Welfare State Myth

Stefan Fölster has been the Chief Economist for the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise, affiliate Professor in Economics at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm and director of the Reform Institute, a think tank based in Stockholm with a focus on innovative reforms. He has authored many academic articles and books, including Renaissance for Reforms (co-authored with Nima Sanandaji), published in 2015 by the Institute of Economic Affairs in London. He is also very active in the wider economic discourse with columns and newspaper articles. Two of his other books, co-authored with Dag Detter, are The Public Wealth of Nations (Palgrave Macmillan), which was listed among the best books of 2015 in The Economist and the Financial Times, and The Public Wealth of Cities, published in 2017 by the Brookings Institution.Dr Nima Sanandaji is an Iranian–Swedish author of Kurdish descent. He has a background in the natural sciences, carrying out research in biotechnology, structural biochemistry and physical chemistry at the University of Cambridge and the Chalmers University of Technology. He holds two technology PhDs from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm in the field of confined space crystallisation, with some of the research carried out at the University of California Santa Barbara. Dr Sanandaji has published 32 books on the history and evolution of capitalism, healthcare, innovation, entrepreneurship, women’s career opportunities, and the future of the ­Nordic welfare states. He is the president of the think tank ECEPR (European Centre for Entrepreneurship and ­Policy Reform).