Venezuela: Demagoguery that Doesn't Help the Poor

One reason I wish the world price of oil would fall is that it might speed the departure of this autocrat. From the NYTimes,

 Venezuela’s traditional dependence on oil exports has deepened, with 96 percent of export revenue now coming from the oil industry, up from 67 percent just before Mr. Chávez took office. Nationalized steel mills produce a fraction of the steel they’re designed for, forcing the state to import the difference. And nationalized electric utilities plunge most of the country into darkness several times a week. The contrast with Brazil’s high-tech, entrepreneurial, export-oriented economy couldn’t be more stark....

With oversight institutions neutered, the president now runs the country as a personal fief: expropriating businesses on a whim and deciding who goes to jail. Judges who rule against the government’s wishes are routinely fired, and one has even been jailed. Chávez-style socialism looks like the worst of both worlds: both more authoritarian and less effective at reducing poverty than the Brazilian alternative. 

Queues for all the products for which Chavez has instituted price controls speak loudly to his failed economic policies. How is it that economists have done such a poor job of educating both voters and politicians about how badly price controls distort the economy and make so many people so much worse off?