How ‘egalitarian’ Sweden became more comfortable with wealth

Sweden is imagined as the land of equality, modesty and Jantelagen – the unwritten rule that no one should think they are better than anyone else. But there has also been a fascination within Sweden with its billionaires, especially those who abide by these dominant cultural norms.

In the case of Ingvar Kamprad, the founder of furniture giant IKEA, Swedes appreciated that he drove an old car (a Volvo, of course), engaged with employees working on the floor in his stores, and every year personally handed out Christmas gifts. His (some would say strategic) display of ordinariness made people overlook the fact that Kamprad was one of the world’s richest people and had moved to Switzerland to avoid Sweden’s high taxes.

But things have changed. The Wall Street Journal has written about Sweden’s surprising “capitalist makeover” and the Financial Times has reported on the idea the country is “overflowing with billionaires”. And in 2024 The BBC broadcast a documentary podcast called Super-rich Swedes. There are good reasons for their interest.

We think we know Sweden – a peaceful nation grounded in social democracy, natural beauty, IKEA and Abba. But in 2026, is this still the real Sweden? Ahead of the country’s general election on September 13, The Conversation UK has teamed up with its Swedish partner universities for a series of articles examining why this small nation remains so fascinating.

While for a long time Sweden was a country with some of the world’s highest taxes, this no longer applies to capital taxation. For instance, it no longer has a wealth tax, an inheritance tax or a property tax. The ideal of egalitarianism doesn’t seem to align with patterns of wealth accumulation, especially at the very top.

Forbes calculates more than 50 US-dollar billionaires in Sweden. This becomes even more extraordinary in a country of just 10.6 million people.

We used Forbes and UN data and found that in 2025 Sweden ranked fourth globally, with 4.7 dollar billionaires per million people. When excluding micro-states (fewer than one million people), Sweden is outnumbered only by Singapore (9.9), Hong Kong (9.1) and Cyprus (7.3), but before Switzerland (4.6) in fifth place. It ranks much higher than some of the world’s largest economies like the US (2.7), Germany (2.1), Canada (2.0) and the UK (0.8).

It is difficult to say for sure whether changes in regulation and wealth concentration have altered cultural norms, but there are clear indicators. Younger generations are now expressing strong materialistic values. When they rank what matters in life, earning money comes second to being with friends and far more important than being with family or getting an education.

Young Swedes and adults alike dream of building a “money machine” by investing in stocks so they can exit the labour market long before retirement. This might be surprising to some, since Sweden has long been shaped by a strong work ethic, both politically and culturally.

In research for a yet-to-be published paper, we found Swedish tabloids and business magazines show a remarkable rise in reporting about billionaires. This includes a fascination with their personal lives and framing them in positive terms such as “entrepreneurs”, “investors” and “philanthropists” (rather than “capitalists”, for example).

Awe and suspicion

This does not mean that wealth is no longer a sensitive topic in Sweden. When studying articles about billionaires in one of the country’s leading tabloids, we found an ambivalent form of “wealth porn”. In Sweden “wealth porn” tends to oscillate between celebrating it and questioning the luxurious lifestyles of billionaires.

The articles tempt readers with drone images and descriptions of lavish mansions – but they also repeatedly point out how reluctant the billionaires are to display and talk about their wealth. This frames the topic as socially sensitive and sometimes even dangerous to the billionaires’ personal safety. Readers are invited to fantasise about life as a billionaire – the transgressive act of breaking Jantelagen adds spice to the fantasy.

This kind of “wealth porn” remains focused on the moral issues around conspicuous consumption. Even though Sweden has long been a model of social democracy, the processes through which billionaires accumulate fortunes, and the political influence such wealth can generate, largely escape scrutiny.

Swedes’ ambivalence towards billionaires is also illustrated in a recent survey we conducted with a representative sample of the population. We asked people a set of questions about their views on money and wealth – it turned out that many find money a strong personal motivator. These people supported statements like “to have a lot of money is an important driver for me”. This suggests there is no social taboo around trying to get rich.

People also said money matters socially, as they largely supported statements like “money gives status and respect”. This indicates that hiding personal wealth may not be so important. In fact, displaying it might bring social benefits – being seen as a successful entrepreneur and someone to look up to, for example. We also asked about caps on wealth, but found strong support for statements like “one can never have too much money”.

While this indicates that Swedes value wealth, they still hold an ambiguous relationship with the super-rich. People reacted strongly against seeing the rich as “good role models for others”.

Striving to get rich seems to have become more socially acceptable in Sweden. Perhaps it always has been the way, but Swedes just never spoke about it (at least not in public). Actually being rich remains a contested topic. If Jantelagen still exerts any influence, it seems to be centred on shaping attitudes towards the wealthy themselves – rather than as a force to discourage the pursuit of wealth.

Håkan Johansson, Professor of Social Work, Lund University and Axel Vikström, Senior Lecturer, Department of Communication, Lund University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.