Sounds like an interesting book. As you noted, many Venezuelans have left their country and I was told an estimated 50,000 of them came to Chicago in the last year or so. Do you know anything about that?
It is my understanding that Venezuela's problems are not due so much to "entitlements" (which has a very moralistic tone) as it is to "Dutch Disease". So it's not really "high living" as much as it is having made certain aspects of the public sector (such as construction of "non-productive" infrastructure like hospitals and libraries) "too attractive", and allowed development in Venezuelan agriculture and consumer goods (including medicine and medical supplies) to whither-thus requiring all such goods to be imported.
A agree that oil-wealth "entitlements" are less a cause than a reflection of the distortion of the society and economy. I did not mean to sound judgmentally neoliberal!
Sounds like an interesting book. As you noted, many Venezuelans have left their country and I was told an estimated 50,000 of them came to Chicago in the last year or so. Do you know anything about that?
They are transporting immigrants from border states. There are tons of people in tents along Lake Shore Drive.
Wow! I didn’t know that. It must be awful to be living in a tent by Lake Michigan during a Chicago winter.
My step daughter said it was because Chicago is a refuge city. Believe me, the increase in homelessness is striking.
It is my understanding that Venezuela's problems are not due so much to "entitlements" (which has a very moralistic tone) as it is to "Dutch Disease". So it's not really "high living" as much as it is having made certain aspects of the public sector (such as construction of "non-productive" infrastructure like hospitals and libraries) "too attractive", and allowed development in Venezuelan agriculture and consumer goods (including medicine and medical supplies) to whither-thus requiring all such goods to be imported.
A agree that oil-wealth "entitlements" are less a cause than a reflection of the distortion of the society and economy. I did not mean to sound judgmentally neoliberal!
No worries-I actually thought you were quoting the book and its point of view.