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PS
A comment to the More or Less posting indicated that the per-pupil expenditure is the relevant statistic and that in this sphere Finland spends more than other countries. Per-pupil expenditure is also available in Education at a Glance, Indicator B1. The data are analyzed in several ways, but no matter how you slice it, Finland is far from the biggest per-pupil spender. As an example, here are the rankings for cumulative per-student expenditure for all services over the theoretical duration of primary and secondary studies (expressed in US$).
Luxembourg ($209.060); Switzerland ($141,013); Norway ($134,303); Iceland ($124,601); United States ($123,361); Denmark ($119,621); Austria ($118,930); Italy ($106,351); United Kingdom ($103,352); Ireland ($100,352); Sweden ($97,116); Slovenia ($96,239); Australia ($96,079); Belgium ($94,039); OECD Average ($93,775); Canada ($93,288); France ($92, 439); Japan ($91,716); Germany ($88,729); Netherlands ($86,603); Spain ($83,552); Finland ($82,868); Korea ($73,950); Portugal ($72,017); New Zealand ($71,614); Israel ($64,683); Hungary ($50,215); Estonia ($48,194); Poland ($46,557); Slovak Republic ($39,413); Russian Federation ($26,394); Mexico ($26,019); Chile ($25,072); Brazil ($16,844)
In education at least, it appears that you don’t necessarily get what you pay for.
Finland teachers do not received high pay. There was another article that I read, and for the life of me I can’t find it on my computer. . Using per-pupil expenditure can be misleading, if you are not aware of what each country is dealing. Luxembourg and Switzerland are both countries that are dealing with multiple languages. Finland is a small country, with a stabled population, that also has a comprehensive pre-school program. Most of these children are well prepared to enter into grade 1.