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How Bad Off Is Oil-Rich Venezuela? It’s Buying U.S. Oil

nytimes.com

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Re: How Bad Off Is Oil-Rich Venezuela? It’s Buying U.S. Oil

#141

Post by AnimalMuppet »

binarray2000 wrote: post #113
civilian wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm gonna blame it on communism. It's not that they don't know how to produce oil. It's that the oil company has been so heavily mismanaged and used for political purposes that it has become extremely inefficient. http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21607824-venezuelas-l... > IN 2003 Venezuela’s then president, Hugo Chávez, fired more than 18,000 employees, almost half the workforce, of the state-run oil corporati…

What you (plus the quote from The Economist) describe is like shooting yourself in the foot. Still, ideology aside, why would Chavez do such a thing? Was he an intellectual moron? No. He knew that without oil exports his people would be hungry, and hungry people mean bloody revolution. Also, quoting from The Economist is one sided considering their position regarding Venezuela during and after Chavez. You see, media…

You don't trust The Economist to be unbiased. Fine. But I know of no sources that assert either that the event in question (the firing of the oil workers) didn't happen, or that it didn't destroy Venezuela's oil production. So in the absence of any contrary evidence, I think The Economist's account of that specific event is to be trusted.

Why would Chavez do such a thing? I suspect (OK, guess) that when you have a theory that you are so committed to that anything that doesn't conform is regarded as enemy propaganda, it becomes amazingly easy to do really stupid things. (Note that this does not depend on what the theory is; any theory, disconnected from any counter-evidence, is prone to this.)

Re: How Bad Off Is Oil-Rich Venezuela? It’s Buying U.S. Oil

#142

Post by astine »

mikeash wrote: post #138
astine wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think anyone in this thread is blaming it all on social programs. Even the opening post mentioned that corruption was largely to blame. If you want to get into discussions on socialism, one might ask the question whether nationalization of industries presents an opportunity for corruption or if socialist ideology can present a cover for kleptocracy. It looks a lot like that's what happened in Venezuela.

You're right, it's not all . Still, I don't get why it's even brought up. Seems like authoritarian government, nationalization of industries, and general screwing about with market forces would be far more important. Or are people just equating nationalizing the oil industry and making it illegal to get money out of the country with "social programs"?

"Seems like authoritarian government, nationalization of industries, and general screwing about with market forces would be far more important."

I'd agree, though I think you could describe land redistribution as a 'social program.'

Re: How Bad Off Is Oil-Rich Venezuela? It’s Buying U.S. Oil

#143

Post by AnimalMuppet »

tptacek wrote: post #132
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think jondubois's proposal was to de-nationalize it.

Can Venezuela's current leadership do that without altering the country's political identity? It's been clear for awhile that the Chavism experiment with oil sector management has been a failure. Is there any indication that they're going to change now?

I don't think Venezuela's current leadership can do anything useful without altering the country's political identity. But no, I see no indication that they're going to change now.

Re: How Bad Off Is Oil-Rich Venezuela? It’s Buying U.S. Oil

#144

Post by AnimalMuppet »

dragonwriter wrote: post #135
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think jondubois's proposal was to de-nationalize it.

Which, really, does nothing. The problem is that the country's economy is dependent on a single extracted resources for export, making it do well when prices for that resource are high and badly when they are low. Whether its privately extracted by firms paying taxes on income and leases for extraction rights or publicly extracted by the government, the same fundamental problem remains (and the same broad economic re…

Well, it does some. They're still dependent on a single extracted resource, and the price is still low, but they could actually produce more of it. It wouldn't be a magic fix, but it would be better than the current situation.

Re: How Bad Off Is Oil-Rich Venezuela? It’s Buying U.S. Oil

#145

Post by matt_wulfeck »

tloble wrote: post #104
matt_wulfeck wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes points. And perhaps there's a larger discussion about what the role of the federal government should be is now discussed in our daily lives, not just hacker news, with such topics as student aid debt forgiveness, basic income, mandatory health care, etc. And also maybe it's an example how power can be purchased with social programs. Also points. Gotta get those points. I hear someday I'll be able to cash them in…

Let's not pretend you tried to make a well-researched and honest argument. The whole point of your comment was bullshit propaganda.

At what point did my comment switch from being my personal opinion to propaganda?

Re: How Bad Off Is Oil-Rich Venezuela? It’s Buying U.S. Oil

#146

Post by jimmywanger »

jimmywanger wrote: post #83

Currency controls and price controls and government nationalization have destroyed Venezuela. Currency controls: there's a 1:10 exchange rate, dollars to bolivars, for essential imports, like food, medicine, etc. The black market exchange rate is about 1:1010. To get the good rate, you need connections. But hey, it's a pain in the ass to actually contact suppliers and get goods through customs, and you're capped at w…

Funny thing is that socialism tends to reject religion, but price controls originated in Christian thought.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_price

What a lot of people don't realize is that prices aren't inherently good or bad in and of themselves, they just are. If somebody else is willing to pay 20k for a diamond, that's the price of a diamond.

