we have an ongoing trade war. We also have the Greenland issue that's also going to affect the economy at some point. All of that considered, five years from now, 10 years from now, we are going to have more pensioners. We are going to have an older generation that's going to not be paying these heavy taxes and corporate taxes either. So I would hope that there are all those smart economists coming up with some kind of solution. Now I'm just on a rant, and I'm really coming from a personal perspective where people of my generation or the younger generation are really not able to invest in a home or have a secure future where they can invest in a home and have basic amenities, like a decent household. People are not having kids because, you know, things are going really well. But how's that, going to support the economy? I mean, it concerns me that we have a great surplus now, but five or 10 years from now, I want to know what the government would do for that.

NARCIS:

I mean, you cannot hope that every year you have a surplus. Just the idea that the government has a surplus is unique in Europe. Very few countries in Europe can say that, if any, this last year, we are in a very unique position. We are outperforming Germany, for God's sake. That's how well we are doing right now. But unfortunately, it's more usual than not that countries have to borrow money to keep up the budget instead of having a surplus. It's very unusual that a country has a surplus. It's usually that you borrow more money so that you can keep up with the deficit. Now Germany has actually voted that it will not follow the one per cent deficit. They will allow it to go further into deficits, which means that they will allow themselves to not have a surplus, but to have a debt out there because it's necessary. Germany is not performing. There is no money. So they need to invest more money to make the economy run.

KALPITA:

Yeah.

NARCIS:

It's very unique what Denmark has right now. So what scares me actually, I understand what you're saying, that money is needed in many directions. Of course, they need to put some money aside for the fact that there is this whole pension crisis coming up. They would need to put some money aside to see how we're doing with constructing more affordable housing. Also, there should be more campaigns to encourage people to get out of the cities, to be honest. There is affordable housing in Denmark if you're willing to get out of Copenhagen.

KALPITA:

Yeah.

NARCIS:

People who are unemployed can afford a house outside of Copenhagen. That's what I'm saying. You can be on unemployment benefits, both of you, and still get a house in a village somewhere in Denmark.

KALPITA:

Okay, wow.

NARCIS:

You understand? So, it is a crisis, but that crisis is. overly exaggerated in Copenhagen, in the capital. Because yes, for a million you maybe get seven meter by seven meter.

KALPITA:

Yeah. Yeah.

NARCIS:

Yeah, if you're lucky.

KALPITA:

But then it is a result of the past, I would say about five to six years, right? Because first, we went into decentralisation, and then we again came to centralisation. So now everything and everybody is concentrated on Copenhagen, and in Copenhagen, there are very few people who actually travel into Copenhagen for work. Even if there are jobs in smaller towns and villages, people are not willing to go that far, you know, because they already have a setup in Copenhagen. So, why leave that? Because, of course, prices, I mean, house values are appreciating. So, no one's going to leave a big pot of gold and just go into the village because they can.

NARCIS:

Yeah, but then to afford that big pot of gold, it's usually starting point, what, four, five, six million, eight million?

KALPITA:

Easy. Average five million anywhere, yes.

NARCIS:

Five million. I'm buying for five million, I think, a mansion here with 40 hectares of land, my own lake, my own forest, my own island!

KALPITA:

Absolutely. Yeah, three million, you can buy land and build your own place and still save out of the five million. I totally agree. But that's the thing. I mean, that was also what we spoke about last week regarding the farmers. They're also facing the pinch of people not being in the villages, and they are also not getting the attention that they want from the government. So, I would hope that there is a solution to it because, of course, people want to go into villages. I mean, the slow life is truly in villages and small towns, especially in Denmark.

