1960. Venezuela one of the 10 richest nations on earth, now bottom third

[Bacchus4.0]

http://www.eluniversal.com/opinion/150929/success-or-failure

[COLGATE4]

1. Look at all the hard work Chavez (and

later Maduro) put in to achieve this stunning result. This doesn't happen just by chance - you've really got to work at it to bring a country's economy to its knees in such a relatively short period of time.

[Human101948]

2. Yeah, it was such a great place when he took over...

When Hugo Chavez first took office as Venezuela’s president in 1999, the country wasn’t exactly anybody’s economic model. Great oil riches had been squandered, repeatedly. Inflation was a recurrent problem -- it had topped 100 percent in 1996. The economy wasn’t growing much. Almost half the population was below the country’s poverty line. One political scientist, sizing things up a few months into the Chavez presidency, went so far as to declare that the nation was “in ruins.”

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-08-27/how-hugo-chavez-trashed-latin-america-s-richest-economy

Earlier this year Alejandro Werner, an economist from the International Monetary Fund, explained that in an environment of low oil prices:

Venezuela’s economy will take the largest hit, and is now forecast to contract by 7% in 2015. Indeed, each $10 decline in oil prices worsens Venezuela’s trade balance by 3.5% of GDP, a bigger effect by far than for any other country in the region. The loss in export revenue causes mounting fiscal problems and a sharper economic downturn.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/nathanielparishflannery/2015/04/28/how-close-is-venezuela-to-defaulting/2/

Depending on oil which was going down in price while increasing spending was admittedly foolhardy, but the economy was only good for some Venezuelans before Chavez. So the poor people are still poor.

[COLGATE4]

3. Say what you may, when Chavez took power Venezuela was

a very rich country. Food was abundant, prices reasonable, public services (light, water, etc.) very good and security was good to excellent. Venezuelans took to the road in enormous numbers on the numerous holidays, with gasoline at about 2 cents a gallon. They could also travel abroad, freely exchanging their Bolivars for dollars at one rate, somewhere around 3 Bolivars= 1 $US. Medical care was excellent, hospitals absolutely first rate.

Now, let's compare and contrast. Food items are almost all imported and are increasingly scarce. Venezuela now imports almost all foodstuffs. Agricultural production was decimated when Chavez broke up large farming operations to instead give the campesinos subsistence parcels incapable of sustaining a family, much less producing the food the country needed. Electric service is now nothing but sporadic, with a disintegrating system because no maintenance or upgrading was done under Chavez. Prices are now off the chart with predictions for monstrous inflation this year and the only real currency is now the dollar. Speaking of the dollar - government insiders and cronies can get a preferential exchange rate of 6 Bolivars to $US 1.00. The general populace, however must get their dollars on the black market where as of 9/29/15 the exchange rate was 800 Bolivars to $US 1.00. Security is worse than poor. Medical care is lacking overall with patients having to now attempt to treat their diseases with veterinary drugs because the human versions are no longer available. Hospitals are re-using all kinds of 'disposable equipment'.

Chavez' "increased spending" was misused to support his quest to form a new geopolitical alliance (with Chavez as leader, of course), giving away billions of dollars in oil to countries Chavez believed would be sympathetic to his regime. Most of the rest went to fraud and mismanagement in companies vital to the economy, such as PDVSA, the state-run oil company where professional management was replaced by political cronies. So the poor people were poor before Chavez and are still poor today. But today they can't get items like flour and soap, wait in interminable lines for the most basic items, can't get decent medical care or drugs and are afraid to leave their homes after dark due to the horrible crime rate. Progress? I don't think so.

[Marksman_91]

4. It sure as hell was better than it is now.

And just so you know, poverty was actually starting to decline when Chavez took over. Maybe if he had kept the model preceding him and instead of becoming an ideological militaristic populist, Venezuela might just be the #1 power in the region. Now it's essentially dead last in all but every category except homicide rates and inflation

[Bacchus4.0]

5. I recall shopping in supermarkets no problem, Colombia was the basket case then,

and the B was about 6 to a dollar (really!)