No amount of legislation or argument will drive down the price of a diamond to what it "should" be.

See http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB100014240527023034600045791921.... The prices of electronics dropped in price after a governmental mandate. Guess what? After the store inventories were depleted, they never got any more TVs to sell.

Re: How Bad Off Is Oil-Rich Venezuela? It’s Buying U.S. Oil

#147

Post by dogma1138 »

detaro wrote: post #140
dogma1138 wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While there are some issues, it's also often not what you say but how you say it. I do dislike the fact that there is no way to "vouch" for flagged comments, and that -10 auto flag kills it. While I can't comment much on the bias there is some sort of a group mentality to downvote comments that already have been downvoted once or twice, maybe people think they are helping to "clean up" the discussion. I often wondere…

> I do dislike the fact that there is no way to "vouch" for flagged comments, huh? There is a link on the page of a flagged comment, called "vouch".

Oh I didn't knew that, I thought you could only vouch for submissions =)

You learn something new everyday.

Re: How Bad Off Is Oil-Rich Venezuela? It’s Buying U.S. Oil

#148

Post by currysoup_t »

astine wrote: post #139
currysoup_t wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a bit of a straw man to present failed socialist-in-name-only states when critiquing socialism. If someone were to bring up the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea as an attempt to critique democracy you'd rightly scoff. I'll freely admit there have been numerous failed socialist states. Very few self-proclaimed socialist states have even attempted to implement socialism. Many who claimed to be socialist were d…

"It's a bit of a straw man to present failed socialist-in-name-only states when critiquing socialism. If someone were to bring up the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea as an attempt to critique democracy you'd rightly scoff." It's a bit of a straw man to present failed attempts at cold fusion when critiquing cold fusion itself. Communist revolutionaries genuinely did attempt to implement socialism. The fact that s…

Your point about referencing socialist revolutionaries is indeed part of what I'm going for, and is why I'm very reluctant to align myself with vanguardists, but we're not discussing the efficacy of revolutionary socialist parties. I meant precisely what I said, if a state is socialist-in-name-only, then how can you compare it to an actual socialist economic model. If these countries we're discussing ran a system of worker ownership, that I'm simply unaware of, then I'd love to be provided with some names so I can study their history.

European feudalism was over by about ~1500, the Industrial Revolution started in about ~1750, but it certainly makes for a cute soundbite. People on the left often cite the enclosures[1] in England as the beginnings of capitalism. Laws such as vagrancy[2] laws were in place to force people to work, land which was previously agreed to be communal was taken into private hands. If you consider this to be a 'capitalist revolution' then it could easily be argued

[1] This has a lot to do with the lefts definition of capitalism, which I recognise is not universal so enclosures being the origin of capitalism isn't an argument which is likely to be fruitful, especially on HN.

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vagrancy_(people)#United_Kingd...

Re: How Bad Off Is Oil-Rich Venezuela? It’s Buying U.S. Oil

#149

Post by cvwright »

jimmywanger wrote: post #146
jimmywanger wrote: post #83

Currency controls and price controls and government nationalization have destroyed Venezuela. Currency controls: there's a 1:10 exchange rate, dollars to bolivars, for essential imports, like food, medicine, etc. The black market exchange rate is about 1:1010. To get the good rate, you need connections. But hey, it's a pain in the ass to actually contact suppliers and get goods through customs, and you're capped at w…

Funny thing is that socialism tends to reject religion, but price controls originated in Christian thought. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_price What a lot of people don't realize is that prices aren't inherently good or bad in and of themselves, they just are . If somebody else is willing to pay 20k for a diamond, that's the price of a diamond. No amount of legislation or argument will drive down the price of a…

> What a lot of people don't realize is that prices aren't inherently good or bad in and of themselves, they just are. If somebody else is willing to pay 20k for a diamond, that's the price of a diamond.

Arguably, even the early Christian thinkers like Acquinas agree with you on this. http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2015/08/15435/

Re: How Bad Off Is Oil-Rich Venezuela? It’s Buying U.S. Oil

#150

Post by civilian »

binarray2000 wrote: post #113
civilian wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm gonna blame it on communism. It's not that they don't know how to produce oil. It's that the oil company has been so heavily mismanaged and used for political purposes that it has become extremely inefficient. http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21607824-venezuelas-l... > IN 2003 Venezuela’s then president, Hugo Chávez, fired more than 18,000 employees, almost half the workforce, of the state-run oil corporati…

What you (plus the quote from The Economist) describe is like shooting yourself in the foot. Still, ideology aside, why would Chavez do such a thing? Was he an intellectual moron? No. He knew that without oil exports his people would be hungry, and hungry people mean bloody revolution. Also, quoting from The Economist is one sided considering their position regarding Venezuela during and after Chavez. You see, media…

Yeah, idk if I have the tools to convince you. AnimalMuppet's response is good.

If anyone is curious what The Economist's "bias" against Chavez looks like, here's a good article: http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21573106-appeal-populi...

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