Pär Nuder

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Pär Nuder

Pär Anders Nuder (born February 27, 1963) is a Swedish Social Democratic politician. He was the Minister of Finance between November 1, 2004 and October 6, 2006.

Pär Nuder was born in Täby north of Stockholm, but grew up in Österåker, where he still resides. He is of Estonian descent on his father (Ants) side, reflecting the influx to Sweden from the Baltics at the end of World War II. During his childhood, Pär Nuder spent several summers in Israel, which has resulted in a strong personal commitment to the Middle East peace process.

Educated at Stockholm University, Nuder has a Bachelor of Laws degree. His political path began in the local Swedish Social Democratic Youth League club. From 1986 to 1989 he was the chairman of the Stockholm County branch of the organisation and from 1987 to 1990 he was a member of the national board. At the same time he was a member of the Österåker Municipal Executive Committee, from 1982 to 1994. In 1986 he started his career as a political adviser, first to the Minister for Justice and later to the Prime Minister, first to Ingvar Carlsson and later to his successor, Göran Persson. For a few years he also worked as a political secretary to the Social Democratic parliamentary party group. In 1994 he was elected a Member of Parliament.

In 1997 he was offered the position of State Secretary in the Prime Minister's Office. Although he was more or less unknown to the general public at the time, he was generally believed to be Göran Persson's close ally and one of his personal favourites to succeed him as party leader and Prime Minister. This impression was further strengthened by Persson's move to let Nuder join his Cabinet as Minister for Policy Coordination in 2002, an influential behind-the-scenes post. When Marita Ulvskog stepped down as Minister for Culture in September 2004 he took over the portfolio, although it was explicitly stated that this was not a long-term solution. The Prime Minister's intentions instead became public on October 21, 2004, when Göran Persson announced a restructuring of his government in which Pär Nuder was to take over as Minister of Finance after Bosse Ringholm.

Responding to media questions on whether his plan was to be the next Prime Minister, he simply answered that he did not "think about it" and was concentrating on his tasks as Minister of Finance. He also restated the government's goal to get the rate of open unemployment below four percent again.

In December 2004 he introduced the controversial term "Köttberg" ("Mountain of meat") to describe the baby boomer generation (born in the 1940's) during a speech. This speech addressed the potential pension bomb Sweden is facing.