I was using the OECD databases, except I was not using 2005 PPP to compare 2013 gdp. Which is what is in your link. Setting the exact same table to compare against the US as the hundred percent baseline gives a number for Norway of 130.2 Which isn't what I got from the table I was using, so obviously the OECD doesn't agree with itself at all times o,O Oh well.
Further checking the OECD quickly, no, the lead isn't down to petroleum alone - absurdly high in all sectors, save agriculture. Which is mostly down to Norway being an idiotic place to grow crops. And that lead is growing, so it is not a legacy - their current policies are successes.
If oil has anything to do with it I strongly suspect that it is via indirect political effects - No Norvegian politician can implement austerity or embark on a campaign to suppress wage growth due to the oil money, so the country doesn't shoot it's own economy in the knee on a regular basis like the rest of the west does.
But never mind statistics. Do you have issues with the basic logic? "Policies that remove gender based barriers to employment are good for the economy, due to the basic fact of life that housewife is a ludicrously low-productivity job sector". Heck, near as I can tell, a good chunk of the wealth gain's of the past 50 years has mostly been the working out of the productivity implications of household appliances - 2 income households are possible because the electric stove, the refrigerator and the vaccum means keeping house isn't a full time job.
Re: Being poorer than the US due to smaller size. That isn't how people use the word rich. Depending on which statistics you use, China has an economy which either is, or will shortly be, larger than the US one. Would you consider it reasonable to refer to China as richer than the USA once that absolute size becomes indisputable?
"Policies that remove gender based barriers to employment are good for the economy, due to the basic fact of life that housewife is a ludicrously low-productivity job sector".
What do you mean "remove gender barriers"? Do you mean policies requiring companies to hire be "non-sexist" in their hiring practices etc.? Because if those practices increased productivity companies would use them anyway.
...Heck, near as I can tell, a good chunk of the wealth gain's of the past 50 years has mostly been the working out of the producti
I remember seeing a talk of the concept of privilege show up in the discussion thread on contrarian views.
Some discussion got started from "Feminism is a good thing. Privilege is real."
This is an article that presents some of those ideas in a way that might be approachable for LW.
http://curt-rice.com/quotas-microaggression-and-meritocracy/
One of the ideas I take out of this is that these issues can be examined as the result of unconscious cognitive bias. IE sexism isn't the result of any conscious thought, but can be the result as a failure mode where we don't rationality correctly in these social situations.
Of course a broad view of these issues exist, and many people have different ways of looking at these issues, but I think it would be good to focus on the case presented in this article rather than your other associations.