The Media Welfare State: Nordic Media in the Digital Era by Syvertsen Trine & Enli Gunn & Mjøs Ole J. & Moe Hallvard

Author:Syvertsen, Trine & Enli, Gunn & Mjøs, Ole J. & Moe, Hallvard
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The University of Michigan Press
Published: 2018-05-15T00:00:00+00:00

An Equal and Secure Source of Income

A further indication of the central role that the public service broadcasters continue to play in Nordic societies is the fact that they retain an equal and secure funding source. Up until recently, this funding across the region has been in the form of a traditional broadcasting license fee. In Iceland, the license fee was abolished in 2007 and the RÚV also takes advertising. In 2013, Finland introduced a specific YLE tax to be paid by everyone 18 or older, regardless of set ownership and media use (Ala-Fossi 2012). The remaining Nordic public service broadcasters, NRK, DR, and the three Swedish ones, all belong to a rare breed that have retained the license fee as the dominant form of revenue. In one case, the license fee has been extended, as in 2007 Denmark changed it to a media fee that covered all terminals capable of receiving audio-visual content—including personal computers and smartphones. More importantly, the four larger Nordic countries, Finland included, keep the broadcasting corporations comparatively well funded and free from regular radio and television advertising.

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Figure 4.1 shows that the fees in the Nordic countries are comparatively high: Over €200 annually, and over €300 annually in Denmark and Norway. Such calculations are problematic, since they neither include VAT (which differs from 0 percent in Germany to 25 percent in Denmark), nor the numbers of nonpayers. Statistics from 2007 show that while license-fee evasion across the Nordic region was below 12 percent, many more ride for free elsewhere: In several European states, including Serbia and Italy, the numbers of evaders surpassed 35 percent (Berg and Lund 2012). Such differences clearly impact on the actual finances of public service broadcasting and also testify to the high degree of legitimacy and strong societal position of the Nordic institutions.

The license fee is a technical way of funding that has been closely linked from the beginning with the conception of broadcasting as a public good. In the same way that everybody was entitled to water, roads, electricity, and sewage, broadcasting was seen as a cultural and informational good that should be available to all. Since the cost to the individual consumer only depended on whether or not they had a television set, the scheme implied a massive cross-subsidy from those living in central areas to those living in sparsely populated Page 79 → areas and in the periphery, as well as from those who used the service less to those who used it more (e.g., the elderly and people with lower incomes). The principle of universality and affordability implied pressure on the government to keep the cost down, but as a universal service the fee was set high enough to provide comprehensive programming in all genres. In this sense, the change into media-neutral fees that also cover personal computer and smartphone ownership, or even specific taxes such as seen in Finland and Germany (Moe 2012b), should be seen as an extension of the traditional license fee.

However, the

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