Illustration by Tag Hartman-Simkins / Futurism. Source: Joe Raedle / Getty Images
On the campaign trail leading up to his election in 2024, Donald Trump made a plenty of bizarre promises that have fallen by the wayside. Arguably the strangest one he’s still harping about? Greenland — a massive island in the Arctic Ocean, currently a territory of Denmark, that he desperately wants to seize.
Geopolitical analysts and pundits have spilled plenty of ink over the past year trying to come up with some rational explanation for Trump’s obsession with the idea. One of the simplest, the New York Times suggests — yet somehow the most cynical — has to do with the scientific certainty that Greenland’s ice will soon melt away.
From September 2024 to September 2025, Greenland lost a staggering 105 billion metric tons of ice, according to researchers at the Danish Meteorological Institute.Between 1985 and 2022, Greenland’s ice sheet has shrunk by some 2,000 square miles. These trends are sure to continue in the years to come.
Beneath all that ice and permafrost is a veritable treasure trove of minerals like graphite, zinc, and rare earths. Basically, as the climate warms and Greenland’s ice melts, more and more of those minerals will become available for extraction.
In a nakedly empire-building type of way, in other words, Greenland makes perfect sense. The only problem? Publicly, Trump disparages the very notion of climate change — meaning that if really does understand the wealth of resources that the phenomenon is opening up in colder parts of the world, he’s fibbing to his base for jaded political reasons.
“His fixation on Greenland is an admission that climate change is real,” John Conger, an advisor to the Center for Climate and Security told the NYT.
If Trump or his advisors really are intrigued by Greenland because they’re anticipating a thawing world,that puts them in good company with Trump’s longstanding allies in Russia, where the ruling oligarchy is said to be banking on a similar strategy for the country’s immense frozen expanses.
If it sounds convoluted, it’s only because other explanations for Trump’s North Atlantic fixation just don’t add up.
As economic historian and analyst Adam Tooze explains, the US has a long-standing Cold War treaty with Denmark giving the US military carte blanche to do whatever it wants on Greenland’s territory. As such, there’s no national security justification for why the US needs to own Denmark outright.
“If Greenland isn’t currently adequately defended, it might be to do with the fact that America has completely run down multiple military bases it used to maintain on Greenland during the Cold War,” Tooze said on a recent episode of his podcast Ones and Tooze.
Oil — the classic raison d’être for US intervention on foreign soil — also doesn’t apply here. (Nor Venezuela, for that matter.)
In 2021, the governing body of Greenland stopped granting oil exploration licenses, the NYT notes, due to “climate considerations, environmental considerations and economic common sense.” That news came after 50 years of unsuccessful attempts to strike black gold in the icy waters off the island’s coast, meaning oil is a very unlikely motivation.
At the end of the day, we probably won’tknow the administration’s true motivations for Greenland unless they actually pull the trigger — though if Venezuela is any indication, a straight answer is far from guaranteed.
I’m a tech and transit correspondent for Futurism, where my beat includes transportation, infrastructure, and the role of emerging technologies in governance, surveillance, and labor.
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For much of the 20th century, Sweden enjoyed a justifiable reputation as one of Europe’s most egalitarian countries. Yet over the past two decades, it has transformed into what journalist and author Andreas Cervenka calls a “paradise for the super-rich”.
Today, Sweden has one of the world’s highest ratios of dollar billionaires, and is home to numerous “unicorn” startup companies worth at least US$1 billion (£742 million), including the payment platform Klarna and audio streaming service Spotify.
The abolition of the wealth tax (förmögenhetsskatten) 20 years ago is part of this story – along with, in the same year, the introduction of generous tax deductions for housework and home improvement projects. Two decades on, the number of Swedish homes that employ cleaners is one marker of it being an increasingly two-tier country.
This trend has been coupled with a gradual shrinking of the welfare state. Many of my interviewees regret that Sweden no longer has a collective project to build a more cohesive society.
“Us pensioners can see the destruction of what we built, what was started when we were small children,” Kjerstin, 74, explained. “I was born after the end of the war and built this society through my life, together with my fellow citizens. [But] with taxes being lowered and the taking away of our social security … we’re not building anything together now.”
