I believe before they went far left, Venezuela was the richest per capita SA country. (not certain if true)
I went to school with some Venezuelans at University of Florida. They were kind and educated.(obviously from rich families)
They were in Chemical Engineering. I wonder if they have left Venezuela for America?...
I worked in Venezuela and was there during the initial coup attempt.
In the twenty years after I worked with many Venezuelan engineers in the US; our company hired them right and left. They had exactly the experience we needed, and were glad to come to a location not many American engineers wanted to come to. Eventually our clients started hiring them away from us, they liked them and trusted them.
Because they had once signed an anti-Chavez petition they were banned from working in their own country.
For us it was a win-win. For my part, I liked them.