Swedish legislation

It is relatively well known around the world that Sweden is one of those countries leading the way in the "war on discrimination", as mr Bush would probably put it. Above all, it is perhaps on the women's rights front that Sweden has been most successful. But the battle, it seems, is far from won. A new Swedish law will make it illegal for, say, hairdressers to charge women more than men. The length of the hair as well as the amount of time put in will from now on form the basis of hairdressers' pricing in this country. This is effectively the last nail in the coffin for fixed prices as hairdressers will now most likely operate with "from SEK...prices". This, of course, is on collision course with Swedish consumer legislation which states that a customer is always entitled to know the price before the purchase...

Bringing the war on discrimination to this level, the government has perhaps gone so far that it seems that the time has come to combat other types of discrimination, namely the horrible thing of discrimination against men. A new bill will end the practice of having different age limits for men and women at (mostly) nightclubs. Effectively Swedish men will now be able to pick up girls their own age everywhere when going out on a Saturday.

Another thing which will be history are the "subsidised" taxi fares for girls taking a cab home after a night out. It seems not to matter that making cabs more affordable was introduced to reduce rape incidents. In the future the only alternative will be reduced fare for people taking a cab on their own, probably very popular with taxi firms.