Socialism has never worked and can never work. Apologists blame it on capitalism or maybe George Bush if they can remember him. It is sad that after the cold war, socialism is still popular here and arguably more popular than ever. Venezuela is feeling the Bern.
To be fair, Socialism works as long as someone not receiving benefits is willing or able to pay for them. Once you get too many people on the dole or the productive elements of society stop producing, socialist systems collapse. Like Thatcher once said - “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money.”
Confiscating property to redistribute it to others has never been fair. Arguably it “works” until the money runs out as we are seeing with our socialist programs of Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare. Our problem relative to Venezuela is that we have a much larger liver and poison more slowly.
In Atlas Shrugged, the Looters & Moochers stay in political power by pandering to the poor w unsustainable largess bourne on the backs of productive people (i.e. just like the price controls in Venezuela where producers are expected to produce at a loss). The productive people get tired of the crap and leave (they shrug). Then there’s no one left to pull the cart. The shelves go empty and the lights go out. Economic & societal meltdown.
I know quite a few Venezuelan engineers who left Venezuela because of Chavez’s policies. They shrugged.
The Venezuelan Looter and Moocher state might have endured longer if the Goose that laid Golden Eggs (black gold) continued to lay.
A Venezuelan friend of mine, whose family emigrated to Panama because of the mess their country is in and the dangers they faced just waiting in line for cooking oil, laughs at the idea of a Bernie Sanders presidency. She told me, “Everybody wants a savior. Well, we had a ‘savior’ in Venezuela, and it doesn’t work. It never does.”
@doschicos You said, “It’s interesting to contrast South America’s two socialist leaders - Chavez vs Evo Morales - and the different economic effects they’ve had on Venezuela and Bolivia, respectively.” Actually, those are not the only socialist or communist leaders in South America. You have the Castro brothers, of course, but you also have Ortega in Nicaragua. More successful leftists are Correa in Ecuador and Bachelet in Chile. Tabare Vazquez in Uruguay is a leftist and one could argue that Humala is center-left (especially when compared with the two candidates who are about to run in the run-off: Fujimori and a U.S. and British educated economist who actually had to give up his U.S. citizenship to run. (His exwife and at least his daughter still live in the U.S.)
@doschicos You also wrote, “where in Brazil the fact that they are finally fighting against corruption and calling for impeachment is a very, very healthy thing” Maybe-- but Temer is no angel, and neither was Cunha. Their party is also corrupt. In other words, the desire to impeach Rousseff was motivated by pure politics. That doesn’t mean the PT isn’t corrupt; it just means that this isn’t a ‘clean slate.’
There is a HUGE difference between socialism and communism. Even the U.S. has some level of socialism in the sense that we have public schools and we use taxes to redistribute wealth. Many countries have presidents or prime ministers who are socialists. Venezuela was not a “poor” country. It had natural resources and a strong education system. I agree with the pp who wrote that it had a few, elite families controlling the money. Then Chavez came in and nationalized properties and industries, made the govt too big and started using oil to support other countries, like Cuba. The middle and upper class fled. Chavez spent all the money and the govt started clamping down on opposition-- imprisoning people, closing down media, etc. What the U.S. does-- and Venezuela needed to have done, back in the day-- is use taxes to redistribute some wealth. Those people in Venezuela with huge, inherited properties that lie fallow? They should pay taxes which the government can then use for the benefit of the country: to support public schools, public housing, to fund police, etc. We all criticize taxes but a reasonable level is a very fair way to create a workable society. It doesn’t work when there is rampant corruption, when there is not enough of an economy, when the inflation is sky high, when crime rivals countries at war.
Economic efficiency can never be inspired nor improved when you take (some would call it stealing) money from producers and give it to non-producers.
Everyone buys things; that does not make one a producer.
A producer is one who provides labor and/or investments/jobs.
The only difference between socialism and communism is the rate at which its dictators kill people - and I guess the lengths to which their apologists will go to rationalize it. The socialists seem to be hanging in there.
“Economic efficiency can never be inspired nor improved when you take (some would call it stealing) money from producers and give it to non-producers.”
I’m not sure economic efficiency is the goal. When you have a country where masses of people have little or no possibility of climbing out of poverty and a few families hold all the money, you run the risk of civil unrest, corruption, crime, even revolution. It may be more efficient in theory to have 10 families hold all the wealth-- but, in reality, they will soon become corrupt and the society will be unstable and unfair for the great masses of people.
@WISdad23 Not even close. Plenty of socialist leaders are elected. Think of the Nordic countries. And plenty of non-socialists have been dictators: Franco, Pinochet.
Some of the socialist countries are not washed up yet. The European socialists have a fair amount of opposition and a large amount of wealth to destroy before they are done. Nothing worse than a socialist/communist with a large budget. They do develop nice rail systems though.
"Actually, those are not the only socialist or communist leaders in South America. You have the Castro brothers, of course, but you also have Ortega in Nicaragua. "
Never said they were the only leftist leaders in S.A. I brought Evo into the discussion because her and Chavez were often linked and compared, especially in Evo’s early years, often because of their anti-American stance. Whether one likes Evo or not, he has had measurable economic success in Bolivia.
Cuba and Nicaragua are not South America. 
Haha! You’re right about SA but discussing Latin American leftists without mentioning Castros or Ortega is like discussing a symptom and ignoring the illness.
I think Correa has been even more successful than Chavez or a Morales-- and Bachelet even more but, of course, she’s more moderate. To be fair, Venezuela isn’t just Chavez’s fault; Maduro is particularly inept.
Cuba is just like Venezuela in that otherwise unsustainable largess in a dysfunctional economic system was funded by a seemingless endless gravy train. In Cuba, the gravy train was external money from the Soviet Union. For Venezuela it was oil.
Maduro is inept, but the damage was already done. The inept Maduro got left holding the bag.
The Cuban economic system deteriorated into that. It probably expected to be based on sugar, rum and cigars and some tourism. The non-productivity of communism caused the dependence on the USSR and later Venezuela. Venezuela’s oil crash was a key reason to reach out to the U.S. but Cuba has a huge non-productivity problem.
Lots of countries rely primarily on oil. Venezuela could have handled it better when times were flush and Maduro has not helped matters-- threatening business owners and such just leads to greater shortages. His disaster has caused even leftist leaders (Zapateros, Torrijos) to try to intervene.
I do not think Venezuela can recover anymore. I pray (non religiously) that Brazil does not spiral down the same drain as Venezuela.
More dominos falling http://www.foxnews.com/travel/2016/05/29/lufthansa-suspends-travel-to-caracas-over-unstable-venezuelan-economy.html?intcmp=hplnws
How long until the currency completely crashes?
Isn’t it about time for Sean Penn to go on an interviewing visit?
The underlying issue in Venezuela is not badly-installed socialism, but rather a long tradition of political cronyism and cultural focus on in-group loyalties. The old ADECO and COPEI cohorts were replaced by a new gang who took their own cuts off the top and helped their buddies.
Even if Maduro would vanish tomorrow, and oil prices would go back up, until Venezuelan culture changes, things are just plain going to be bad.
I don’t know why there is so much opposition to Chavez and Maduro. According to this article, Venezuela is an economic miracle.
http://www.salon.com/2013/03/06/hugo_chavezs_economic_miracle/