NARCIS:

And to be honest, it's the best way. If you're planning to raise a family, do not raise it in the city. Go to the suburbs, find yourself a small village, you'll see that the quality of the daycare, the quality of the kindergarten, the quality of the local school, the safety, the security, all of it is top, top, top, top. Way above and 10 times better than what you'll find in the city. I know that because I am in this situation. I chose to live outside of the city, and it was the best decision ever, especially compared to my friends who chose to live in the city. And you can see the struggles they have with their children, with the system, and so on, because it is more pressure; the system in the city is facing other difficulties, while we are taking it slow here. And not just us, but also the system is much better prepared. So as an international, I cannot recommend better than to not crowd yourself with the others in the most crowded place in Denmark. But enough about money. I just hope one last thing, I just hope that people will not start thinking about reducing taxes in Denmark. We do not have such high taxes compared to the rest of Europe. It's like this weird rumour that we pay the highest taxes in Europe. We don't. We just pay what most of the other EU countries have in place as well, like France or Germany. We do not pay such high taxes. So, any idea of reducing taxes is dangerous because not only that, now, yes, we had a surplus, as I said, but as you said yourself, there are big crises coming in the future. The moment the government reduces taxes, it's very hard to come back and raise them. People will get very angry even if you decide to raise 0.01%. So, that's why I don't want us to fall for any... Because some political parties 100 will come out there and say, hey, let's reduce the taxes if possible.

KALPITA:

Now that, like every year, is the agenda? Almost?

NARCIS:

Yeah, it is, it is. I saw it in Copenhagen happening.

KALPITA:

Sorry to interrupt you, but we are also thinking about war taxes. So, I was thinking that we probably get one more percent added to our taxes instead of reduced taxes.

FIONN:

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NARCIS:

I mean, if necessary, we might have to. And that's how it is. I mean, I would prefer us getting an extra per cent added to our taxes than them cutting down benefits for unemployed people, benefits for people who are on this, I don't know, no social system, people who are handicapped. Because that's the other alternative. That's what Liberal Alliance people say, let's cut all benefits to all the weakest ones that we have in society. Great, fantastic. And instead of adding 1% to the ones who can afford it, because let's be honest, if you have an average salary in Denmark, you do fine. You can get a house, you can put money aside. You do fine.

KALPITA:

Absolutely.

NARCIS:

You do really, really fine.

KALPITA:

Yeah, I agree.

NARCIS:

So, we have capacity—our financial capacity as people living in Denmark. Of course, I do not know how it is if you live in Copenhagen. You'd know better that.

KALPITA:

No, I think it's, it's, it's not extra comfortable, but it's comfortable. Like an average salary, you can pay a home, you can get fresh groceries and premium groceries as well. You can go out for one or two meals a month and live a comfortable life.

NARCIS:

You can still put money aside. Yeah, absolutely.

KALPITA:

Put money aside.

NARCIS:

Absolutely. Sometimes I meet people from Germany, and they're like, surprised that we can do all of these things, have loans and still be able to make investments from the same salary. For them, it's shocking because they get to spend half of their salary on rent.

KALPITA:

And then come out in a surplus. So, yay.

NARCIS:

It's not just Denmark that's doing well. We all, as average families of Denmark, are doing okay. I'm not gonna say we're rich. But we are not poor either. We are fine. I think we are in a good spot. So enough about money, because I guess people can get bored listening too much about money. Let's talk about language. I know you added this subject to the list. You wanted to talk about language laws. We know that the conservatives proposed that we should have language laws in Denmark so that they create some sort of a council that should invent Danish alternatives to English words that have entered the Danish language.

