When a survey by national number-crunchers Statistics Sweden this week showed that 13 percent of foreigners don’t have a close friend, double the proportion of native Swedes who said the same thing, it got me thinking about what counts as a “close friend” anyway.

Are they our childhood friends whom we leave behind when we move countries? The ones who knew us through our childhood, our awkward teenage years and wild university days, who know all our past positives and negatives inside out, but not much about our day-to-day life?

Are they our new casual friends, who maybe aren’t yet our first call when we’re feeling down, but who know what we think about Swedish politics, what our favourite bar is, what music we like, but not anything about who we used to be (and that can also be a good thing)?

What do you think?

We’ve written many times before on The Local about how difficult a lot of foreigners find it to find friends in Sweden and this time we wanted to look at the issue from a more constructive and hopeful viewpoint, so we asked readers to tell us how they met their friends in Sweden.

I enjoyed reading all of their responses and was struck again by how these articles based on reader surveys are some of my favourite articles to write. I’m always very grateful for the fact that so many of our readers are so generous with their time, stories and insights. 

Here’s the article if you haven’t yet read it, and keep reading for more of what we’ve covered this week.

In other news

Sweden’s main business group this week attacked a proposal to exempt some jobs from a new minimum salary for work permits (as well as the bid to raise the threshold), calling it “unacceptable” political interference in the labour model which risks hurting national competitiveness.

A nationwide overtime ban involving tens of thousands of Swedish nurses and midwives got under way on Thursday afternoon, after negotiations about salaries and rotas broke down. Strikes are rare in Sweden, but what should you do if your union asks you to strike?

Planning a train trip in Sweden this summer but don’t know where to start? Try our top picks for railway travel across Sweden.

Sweden is one of many European countries struggling with brain waste, a situation where immigrants struggle to find suitable full-time work or are overqualified for their roles due to their education not being recognised. So how many immigrants in Sweden are overqualified?

Speaking of brain waste, a new analysis by Sweden’s main business group found that 51 percent of the labour migrants likely to be blocked by the new higher salary threshold I mentioned above will be graduates – not low-skilled workers as the government has claimed. The Local interviewed Karin Johansson, deputy director-general of the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise, about what this means for businesses.

Inside Sweden is our weekly newsletter for members which gives you news, analysis and, sometimes, takes you behind the scenes at The Local. It’s published each Saturday and with Membership+ you can also receive it directly to your inbox.