When someone says 'would you rather live in America or Cuba?' that's the wrong question. The right question is 'would you rather live in Cuba than Nicaragua, Guatamala, Panama or Mexico?' and that is a no brainer.
Exactly. I was always thought it was the height of foolishness to compare advanced Capitalist economies, for whom Imperialism played a big part in their enrichment, with much smaller less advanced economy like Cuba's. A more apt comparison would always be with places that started with the same conditions. If your average Haitian woke up in Cuba tomorrow they'd think they'd died and gone to heaven, even with the sanctions hanging on Cuba heavily . This is what many refuse to understand.
Also quite funny that they imagine themselves living as wealthy people by default. Why not take the socioeconomic roulette and see how good your chances are of getting a decent life? 'Cause right now in the US there's a rapidly increasing chance of ending up unemployed, homeless and starving.
Is Mexico really worse than Cuba? I mean, I understand those other countries could be worse, but that would really shock me. Then again, I'm not very informed about that part of the continent.
Also like are you in the top 10% or the bottom 10% of the society? If you’re in the top then Cuba might feel a little stifling, but it’s fine. If you’re in the bottom though you will definitely live in Cuba, whereas your chances are much worse in the states.
I’m from Florida and all I ever heard from Cubans was literally the meme “they took my family’s (insert rich person thing here)”. My favorite was “My father had a dentist office and when it was destroyed in a hurricane the government didn’t build him a new one” As if they think the US government would have done that.
They took my family's sla.. uhm indentured servants, mines, and plantations. Castro also killed seventy bajillions the whole island was empty. SoChUliSm BaDdDddd.
Péter Kiss Imagine for a sec that you have some generational wealth, and lead a decent, comfortable life. Then you wake up one day and the state has taken all of it, and imprisoned or killed everyone who tried to hide their wealth, forcing you to flee your home country. Wouldn’t YOU also be at least somewhat bitter about that, even if, I’m the grand scheme, you are “wrong” to?
@@leovalenzuela8368 why did they have to flee exactly? Didn't they know to work for a living? I guess that can happen when you're born with a silver spoon in your mouth.
@@Nosirrbro It's deeper than that. The embargo also has the US dunking on anyone who trades with Cuba. They're literally holding the world at gunpoint because they are *that* scared of Cuba actually being able to establish itself.
@@MonolithicEthos Canada has enough juice as a major trade partner to the US, that they can do what they like. If Canada cut off the maple syrup alone, US people would riot.
There is a lesson to everything, we do send gay people to work camps in the 60's -and- -never- -make- -an- -apology- -for- -it- , we also ban music, like the beattles, and throw egg or beat a neighbour cuban becouse they were leaving the country and were a "gusano", only to be a few years later thanking them for any little detail like a docen of eggs. Proud and ego are dangerous thing, living under the impresion that you are always right will only couse pain to those who live under your falacy of self righouness. There some more caveat with the housing, if else, it is true that we have a high porcent of owenership, however that is only true for older generations, for millenials and forward there are in a rent free state but don't really own anything, meaing that is common to have up to 3 generations under the same houshold. This is a problem a few can sort out, leaving a big bunch with no life project ahead in a meaninfull time span, there for, people just leave the country. Cuba already show patterns like develop nations like japan with their old populaton and low birthrates.
Paddy O'Door Tokyo and Osaka will be really expensive. Think basically the price of New York but your apartment will be smaller. As a student your living place will probably be decided for you so the cost will probably just depend on the study abroad program. Which is lucky because foreigners face massive (and totally legal) housing discrimination here.
if anything the profits of che guevara t shirts should go to his home country 😤 (pls send help everything is falling apart) but really, it is very funny how everyone asumes el che was cuban, even people from the country he was actually from (including me before i turned 13) 🤣
When I visited Cuba last year I heard a diverse mix of opinion from Cubans themselves on all sorts of issues, almost as if anyone saying "GO ASK A CUBAN" as support for their argument is being disingenuous and pretending that they know the universal opinion of a nation of 11 million people
@kr tu there is a documentary called Cuba And The Cameraman, and thats exactly what they do, but surprise, they openly criticize what they think of the government on camera, and even Fidel himself participates on this AMERICAN documentary wich is looking at the better and the worse in Cuba, and has no problem with it,
Castro started out as a centrist liberal(ish) lawyer & wanted to work with the US. The intransigent hostility of US interests to his basic social justice/national autonomy demands helped to drive him in a much more socialist direction than he'd originally planned. All in all - as far as I can tell (I have close family ties through marriage) this is one of the most accurate & fair representations of life in Cuba I've seen for a while. Good work.
