Economically

It's because supply-side economics is a scam and proven falsehood.

The idea that somehow giving individuals and companies who already have all the money and all the credit they could ever want to invest, will invest more if you give them even more, is logically unsupportable and we see it doesn't work in practice via the Bush tax cuts resulting in years of job loses, whilst a stimulus package only a fraction of the size of the Bush tax cuts has resulted in over three years of job growth.

The idea that there is some kind of magical spell that means money from government cannot be invested the same way as money from business is just mythical retardation. The money doesn't grow horns and wings and fly aways once it's in government hands.

And when a government is run efficiently, because by nature it is not for profit, it can provide more services, for cheaper, while employing more people.

Healthcare, investing in infrastructure, and investing in education cost less when done socially and result in a happier, richer, more successful society.

The only way to get a group of people to ignore this fact, that we can see every single day, which we actually used to get out of the Great Depression right here, which we see successful examples of around the world

is to 1. demonize the idea by calling it something it is not, "socialism" or "communism." 2. Misinform the population about our own history and about places like Sweden and Finland. 3. instill through repedition a knee-jerk reaction to ignore at best but more likely show disdain for anything like what I'm writing right now.

Climate and/or geography.

First, Scandinavia are individual countries.

Second, Scandinavia countries are not socialist, it is merely an welfare state.

The strength of the Scandinavian countries are economically free oriented with markets where Denmark ranks #11, The Netherlands ranks #15 and Sweden ranks #21. Economic Freedom

Economics wise, pursuit of private industries has proven to increase overall national wealth. this is why Russia's private agricultural sector accounted for 27% of the country's food even though it was only 1% of the agriculture (in that, 99% was public yet could only contribute to 77& of the food. Private farms were producing far more food, because supply and demand actually works...).

Also why China's economy went from failing to one of the fastest growing and powerful economies in the world in only a matter of decades. While China maintains their Totalitarian regime, they have allowed the free trade of the individuals (generally, you have to support your government to not be infringed upon).

What many have found about Scandinavia is the issue of income inequality. In the US, income equality is much higher than in Scandinavian countries. However, resources and goods are much more prevalent in the US than in Scandinavia because of the powerful private industry.

Another reason for income inequality is government's constant involvement with choosing winners and losers and creating barriers to entry that have hurt small business and benefited large business. The massive amount of taxation, regulations, and market restrictions have made many small businesses bankrupt. As well, stimulus packages and bailouts take all of these tax dollars (much collected from both small and large businesses) and give them to the corporations that are failing. US government is in bed with business, and giving it so much power will only continue the trend.

As for happiness, even apologists admit that this is not a very black and white issue. The apologists in the link have found that Scandinavia has a very high suicide rate, yet they have the highest happiness rate. How interesting.

A main reason for this would be the lack of wealth and resources within Scandinavia. A weak private sector has a weak overall wealth rate.

What we can do to fix most of these issues that we see is to keep government away from the market. Allow individuals to pursuit their own happiness and entrepreneurship so that they can create jobs and wealth for everyone. Allow businesses to fail (especially the corporations that government has spoon-fed with its power all this time).

And most importantly, stop believing that giving an elite group of people power over everyone is actually a good idea. We've progressed past Monarchism and have written a Constitution guaranteeing that government should remain as small as possible. Maybe it's just the greedy Founding Fathers, or maybe Classical Liberalism is actually a good idea.

The citizens of Scandinavia are well educated and do not engage in violence, thus, a flourishing society.