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Sweden’s gini coefficient, the most common way to measure inequality, has reached 0.3 in recent years (with 0 reflecting total equality and 1 total inequality), up from around 0.2 in the 1980s. The EU as a whole is at 0.29. “There are now 42 billionaires in Sweden – it’s gone up a lot,” Bengt, 70, told me. “Where did they come from? This didn’t used to be a country where people could easily become this rich.”
But like other pensioners I met, Bengt acknowledged his peer group’s role in this shift. “I belong to a generation that remembers how we built Sweden to become a welfare state, but so much has changed. The thing is, we didn’t protest this. We didn’t realise we were becoming this country of rich people.”
Opposite of the American dream
Wealth taxation was introduced in Sweden in 1911, with the amount due based initially on a combination of wealth and income. Around the same time, some of the first moves towards the Swedish welfare state were made – notably, the introduction of the state pension in 1913.
The term used to describe this, folkemmet (“the people’s home”), denoted comfort and security for all in equal measure. It was arguably the ideological opposite of the American dream – its aims not exceptionalism but reasonable living standards and universal services.
After the second world war, the wealth tax – now separated from income – was raised again in several steps up to a historical high of a 4% marginal rate for wealthy individuals in the 1980s, although actual tax burden is is less clear due to complex exemption rules. But total revenues generated from the tax were still relatively low. As a share of Sweden’s annual GDP, it never exceeded 0.4% in the postwar period.
By the end of the 1980s, the political winds were starting to change in Sweden, in line with the shift to privatisation of public services and deregulation of financial markets in several European countries, including the UK under Margaret Thatcher, and the US.
One recurrent criticism of Sweden’s wealth tax was that it was regressive, taxing middle-class wealth (mainly housing and financial assets) while exempting the wealthiest people who owned large firms or held high-up positions in listed companies. Another criticism was that the wealth tax drove tax avoidance, especially in the form of capital flight to offshore tax havens.
‘We’re not building anything together now: one of the author’s interviewees in their home in Stockholm. Miranda Sheild Johansson, Author provided (no reuse)
While a wealth tax might appear to signal their country’s commitment to socioeconomic equality, my interviewees said it wasn’t something they really thought about much until it was abolished in 2006 by Sweden’s then-rightwing government, following the axing of inheritance tax a year earlier by the previous social democratic government.
“When the wealth tax was abolished,” Marianne, 77, told me, “I wasn’t thinking about millionaires being given a handout, because … we didn’t have lots of rich aristocrats who owned everything. Abolishing the wealth and inheritance tax seemed like a practical thing, not so political.”
Marianne and other pensioners I talked to all told a story of the welfare state having been built through communal effort, as opposed to it being a Robin Hood project – of taking from the rich to give to the poor. This notion of the Swedish welfare state as having been built by equals, by an initial largely rural and poor population, arguably distracted these pensioners from questions of wealth accumulation.
While Sweden still taxes property and various forms of capital income, in hindsight, many of my elderly interviewees now regard the abolition of the wealth tax “on their watch” as a crucial step in reshaping Swedish society away from a social democracy welfare state towards something new – a place of billionaires and increased social disintegration.
“I think about my children, my two daughters who are working and have young families,” Jan, 72, told me. “As children, they were provided for by the welfare state, they went to good schools and had access to football and drama class and the dentist – but now I worry that society is going to get worse for them.”
As with others I spoke to, Jan showed regret at his own role in this change. “I now think that is partly my fault,” he said. “We got lazy and complacent, thought the Swedish welfare state was secure, didn’t worry about abolishing the wealth tax, didn’t think it was going to change anything … but I think it has.”
‘A society that is more humane’
My research suggests the impacts of wealth taxes, or absence of them, are not only about fiscal revenue streams and wealth redistribution. They have wider social ramifications, and can be foundational to people’s vision of society.
In Sweden at least, the question today isn’t just whether wealth taxes work or not, but about what kind of society they project – one of folkhemmet, or a paradise for the rich.
“Tax was just natural [when] I grew up in the 1950s,” Kjerstin recalled. “I remember thinking when I was in second grade, that I will always be taken care of, that I didn’t ever have to worry.”