KALPITA:

Yeah, it's, it's a bit tricky, to be honest, where I come from, we are having this huge language politics, in recent times. In the past three years, we've started having some serious, serious language politics. Where I come from in India, we were divided as a country based on our languages, and in the north, we have a Hindi belt where most people speak Hindi, and that's why it is our national language. But if you ask the people in the south, they don't agree with using Hindi as their national language, because that is not their language. Each state in the south has their own language and, of course, they're very proud of it, and they don't have Hindi in their school curriculum either. While in the north, the Hindi belt, people don't want to speak English because their language is Hindi, and in the South, they prefer English. So, it is very tricky to, you know, make laws where a certain language should be compulsory or a certain language should have friendly substitutes so kids and people can pick it up. I mean, take in our integration situation, right? As soon as you come into the country as a new international in Denmark, you are always offered to learn the language. And most of us, almost 80-90% of us, choose to learn the language because it's easier to understand our environment, to be friends with the locals, to understand signboards, place an order in a cafe or something like just basic things. So, I think this thing is sort of making, it's a weak choice, I think. It's something that is telling people that, oh, okay, if you can't do it, then here's another alternative, you know? But then I think you should just be pushed into it and just do it. And if that means that you take three years to learn the language, that's fine, you learn the language.

NARCIS:

But I think the language laws here are more about the fact that they're afraid that Danish is becoming "Danglish", with time. Language is evolving. Language has always evolved. And I think trying to regulate or legislate how we should speak or how young people should speak is absurd. You can come up with words and alternatives. You can try your best to use them in education and try to push them through the educational system, but you're not going to beat up TikTok or Instagram, and the language there is English, even for the Danish young kids. So it is, yes, now there are more and more words coming into the Danish language from English. I think that's the case all over the world, in all the languages. That's just the situation. We're becoming a more globalized world. We have to accept the fact that now English is slowly becoming like a language of the world, you could say, where almost every citizen of the world is expected to speak maybe their native language plus English as a package deal, right? So, it makes sense that with time, all the other languages will pick up English words, because we keep inventing things, new things appear, and new situations that they were not before. So, of course, we have to come up with words for all those things. And usually those words come from science, science is in English, science will give us further language—or comes from tech or comes from IT, which is also in English, it comes further to us, and we adopted in that language. So, it will be crazy. I mean, France tries very hard to keep up with the English words being created. But to be honest, if you ask any French people, they will find it hilarious. A lot of those words are hilarious. It's very hard. I mean, think about it. The conservatives proposed to change the word bacon to England's flæsk. What? What?

KALPITA:

I mean, to be fair, I think. I think this is also for specific words that are coming from Persian and Arabic. It. This wasn't happening when there were words from English that were being included in the Danish dictionary. I have not heard someone opposing new words until this year. And mind you, I've been here about seven, eight years, and I've never heard of anyone taking issue with it. So, I think it's becoming concerning for them because now Persian-Arabic words are also becoming part of the language. And I think it's fine. I find Persian extremely beautiful. I also find Urdu very beautiful, because they are very close to the languages we have back in India. But also to be fair, the Danish language is also expanded to the UK, including Scotland. Some of their words are very, very Danish-inspired or actually completely Danish, like "church" in Scottish and Danish is the same. "Baby" is the same as well. So, it's not that it's only languages coming into the Danish language, but the Danish language is also going outside of Denmark. Also, American words are also picking up, like "Hygge" became the word of the year or something like that a couple of years ago. So, I don't see why Denmark should complain at all about such a thing. But at the same time, I think it's also a bit against Danish core values as well. We are very open to new things; we're very open to cultural impact as well. So, I think this is a bit petty from my perspective.

NARCIS:

It's just a proposal from a small party that has 5% in the opinion polls. None of the other parties have reacted positively yet to the suggestion, and unless we see a blue government, if they find ever a candidate for prime minister, which they struggle to, we're not gonna see any such ideas being put into practice because it is about hiring more administrators, hiring more people to do administrative work. And now the government's idea is cut, cut, cut. We do not want to hire more highly educated people. Stop with that. We need more money for, you know, nurses and people like, you know, educators and whatnot, and not people with three master's degrees and two PhDs studying and thinking how to make bacon England's flæsk.

KALPITA:

Yeah, I mean, it makes complete sense because all the internationals that come into Denmark are leaving Denmark, and we're okay with them leaving. They are highly educated people, you know, but I also think that Denmark can do a good job of using the workforce that they already have in terms of. You know, accompanying spouses and other internationals.

