Luxembourg

(The World Factbook, 2011)

Today I thought I would take a look at a country that I know very little about, but have heard multiple times that it is a highly developed country. One of my friends is actually hoping to move there in a few years, as he says, "it's awesome" and it really does look lovely. I'm talking about Luxembourg for those of you who weren't able to tell from the title. While looking up information on Luxembourg's government, schooling, etc. I came across some interesting facts from the national geographic website (National Geographic). Luxembourg is a land locked country in Western Europe, its population is 78, and the literacy percent is 100 (woo! It's nice to see such a great number after last weeks rather depressing post on Sierra Leone). There are roughly 457,000 people living in Luxembourg, so when you think about it there really aren't that many people. Which would make sense seeing as it is only 988 square miles, now compare that to Canada's 3.8 million square miles; pretty big difference if I do say so myself (Encyclopedia of the Nations, Canada).

Okay, now I'll get into the nitty gritty government information. Luxembourg has a constitutional monarchy, (U.S. Department of State, Sep 24 2010) which means that a monarch acts as the head of state, but must act within the paremeters of a written constitutions. In a constituional monarchy there is also a prime minister, who is the head of government and holds political power. A constitutional monarchy differs from an absolute monarchy, as an absolute monarch is not bound by a constitution and holds all political power. Through my research I came to the conclusion that the citizens of Luxembourg do not currently have any large problems with their government; I'm sure there are some people who are not satisfied with the prime minster, but that is to be expected. We don't all love Stephen Harper over here (thank God) but we are still able to be a productive and advanced country. I feel as though this is the case for Luxembourg, at least as far as I can tell. I believe that countries that are allowed to elect a president or prime minister are generally better off and more developed, as the people in these countries are more content with their government and are less likely to rebel against it.

The education system in Luxembourg is seemingly very well run and accesible to everyone, at least up until post secondary education, then, like Canada, it becomes expensive. In Luxembourg education is mandatory for eleven years, in which there are two years of pre primary education, six years of primary education, and three years of secondary education. I really like the fact that education is compulsory for eleven years, and that transportation to school is free (State University.com, 2011). This definitely enables children who lack transportation a fair chance to attend school. As I said at the beginnning of this post, Luxembourgs literacy rate is 100 percent, which is wonderful! This certainly contributes to the fact that Luxembourg is a well developed country, as the people are well educated and able to advance to higher education, thus granting them well paying jobs and jobs that contribute to the government, healthcare system, etc.

A beautiful view of Luxembourg (wine pages, 2008)

Now lets move on to gender equality in Luxembourg. Now, I wasn't able to find a great deal on women's rights/gender equality and I think that's because Luxembourg really supports gender equality. Something that I think is wonderful is the fact that women are treated equally to men under the law, and men are severely punished if they abuse a woman. I believe this is a major difference to many of the less developed countries, as many times women are not protected under the law in terms of abuse, and if they are the laws are not well enforced. Something that did bother me however was the fact that women are supposed to be given equal pay to men, but it was found that they are receiving 14 to 16 percent less than men for the same amount of work (U.S. Department of State, Feb 25 2009). This should not be happening, especially in a developed country.    Hopefully over time this difference will decrease until there is no pay difference at all.

To conclude I have to say that although Luxembourg is in a completely different region of the world than canada, it seems quite similar, what with the education system and government. I am going to make the assumption that gender equality in Luxembourg is also very similar to Canada's. Yet I will definitely be reading more about it and will hopefully be able to update you all on my findings. I just really wanted to get this posted because I've been working on it for a few days and it's getting quite long! Have a good day everyone, and talk to you soon!

Oh, and before I sign off, here is a short video on tourist attractions in Luxembourg. It looks so beautiful, and you can really see how well developed it is by watching this.

(youtube, Travel Guide: Luxembourg- Top Attractions, May 11 2010)