When central planning fails — and it always fails — the result is almost never the relaxation of political regimentation but the redoubling of efforts to impose the plan by increasingly brutal application of force.
Venezuela’s Future — and Ours
I have long argued that about half of our political disagreements are simply cases of failing to agree about the meaning of a word. By “capitalism” libertarians mean the free enterprise of Adam Smith and Milton Friedman, while our friends on the left mean by “capitalism” the shenanigans of the United Fruit Company in Guatemala (it’s always the United Fruit Company!), the crimes of Enron, the purported misdeeds of Halliburton, etc.
.. the conversation rarely advances much beyond that, in part because of the emotional resonances of certain words, e.g. “neocon,” “corporation,” “exploitation,” etc.
.. Venezuela is what we mean by socialism.
.. those welfare states are attached to largely free economies. Sweden arguably has a more liberal trade regime than does the United States, and most of the Nordic countries had lower corporate tax rates than did the United States until the 2018 tax reform... effectiveness of government and public institutions (which is one place where the Swiss, Canadians, and Germans really outperform the United States).. the debate about whether the top U.S. personal-income-tax rate is going to be 39 percent or 33 percent is not about taking a step toward socialism or a step away from socialism... say that the problem with those countries is not socialism but a lack of democracy, political violence and instability, etc. But repression on the Venezuelan model is not extraneous to socialism — it is baked into the socialist cake... While the Soviets and the Maoists had intricate five-year plans, Venezuela had essentially one big plan: Use the profits from state-run oil companies to fund a massive welfare state, and use the leverage thus gained to fortify support for Hugo Chàvez and his political party until they achieved power sufficient to move Venezuela’s assets and its people around like pawns on a chessboard... Economies cannot in fact be controlled and managed in the way that socialists imagine.. The central planners in Venezuela were arrogant and hubristic, as they always are. (As, indeed, the entire concept of central planning is.)
- When oil revenues proved insufficient to sustain their program, they printed money;
- when the foreign-exchange markets responded by devaluing Venezuela’s currency, they enacted controls on foreign exchange;
- when prices rocketed out of control (Venezuela’s inflation rate is difficult to calculate, but it is estimated to have been around 18,000 percent a month in April), they enacted price controls;
- when producers declined to produce at those artificially low prices, they seized their assets.
- .. Venezuelans are not fools — they noticed that this wasn’t working as advertised.
- When the critics began to say so, their newspapers and broadcast facilities were shut down;
- when they protested individually, they were jailed or assassinated;
- when they protested en masse, they were massacred.
.. it is a fact that children are starving to death in what was, not so long ago, South America’s wealthiest country.