Posted on 08/26/2014 4:20:08 PM PDT by jazusamo
Socialism: As Venezuelans prepare to be fingerprinted to buy bread, it bears noting that their country's transformation came with the late Hugo Chavez's promise of "a sea of happiness." Some happiness.
Fact is, socialism has made Venezuela the most miserable place on earth. But don't take our word for it. That's the result of objective research by Johns Hopkins University economist Steve Hanke.
He has created a "Global Misery Index" based on the original inflation-unemployment misery index of the late economist Arthur Okun and the interest rate and GDP per capita additions of Harvard economist Robert Barro. Put them all together and Venezuela tops the globe in misery with a figure of 79.9.
The misery in this case, as in so many others, is the product of socialism implemented in another purported but misguided effort to help the poor.
The fingerprints-for-bread requirement stems from 25% food shortages due to price and currency controls that lead to smuggling — with rationing instead of free markets the socialist answer. By year-end, Venezuelans must stand in line to be fingerprinted before buying 23 basic items including bread, sugar, toilet paper and other necessities in a system President Nicolas Maduro bills as "perfect."
"The whole thing is absurd," writes banker Miguel Octavio at his blog, The Devil's Excrement. "How much does this system cost? Who will run it? Who sells it? Who maintains it? Who profits from it? How do you implement it?" he writes. "Today it is fingerprint scanners, tomorrow it will be some different imaginary battle. But it will always be about attacking the consequences, not the causes."
(Excerpt) Read more at news.investors.com ...
The same thing is happening here.
And North Korea?
Agreed, and 0bama’s doing his best to hasten it.
Coming to a neighborhood near you soon.
...But Ed Asner and Sean Penn probably think it is paradise....so long as they do not have to live there.
Coming eventually to Obama’s America.
For some reason, North Korea, Cuba and the ISIS “caliphate” are not included.
Communism equals slavery and misery for the masses, but the party-boss slave-masters do pretty well. And they are harder to evict, once established, than poison ivy or leeches. They are the successful lamprey eels of the economic ocean, fattening and getting a free ride while their once-vital nation is sucked dry. And like the worst mafias, they will kill and terrorize to stay in control. That is where the DemocRATs in the USA would like to take us, under Dear Leader Obama.
Now playing at a neighborhood near you.
Well said!
Latvia is more free than the USA at this point, in the sense of not being burdened by senseless regulations.
ex-talker Neil Boortz used to put it this way. The alliance of the moochers and the looters (govt employees etc) will always out vote the producers.
All of those thousands of dim bulbs recently graduated from colleges with meaningless social studies and education degrees? Womyns Studies and Black Studies and Chicano Studies, where do you think they work now? Who do you think pays their salaries? They all “work” for HHS etc, housing illegals and so on. Little Marxists most of them, and those “worthless” degrees were plenty good enough for Uncle Sugar.
Price controls do not share the wealth as proclaimed by their supports.
They share the poverty.
I’ll bet President Maduro doesn’t stand in any lines.
Bkmrk
Unemployment in Israel? What about the misery of violence and death? Did I miss North Korea on the list?
Once the socialists reach a certain level of dictatorial control, they will not be removed by the ballot box. There is only one solution and the sooner it happens, the fewer will die in the long run.
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