If Castro had been just a LITTLE bit better pitcher and gotten a contract with the New York Giants, none of this would be a thing and Cuba would be a capitalist shithole.
@CWW I mean tbf he was as liberal in a dictatorship, that was actually a fairly progressive stance and it's what motivated him to rebel. Like he was a liberal in the sense that he believed in stuff like equal rights and democracy. Going further left was somewhat of a natural evolution for him with the conditions of the times. Though also it should be noted that he actually had a lot of support in the US at first, many people in the US thought of him as a freedom fighter before he took power. It was after he came to power that it became clear that he couldn't work with the US so he sided with the USSR which pissed off the US obviously.
As a Russian I gotta say that home ownership is one of the most significant blessings of post-soviet countries. At least most of us don't have to deal with landlords, and even old houses are still pretty decent and sturdy.
From what I figured hanging out in Romania, families just don't sell houses, and generations live there together. It's not that everyone owns, but that most don't have to rent.
@@andrestorp I personally live in Stalin-era apartments in Moscow. While the age is showing, there are three huge rooms with really high ceilings. The flat is in a dire need of a fresh coat of paint and new windows, but this is still much better than most newly built houses here.
@@ernststravoblofeld Been born in Romania in 94, and that's kind of a wrong perception. Yes, it's true most Romanian families don't sell houses, but I know very few Romanians where more than 2 generations (parents and their children) live together. Your grandparents would almost always own a different flat/house. It is a poor country by European standards and I admit it shocked even me that it's number 1 in home ownership (I expected maybe a top 10-20, but not this lol), but it's not the 3rd world either to have "generations" share the same house - the number of people per household is very similar to the country I currently live in, the UK, at about 3 or 4 usually.
@@labadaba5088 capitalists love victim blaming, it's like blaming a rape victim "she was asking for it" "she's not a victim she just wants attention" "she shouldn't have been wearing those slutty clothes"
@Cian Abroad Literally my thought when Obama criticized them for having cars from the 50s. "Oh really, ya think that might have something to do with the EMBARGO THAT'S BEEN ACTIVE SINCE THE 50s???"
I was fortunate enough to visit Cuba for a study abroad program in 2016 before the trump administration tightened travel restrictions again, and (though I am by no means an expert) I witnessed a lot of what you described in your video, such as the dual currency system and discrepancies between housing in the city and the country. Cuba is by no means a rich country, but I was impressed by the way the country was structured around providing basic needs despite the crushing pressure of the embargo. While I was there, I did research on Cuba’s agricultural system. Because of the embargo Cuba is more limited to what it can produce on the island, and a lack of access to things like fertilizer and farming machines makes this more difficult. In order to sustain productivity, Cuba has invested research into ecological practices, such as raising insects that eat crop pests. It was really interesting to learn about given the nature of unsustainable agriculture in places like the USA.
Watch Micheal parent's lecture over imperalism and other topics. And you'll understand how devasting they are and will give more context to what poor vs rich means
My mother is a dentist who works on a public hospital here in Brasil. I've met 2 Cuban doctors who worked with her (before Bolsonaro kicked them out cause LeFTiSts aRE RuINinG BrAZil) and both said mostly the same things. Is not a perfect country, but some things are better and some are worse. They seems to really love their country, not the "they are forced to say that they love" people here love to propagate.
