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I've been Binge Watching a Norwegian TV Series State of Happiness about the birth of the Norwegian Oil Industry beginning with the discovery of North Sea Oil back in 1969.  It's fictionalized of course for dramatic purposes, but several of the characters are real life people.

It depicts very well how the Norwegian Socialists kept control over their Oil and fought off the international Oil companies to keep most of the wealth for the Norwegian peopple.  One can only speculate what the condition of Amerikan economics might be today had we controlled Oil development here in a similar manner.  Instead of a $30T national debt, we'd probably have a Sovereign Wealth Fund orders of magnitude larger than the Norwegians.

Series Finale this week. Highly recommendded for Oil History buffs and fans of Socialism. 😀

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[RE]

Finally saw the last 2 episodes of the Norweegian Oil History drama, which finishes off in the 1980s, so it covered roughly the first 20 years of North Sea Oil development, which is unnfortunately less than half the story in a chronological sense.  I'd really enjoy seeing a sequel series covering thee post millenium development.  It leaves off just as the Vikings aree trying to figure out how to avoid Dutch Economic disease and how to avoid becoming too reliant on a finite resourse to drive their economy.  Economically speaking, that's at least as interesting as the first 20 years.

Anyhow, the production values, writing and acting kept their quality up through to the end, and the main characters mostly had happily ever after endings.  At the end the heroine Anna takes leave from her succesful drilling tech startup company and goes back to work as chief economist for the state Oil fund.  She's kind of conflicted about her own financial success while her company's products are automating workers off the platforms.

Still gets 4.5*s as a must watch for oil historry buffs.

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