How authoritarian socialism caused Venezuela's collapse

Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
May 18, 2016

Venezuela's economy is in freefall. It's probably the worst in the world — literally. The country tops Bloomberg's "Economic Misery Index," which looks at measures including inflation and unemployment to find the economy where things are worst for regular people.

Venezuela's GDP is expected to plunge by a jaw-dropping 8 percent this year, and inflation is an even more gut-churning 720 percent, according to the International Monetary Fund. The Venezuelan government is imposing rolling blackouts on its citizens. Food shortages are rife, leading to lines and even looting. As The New York Times reports, in Venezuela's hospitals children are dying for lack of medicine. The country is on the brink of collapse. And let's keep in mind, Venezuela is one of the world's most oil-rich countries.

What's going on?

Venezuela's president blames foreign companies, the United States, and other dark foreign forces. But the actual reason is a mix of socialism and authoritarianism, which has systematically destroyed Venezuela's productive capacities. the rest

Venezuelan apocalypse: Some updates on the epic failure of socialism in oil-rich Venezuela Despite having more oil reserves than Saudi Arabia, and in fact more proven oil reserves than any country in the world (8 times more than the US), oil-rich Venezuela’s economy is imploding and collapsing under the burden of socialism, and economic conditions there have deteriorated so dramatically that they probably now qualify as the “economic apocalypse” that some left-leaning economists were predicting just a few years ago would never happen in Venezuela...

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