@@lolcatjunior Bolsonaro doesn't want them. He doesn't even want the quarantine. He just fired the ministry of health. His economy plan, that elected him, was failing (the dollar reached 5,20 reais, the highest it has ever been, just before the Covid-19 reached here) so he prefers to kill the poorest and the oldest than loose than loose power. He prefers to burn bridges with long economic allies, like China, Cuba, Latin America, etc. to be friends with Trump.
My mother went to Cuba in the early 1990's "special period" as part of a religious exchange program, and some Cubans likewise came to the US as part of that program. Some key parts of her experience that seemed pretty representative: - The people she met were basically healthy. They didn't have a lot of extra food, and definitely wouldn't waste it the way many Americans would, but they did have enough to survive reasonably well. - The medical system put a big emphasis on public health measures and prevention. For instance, the local doctor would be consulted whenever someone was planning on building a latrine to make sure that water and food supplies were protected from disease. - Another important adaptation in their health system is that Cuban doctors were (and probably still are) trained extensively in herbal medicines that can be used as less-potent alternatives to pills. A doctor's office can even be identified by the herb garden out front. That said, Cubans who can get pills absolutely will use them, and sometimes take more than recommended doses. - There's more political freedom than you might think for Cubans. For instance, her hosts would sometimes crack jokes about Fidel Castro, and my mother and her group weren't followed around by government minders or anything like that.
Sorry but that thing about political freedom is not true. I’m Cuban, when I was a child and I complained about my country my mom would tell me to be quiet, because if “chivatos” heard us we could go to prison or be fined. Also one of my neighbors went to jail for speaking against the government
@@kimobrien. What does this have to do with my comment? I literally lived there for 15 years, why would I need to get anything from any “US propaganda”? *I was there*
@@kimobrien. They do have names you just don’t care enough to look for them, I doubt you’ve actually engaged with many people living in the island. Honestly this is a ridiculous argument, you’ll never understand if you didn’t live there because you’re in denial. Everyone in Cuba knows this is true, literally everyone
@@kimobrien. Of course there’s common crime in Cuba, but there’s also the fact that it’s prohibited to speak against the government, it’s that simple. Even Fidel Castro admitted this in an interview
Americans should realise Cuba is no threat to the world. Sanctions should be removed and I support sanctions on countries like Iran which is destroying the middle East
It received some attention when Obama lifted the embargo. I remember that the Republicans flipped out because he took a photo with Cuban government officials in front of a Che Guevara mural.
In my country Bulgaria a YT channel guy called Kiro Breika explains it well. Basically they as children were put into exercise and sport a lot and out of 15 hundred 2 would be fat not obese and 2 may wear glasses. That ofcourse be over stretch but people generally would be fa healthier. Especially with their food. Food then was way more natural and kids didnt have access to freakish amount of sugar. The peasants had quantity of food that the city people couldnt dream of thou. My mother tells me the city people had to line up vast quantity of people in front of the supermarket. No I dont mean 100 or 200 hundred people rather double triple or quadriple than that possibly. Yes there were pluses and minuses. After all we didnt have 50m subjects as slaves and didnt had the back up of ww2 America which had minor worries compared to the Soviets who faced the largest invasion in human history. So we got the war torn 1 as an allies instead of the fresh. Anyways as vassals we wouldve been so much better today than American by fact militarily occupied colony.
What a coincidence that the rate of home ownership is high in countries that used to be "socialist" or at least tried to be... Almost as if the citizens of such countries benefit from some form of policy that helped the people at the expense of landlords.
I don't know about anyone else in the USA right now, but there's are shortages of types of staple meats right now in my area. Pretending that a system that only operates in the most optimal setting is the basis for any standard is just hubris disguised as pride.
@TheMatron'sMilitia People are talking about food shortages and here you are being That Kind of vegan. You're not winning any prizes here dude. Let it go.