Reflecting on how different living in Sweden feels today, she said: “Now people don’t want to pay tax – sometimes even I don’t want to pay tax. Everyone is thinking about what they get back and how to get rich, instead of about building something together.”
“I don’t think you can say: ‘I pay this much in taxes and therefore I should get the same back.’ Instead, you should pay attention to the fact that you live in a society that is more humane, where everyone knows from second grade they’ll be taken care of.”
The Rundown: Canada just slashed its 100% tariff on Chinese EVs to 6.1%, opening a new North American portal for BYD, Geely, and Xiaomi — and putting fresh pressure on the U.S. to respond.
The details:
Prime Minister Mark Carney announced the tariff cut alongside an initial cap of 49K vehicles annually, rising to about 70K within five years.The move comes as the EU weighs lowering its own Chinese EV tariffs, and Trump said he’s open to Chinese automakers building U.S. factories.Chinese EV exports to Mexico boomed in 2025, and Geely showcased vehicles at CES with executives hinting at a U.S. market entry within two to three years.Tesla may be the first winner, with its Shanghai plant already configured to export Canadian-specific Model Ys and with 39 stores already operating there.
Why it matters: Canada just became a test market for Chinese EVs on America’s doorstep — giving U.S. consumers a front-row seat to the cars they can’t buy. If BYD and Geely start winning fans in Toronto and Vancouver, Washington’s 100% tariff wall might be a lot harder to justify.
At Davos, WEF co-chair and BlackRock CEO Larry Fink openly acknowledges that global "elites" have lost public trust, and now face an uncomfortable reality in an age of populism and "deep institutional mistrust".
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink at the 2025 World Economic Forum in Davos. Photo: Fabrice Coffrini / AFP via Getty Images
DAVOS, Switzerland — BlackRock CEO Larry Fink will open the World Economic Forum with a blunt acknowledgment that Davos — and the economic system it represents — is facing a crisis of legitimacy.
Why it matters: As thousands of executives and global leaders descend on the Swiss Alps for a week of cocktails and canapés, WEF’s interim co-chair will warn that the prosperity they celebrate has left too many people behind.
Outside of the United Nations, this year’s conference marks “the largest gathering of global leadership of the post-COVID era,” Fink will say in his opening remarks Tuesday.
“But now for the harder question,” he’ll add. “Will anyone outside this room care?”
The big picture: Fink, who inherits the mantle of “mayor of Davos” from WEF founder Klaus Schwab, is casting this year’s forum as an elite gathering struggling for relevance in an age of populism and deep institutional distrust.
“Many of the people most affected by what we talk about here will never come to this conference,” Fink will acknowledge.
“Prosperity isn’t just growth in the aggregate. It can’t be measured by GDP or the market caps of the world’s largest companies alone. It has to be judged by how many people can see it, touch it, and build a future on it.”
Between the lines: Fink believes the AI revolution — a theme of virtually every pavilion on the Davos promenade — will pose the ultimate test of whether capitalism can deliver prosperity beyond its traditional winners.
“Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, more wealth has been created than in all prior human history combined,” the world’s most powerful asset manager will say. Most of it has accrued to the kinds of people who attend Davos.
“Now AI threatens to replay the same pattern,” Fink will warn. “If AI does to white-collar work what globalization did to blue-collar, we need to confront that directly.”
What to watch: Fink’s remarks set the stage for a week in which Davos’ elite consensus will be tested by populist politics — including President Trump’shigh-profile return.
Fink is also calling for more dialogue — arguing that the forum must listen to, not lecture, the people and perspectives it has traditionally excluded.
“Davos, yes. But also places like Detroit and Dublin,” Fink will say, promising to take WEF’s conversations beyond the Alpine bubble. “The mountain will come down to earth.”
🚨 WOW! An emergency room physician just revealed that since President Trump took office, he went from seeing a DOZEN fentanyl overdoses daily to just 1-2
Raul Garcia: "Sometimes we even go 3 days with NO fentanyl overdose!" 👏🏻
Image source: Ideogram / The Rundown
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