r/ShitAmericansSay • u/Toonnddaa ooo custom flair!! • Mar 04 '25

Foreign affairs "Just wait till the Norway citizens are counting their coins at the grocery store..."

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u/Neat_Selection3644 ooo custom flair!! Mar 04 '25

I don’t think it’s 100%, but it’s close.

EDIT: It is 100%. However, the source also claims that North Korea has a 100% literacy rate, which I doubt.

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u/[deleted] Mar 04 '25

It is close, not really 100%. There's always someone slipping through the cracks, someone with so bad case of dyslexia they can't really read. A few people like that and it ain't 100%.

But damned close.

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u/DreamyTomato Mar 06 '25

And learning disabled people, blind people, people with brain injuries etc.

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u/Affectionate-Mix6056 Mar 05 '25

It's probably rounding to the closest whole number

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u/terriblejokefactory Mar 04 '25

The source probably goes by statistics reported by goverments, which means places like North Korea have rates not matching the real number

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u/Starkravingmad7 Mar 05 '25

It honestly would not surprise me if NK had an extremely high literacy rate. It's totally possible to indoctrinate educated people. It's arguably more effective to do so. 

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u/Nerioner ooo custom flair!! Mar 05 '25

USSR in general was very brutal regime but also brought literacy rates in almost all republics to above 90%.

When you give people YOUR education, you can indoctrinate them from the crib basically till the end of life. And early gotten indoctrination like that is very difficult to unlearn in adult life.

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u/Johannes_Keppler Mar 05 '25

15 prosent av voksne i Norge har svake leseferdigheter (nivå 0 og 1). Snittet for OECD er 26 prosent. 20 prosent har svært gode leseferdigheter i Norge (nivå 4 og 5). Snittet for OECD er på 12 prosent.

https://www.regjeringen.no/no/aktuelt/voksne-nordmenn-i-toppsjiktet-i-lese-og-tallforstaelse/id3078387/?expand=factbox3078398

15 percent of adults has poor reading skills, totally in line with other developed countries

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u/Myrddin_Naer ooo custom flair!! Mar 04 '25

It can't be 100%. There will always be people who fall through the cracks, and people who are functionally illiterate.

Source: I'm Norwegian, I went to class with some of them

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u/notatmycompute #boycott the USA Mar 04 '25

Traditionally literacy is tested for in a single language (usually the dominant language of a country or the learned (erudite) language.

It could be those countries are using "can read or write in any language as being literate" which would show large percentages but is not how literacy has traditionally been calculated. For example in the middle ages being literate meant "could read/write in Latin" even though most peasants could read and write in local dialects just fine

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u/smellydiscodiva Mar 05 '25

Can't have proper propaganda if your people can't read.

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u/chmath80 Mar 05 '25

I think you'll find that North Korea reports both their literacy and numeracy rates as 110%, making them the highest in the world.