@TheMatron'sMilitia "The pandemic and thereby the shortages were caused by carnism" you could have just said "china eat bat lmao" and shown your arse without the pomp. "We grow enough grain alone to feed 10-12billion people but it gets wasted to fatten livestock for the tables of the privileged." cattle feed =/= human-edible grain but okay "It takes 1/8th as much land and 1/5th as much water to grow a vegan diet over a standard American diet." so you, by bringing up America, admit the problem is *over*consumption and not consumption in general, then, since America's diet is influenced by capitalism i.e. just-in-time supply chains, built-in wastage and consumerism "Veganism is a necessary part of the total elimination of food shortages" your veganism is just another product of capitalist propaganda sloughing responsibility for ecological damage off onto the individual instead of the system but ok
What cuba needs is to invest in production of biomedical supplies, internet infrastructure, and green energy. The combo of CA deficits with lack luster growth is slowly killing the country. Tourism is not a solution, tourism is an economic drug for small countries because its unsustainable and if you only have infrastructure supporting that then prepare for economic ruin.
What Cuba (and the rest of the global south) needs is for someone or something to dismantle the US and capitalism, and get the fucking boot off their necks.
NightfallGemini I’m willing to bet that if the Cubans tried a bay of pigs invasion in Washington it’d go over really well. There’d be plenty of Americans to support them.
@@WeDwellinaFiefdom As much as I wished that was true, unfortunately the fact that we elected Trump and that the US has imposed capitalist propaganda on everyone from cradle to grave to "worship the line (GDP growth)" and the belief that "socialism bad, capitalism good" and "muh individualsm" and "merica is good" and "muh second amendment" can be a serious problem for Cuba being able to hold ground on American soil for long, given the embargo, I suspect that getting raw materials for the most basic needs let alone building up a sizable, modernized war machine to try and stand toe to toe against the world's current biggest superpower who's military budget dwarfs literally every other country on the planet can only result in a catastrophic failure and impending doom for the Cuban Republic, I mean when the US was busy in the middle east, it even took the time to literally invade Haiti in 2004 on a whim to help the far right militias overthrow Haiti's Leftist President Aristide.
@@jorgeamadosoriaramirez8953 what I really mean is that cuba has to not rely on producer good imports and increase it's own producer good production such as medical equipment because they have enough doctors and engineers to do it. Before castro cuba had generous amount of imports come from the US and once castro came to power those generous imports cames from the ussr and once that ended cuba went into the special period it needs to try to increase investment in production like the USSR did.
What makes you think you have the right to tell real Cubans what their country is like? I swear this ignorance is incredible. A Cuban’s word about Cuba is worth 50 times more than anyone else’s
CURRENCY UPDATE: Cuba is now transitioning to a single currency. The convertible currency 'CUC' is being phased out this month (June 2021) leaving just the Cuban Peso.
CURRENCY UPDATE: Cuba now have 3 currency. The convertible currency 'CUC' is being phased out this month (June 2021) leaving just the MLC, USD, CUP. and devaluation of 500%
That was interesting as hell. I really liked the idea of not paying rent and actually be able to afford a house. That will make living in California hell of a lot better.
Even something as basic as rent control is common in other parts of the world, it's been the accepted law here in Denmark for decades and people often speak up about unfair rent hikes. And even something like that can do a lot. I do wish we could also adopt something like that where housing was just guaranteed, seems like the obvious next step.
So I actually decided to look up the "Doctor vs Taxi driver" thing in my country and it actually turns out that a newly trained doctor here will earn a similar wage as the top 2/5ths payed taxi drivers. And also a trash collector here is payed similarly or more than a newly trained doctor, being payed anywhere from 23 to 29 dollars an hour. As it turns out this isn't a bad thing, strangely paying people a proper wage doesn't hurt anyone and it just gives people more freedom of choice. Denmark isn't running out of doctors because everyone is running off to become a taxi driver or trash collector because education is also free here so people are just gonna do what they want.
19:17 'What's normal for us isn't close to normal for the majority'. Como argentino viendo un video en inglés, esto es algo que siempre tengo en cuenta. Soy alto cheto
Thanks, you did your homework. Im cuban and your video very accurate. No country is perfect and Cuba need a lot of work is not as bad as many people want it to be.
I literally just read up on this yesterday. Had to try to read between the lines on western sources. Nice to have a more even report with sources. I'll have to read up through these!
That’s interesting. I’m usually against means testing but I guess Cuba’s growing inequality is happening under pretty different circumstances than in most of the world.
