Although jeg har ikke begynt å jobbe (I haven´t started working) yet (and probably won´t  for another month-I finally applied for my arbeidstillatelse (work visa) today, I have the sense that there can´t be many other countries in the world that boast the kind of labor laws that Norway does.

The Norwegian arbeidsdag (work day) is i gjennomsnitt (on average) 37.5 timer (hours) and cannot exceed 8 timer per day.  Most Americans I know work quite a bit more than 40 timer per week-maybe not so much in the current økonomi (economy), but otherwise, yes.  Most butikker (stores), tjenester (services), and skoler (schools) don´t start/open until sometime after 8 in the morning and they stenger (close) around 4pm, maybe 6pm.  So the arbeidsdag and skoledag is much shorter here than it is in the U.S. for example.

Perhaps the most attractive perk of working in Norway is the amount of ferie (vacation) one receives.  Arbeidstakere (employees) are granted 1 month and 1 day of vacation every year and up to 16 days of paid sykemelding (sick leave).  I worked at my last job in the U.S. for almost 2 years and I got 10 days of paid ferie and could take up to 8 days of sykemelding.  So, I got about half of the perks in the U.S. than I would get if I worked a normal full-time job here in Norway.  I will be working as a lærervikar (substitute teacher), so I get the liberty of choosing when I want to work and when I want to have ferie, I just don´t get paid for the time that I don´t work.

Oh, and another unbelievable thing the Norwegian state does for it´s sick arbeidstakere who suffer from psoriasis, for example, is get this-sends them to the south (Spain or Greece, somewhere warm) so they can be treated by the sun.  That would NEVER happen in the U.S. as far as I know.

As far as protection for arbeidstakere, Norwegian labor laws strictly forbid any sort of discrimination based on religion, ethnicity, national origin, gender, etc.  The majority of arbeidstakere in Norway belong to a union and are entitled to mandatory mediation in labor disputes.

I want to start working!!