Venezuelan government raises taxes as it tries to combat runaway inflation
I would consider putting this under humor because I did laugh at the absurdity of this, but then it made me sad. I know so many Venezuelan expatriates who came to me during their escape. I taught them well.
One good thing that may come of this: they might get to the point that they have to start all over as a nation. Then they will have the opportunity to start over with a government based on protection of natural rights.
But it can appear to work. Just like leeches can appear to heal.
And if you have enough spoils and a rather limited amount of people to share them amongst, then the appearance can go on for a long time.
Chavez's redistribution of oil wealth and income raised the standard of living of millions of people for a number of years. But he was giving out and promising more than he was taking in, thus it was doomed to failure. The drop in the price of oil brought reality home to roost rather dramatically.
In contrast, a place like the United Arab Emirates could go on for years living off the collective oil earnings without hardly any of its citizens doing much to produce those earnings. Birthright socialism. Bring in foreign workers to produce, then keep most of the fruits of production. Foreigners work according to their ability, citizens benefit according to their need.
And they Need to go to Disneyworld, obviously.
I love this quote.
"Socialism in general has a record of failure so blatant that only an intellectual could ignore or evade it." Thomas Sowell
They showed some on the street interviews and the people didn't blame socialism, they blamed Maduro.
Unfortunately I don't remember where I saw the interview, so can't direct you to it.
So my question is: Are there actually any countries where this is working (I know there are not), and what are good counterarguments when the aforementioned countries are used?
And, of course, there is always the argument from my protagonists that, well, gee, it really hasn't been tried, or it needs really smart people to do it right, etc. :-)
I'm looking for ammunition in the form of specific data or examples.
Here is another. Some specific straightforward ammunition between :30 and 1:30.
The rest of the video has more stats and is interesting, but they require more in depth understanding of background data and changes in the politics to fairly/properly make sense out of them.
This might help. Former citizen of Venezuela.
About minute 4:00 there is an interesting bit of data regarding the Maduro diet.