BadEmpanada so maybe it should be more categorically based on private work rather than like a set income cap, idk, maybe it’s just me being an anarchist that makes me feel torn on this.
2:45 US response to Castros regime which made them reliant on the USSR 4:20 collapse of USSR crashed Cuba’s economy 4:45 ships that land on Cuba cannot land on the USA for 6 months, the US made the embargoes harsher after the collapse 10:30 free housing 13:00 what housing looks like, richer families can renovate 14:15 free healthcare and checkups 17:30 Cuba second sources of income and second economy 18:40 non extreme food scarcity 23:00 new dollar economy 26:00 most banned Cuban websites are blocked due to US embargos 26:50 US embargos prevent shipping of medical supplies to Cuba 28:30 solutions
Without embargo’s then Cuba would be in much better condition, however even with embargo’s Cuba is in a much better state than most Latin America countries. Cuba is pretty cool
El problema es que los yankees tampoco llegan a comprender el estilo de vida Cubano. Les parece ilógico, antinatural y prehistórico que una persona prefiera tener salud y educación de calidad, viviendo tranquilo, sin las presiones del consumismo y los "lujos".
This is what my dad said after I read your bullshit comment to him. “Tu eres mal informado o un comunista descarado. El pueblo Cubano se esta muriendo de hambre. No tiene agua ni comida ni ropa, nada! Estan viviendo en la miseria. Lo que tienen viene de la familia en los Estados Unidos. Los hospitales se ven como cuevas viejas y desbaratadas sin ventanad. A mi no me hagas cuento que yo naci en Cuba y vivi 35 años en Cuba. Ni la educacion sirve para nada. Hasta los doctores se estan muriendo de hambre. Toda my familia esta en Cuba y tengo que mandarle dinero para que no se muera de hambre. Ni con dolares consiguen las cosas.
Lujos ? Si ni siquiera hay arroz, si ni siquiera tienes internet que sea pagado por meses, solo por horas y a 1 dólar cada una de estás, la gente que mejor vive es por qué tiene familia afuera o trabaja para el gobierno
@15:20 you cited number [18] but the source in the description gives me a study about cancer and not the one of UNESCO you showed in the video. Except that minor issue, great video as always! If I had the chance I would love to do my PhD of biochemistry in Cuba. Apparently molecular biology and biochemistry are the sciences Cuba specializes in.
It seems to me that instead of means-testing the government provisions because there's the people who don't need them, instead Cuba should just tax those substantially higher earners a little more to pay for higher government salaries.
That's honestly what I think too. Seems like if the tourism industry is thriving, it should go straight to the people that can't benefit from it directly. So it mitigates a rising wealth inequality as much as possible.
That all sounds pretty amazing given that the US has literally been trying to overthrow or destroy the country since Batista was overthrown... though I worry whenever some people get disproportionately wealthy - I'd hope they at least commit to a maximum acceptable wealth inequality before things get out of hand.
As a brit earning more than 40% of the population, living in a van, house ownership an impossible dream, this seems pretty good. I know my access to consumer goods is globally very high. But not having the chance of owning a house to put them in it seems pretty pointless. If you stay in rental accommodation it's so easy to not find work for 3 weeks and get evicted. When that happens you chuck all those consumer goods in the bin and start again from scratch anyway. I think I've done that 4 times before I gave up and said fuck it I'm building a van house . I'd sooner have guaranteed access to the essentials than easy access to none essentials. Like what's the point of a system that literally has people living in a bmw because it's worth less than a months rent on the tiny flat they just got kicked out of . The only genuine up side to Britain is food quality. If you cook at home you can eat fantastically for 1 hr of minimum wage. Probably one of the best food price to earnings ratio in the world. But still about 10% of the population regularly visit food banks. This is because unemployment benefits are so low. They also take weeks to be issued hence the frequency of evictions . Imagine what Cuba would be like without all the trade embargoes. Really sad . Fuck USA.
Cuba is one of the only countries you should root for in world politics. Basically every other country in the world has no interest in redistributing wealth.