NARCIS:

But more can be done there, of course. And it's just like a subject we can cover another time. And talking about languages, let's look at history. History is part of identity, just like languages. And something happened some time ago, a man with a metal detector. By the way, that's the crazy thing. So many people in Denmark spend time in there, like at their weekends and or after work and whatnot, going with metal detectors around simply and finding all sorts of weird things. Like a lot of people found really cool stuff from, from met gold to gold coins to God knows what. But the latest find is quite interesting because it's a bronze stamp from the year 600. Actually, the motifs on it seem to be similar to the ones found in the British Tutankhamun and the Sutton Hoo headgear. Why is this important? It's because at the moment, they think that gear is made by the Swedes, and it puts Sweden as a much earlier developed state than Denmark. But now it seems that maybe it's not actually Sweden that made that. It's Denmark. This will be incredibly interesting because you know how much Danes and Swedes love each other. It's the love of the year, in there.

KALPITA:

I cannot wait to be a fly on the wall when the Swedish and the Danes are actually discussing who is more advanced than whom.

NARCIS:

Exactly. And then why is this also important for Danish history? Because we think that Harald Bluetooth, in the year 900, actually took the first steps towards creating the Danish state. But in fact, if this is proven—they still need to get confirmation, of course, to it—that means 300 years earlier than that, Denmark existed as a power in the North States. So, that really kind of makes us rethink Danish history in general.

KALPITA:

Yeah, the news article says since the 6th century. That's a long, long time ago.

NARCIS:

Yeah, I mean, you have to be somehow into history to care about things like this, but if you're going to be taking any sort of tests in the following year about citizenship and, I don't know, permanent residence, if you're non-European, then most likely you might get a question about this man and his metal detector who found the little bronze stamp that kind of changed a little bit Danish history and put us a bit ahead of Sweden. And Danes love nothing more than to be ahead of Sweden.

KALPITA:

But I think it's incredible that, you know, we can still find pieces of history and archaeology that can date back centuries and centuries away and still make new discoveries. I think it's extremely fascinating that we can still do that. I also think that it could be a result of all the flooding and all the erosion that we are experiencing in recent times across Europe, and especially Denmark in the past two years, especially we've had some serious floods as well. So, I think these nature consequences are very fascinating.

NARCIS:

Yeah, it gets us to know our history better, of course, and in general, it's based on what we know so far. So every time we learn something new, history changes. So it's, you always have to remember that history is based on known facts and what we know until this moment. So, that's why don't be surprised if even history books change. If you look at the history books 50 years ago and a history book now about the same historical event, maybe in the last 50 years with all the new technologies, with all the maybe more people involved in archaeology and more people involved in historical analysis, maybe we learn new things about the same event, new angles, new things, and then you'll see it differently presented with different impact over history.

KALPITA:

Yeah, just not new words in the language, just that we can't have.

NARCIS:

I mean, you can have new words in language, but they cannot be in shallah. Yeah, because that will freak out the conservatives.

KALPITA:

Exactly.

NARCIS:

You know, but I think we covered the four topics for today. We went quite fast through it, but I hope you all have enjoyed our little exchange about the four main topics that we think are important in the week that has passed. Thank you so much for listening. Thank you, Kalpita, for being a great co-host.

KALPITA:

You're very welcome. I had a wonderful time. Thank you.

NARCIS:

See you soon, everyone.

KALPITA:

Bye. 

KALPITA & GOLDA:

Hey, this is Kalpita and Golda, co-hosts of the Last Week in Denmark podcast. Did you know Last Week in Denmark offers sponsored content in the newsletter? Our reporters are producing original articles and content tailored for internationals in Denmark. So, if you have a business our readers should know about, let us write about it! Get in touch with us at reporter@lwid.dk. You can also reach out to us on LinkedIn and Instagram at Last Week in Denmark.