What does norway pay pharmacists in the us currency?

Question

I want to live in Norway, but i am afraid of the whole money issue. Would it be easier to pursue the pharmaceutical career in norway with high gas, food, living, costs, or just stand living in the us with lower costs? Are people nice in norway? Where is the best city to live? Are children well behaved? like is there a big drug problem in some areas?Sorry so many questions I've tried looking these questions up on google, but i found nothing so i thought asking here might be easier because i can at least hope someone will answer.

Answer 1

1 Norwegian Kroner = US$0.19 ($1.00US = 5.41Kr)

1 Kr = €0.13 (€1.00=7.99Kr)

How much you'd earn would probably depend on just where you would be living in Norway.  I have never been to Norway, though I understand that Norwegians are indeed very nice people, so I'd assume that their children would be rather well-behaved, but that would probably depend upon a lot of factors.  Children are, after all, children.  Norway, like all European countries, does have a drug problem, but I am not sure how extensive it is or if the problem is concentrated in particular areas.  We all know that cities tend to harbor such a difficult problem, but I've never heard that the violence associated with drug trafficking is as prevalent in Norway as it is, for example, in the United States.

Answer 2

You can find some listings for pharmacy-related jobs at the Labor Administration website:

http://www.nav.no/jobbsok

(Select "Helse, omsort, medesin og biologi" and then "Farmasøytisk og apotekerarbeid")

While most of the listings don't include wage information, a few of the ones for pharmaceutical researchers do, because the salaries are to some extent set by the state.  It should give you a good idea, because wages tend to be a bit flat, thanks to the socialist-leanings of the economy.  State wages for a pharmaceutical researcher are between 371,000 and 487,000 NOK, depending on experience.  That's equivalent to around $67,454 to $88,545 USD (obviously varying with the exchange rate, since the dollar has gained over 8% against the NOK in the first half of this year).

However, just knowing the dollar amount doesn't help much, since the cost of living is so much higher.  Also, taxes are quite high and are usually at least 40%.  For a very general idea of the purchasing power of that dollar amount, you can use a basic US relocation cost of living converter with your current location and New York City in place of Norway.  While Norway is technically more expensive than NYC, the numbers come out well enough for a basic idea.  So if you put the current location as NYC and your location as the destination, you'll get a basic equivalent salary in your current home.

http://www.bestplaces.net/COL/

Chances are that the number you come up with is surprisingly low.  As I mentioned, the pay structure in Norway is extremely flat, so that many people in many industries make surprisingly similar salaries, while pharmacists have one of the higher salaries in the US.  Also, Norway isn't a particularly materialistic society, so there's less emphasis on buying lots of "stuff."  However, that's not to say they don't spend money!  Since health care, education, some retirement benefits, etc are paid for by the government, there isn't a lot of incentive to save like there is in the US, so many Norwegians will spend almost there entire salary with very little in savings.

As for your other questions...

People are nice, but reserved.  They are generally helpful, sincere, and kind, but especially in the more rural areas, they may not be especially outgoing and outsiders often have difficulty getting to know people.  This is less of a problem in the cities, where there are bigger communities and more influx from different parts of the country and world.

The best city would depend on your tastes.  Oslo is the only place that could be considered a "big city" but it's still quite small compared to most other parts of the world.  It has the most multicultural feel, the seat of the government, and the cultural benefits of being the nation's capital.  As the largest city, it also has the biggest crowds, the most crime, etc.  Thankfully, there is still not much in the way of crowds and crime, but it's certainly more compared to the rest of Norway.

Bergen and Trondheim are the next biggest cities.  While Oslo is still quite green, these cities are even more so.  They have smaller buildings, more natural landscape, fewer people, etc.  The southwest coast has a more temperate climate with lots of rain and mild winters.  The fourth largest city is Stavanger, which is the headquarters of many of the international oil companies.  Because of this, it has a very international society for such a small city.

I think the children are generally well-behaved, although the teenagers do seem to run a bit wild.  I think the Russ tradition is a pretty representative example of this, with graduates running all over the city, consuming copious amounts of alcohol, and riding around all night blaring the stereos in their speaker-laden Russ Buses:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russ

There is certainly some drug use, and there are a few areas of downtown Oslo that have more issues than others, but I wouldn't say there's too much of a problem anywhere.

Answer 3

Norway and the Netherlands are two very different countries ....