"The point of an economy is, after all, to serve human needs, not to just make numbers go up for the sake of it." AHAHAHAHAAHAAA haaahahaha aaahhhhhhhhhh... wow, you're funny. Imagine how *amazing* such a world would be, though. It's painful to think about, in contrast to what we have at present.
Omg. No wonder Cubans are so happy. Imagine a legal system that made sense. Tax law that can be described in a single breath. How do I relinquish my US citizenship
Cubans are not happy, stop believing in propaganda. I’m Cuban and I can tell you most people hate it there. There’s a reason so many people risked their lives in boats to escape the country
@@Johnnysmithy24 I have a close friend who was born in Cuba. You sound like a Cuban born to privileged parents who were upset the communists took away their slaves
@@Johnnysmithy24 Yes you guys are, just because you guys aren't the united states doesn't mean that you guys don't have good lives, you people have a nation that it's comparable to places like haiti and nicaragua but you guys have better quality of live than places like argentina and brazil (my native country). Stop being so entitled, you guys are never gonna have quality of live like the United States and Europe, because you guys are latino americanos, third worlders. And dictatorship or not (because i have seen how your country democratic system works) freedom doesn't really matter when people are below the line of poverty dying of hunger.
An exact statistic would be hard to find but I'd bet it's about 10% of migrants because plantation owners arent very populous but what I know is that a lot of upper middle class business owners/professionals in the major cities. Another big bulk of the population that left would have also been religious Christian's whom I also assume would have been from the cities. Rural Cubans would have been the least likely to migrate being as they were the poorest and beneficiaries of Castro's land reform. Alot of what I'm saying comes from my Cuban heritage and statistics about cuban americans in Florida. My grandparents were city workers(grandpa was a Ford factory worker and grandma a office secretary) in Havana who left and now live in NY
Not that many really, however there were many other small-medium business, that were nationalized regardless, people lost their stuff,get mad and took off, anger is a very human response, if you gonna take my stuff and give me penny's worth for it.
Not all were plantation owners, some were landlords, like the one in the documentary Cuba Libre who complained about only getting 400 dollars in rent a month. Now that you've seen what the average wage in Cuba is now you can see how outrageous it was for that man to complain in the 1960s. I also checked and adjusted for inflation that'd be 41k dollars in todays money. So like already at the time he was earning more than 12x the wage of the average Cuban today and in today's money he's earning 1.464 times the wage of the average Cuban.
Hilariously this guy though was so greedy that he decided to join the Bay of Pigs invasion which resulted in him becoming a prisoner of war. He could have lived like a fucking multi-millionaire but that wasn't enough so instead his greed led to him getting payback in the form of becoming a prisoner of war. It's absolutely hilarious.
When I went to Cuba as part of a sociology study abroad trip back in 2018, the internet situation was just as you said, the only difference I noticed was that 1) you needed to go to internet cafes to use it and 2) the connection was slow, about on par to some of the more rural places I've lived. Admittedly, I had rose-colored glasses on when I went, since I was a budding socialist, but I'd love to go back and reevaluate with all this and what I've studied in mind and look at things from a less biased perspective
Internet cafes are probably just an economic thing, many people can't / won't bother affording a PC, internet cafes are popular in China too while many own personal devices. This just sounds like the avg internet situation in less developed countries. Definitely would love to visit tho, but the embargo really does put Cuba in a difficult situation that doesn't leave many great options to move forward
@@My-nl6sg Well, in my country until 2017-2019 we have a lot of Internet Cafes, with a lot of Telefon Cabinet's. In my period of poverty, my mom have pay for 2 hours of Internet (A 2.50 Euro) for me in some days for entrenament (Me, a 12 years old kid whacked TH-cam) but by the COVID and the great access to Smartphone and cheaper PC's the Ciber Cafes are closed. And in the High Schools now the students have access to a PC's of the Government and a lot of Public Library's whit PC's.
I've been to Cuba (less than half a year ago on this trip), and also visited a store with some locals. Westerners don't understand what rations are, they are a minimum standard, not a maximum. This means you get this at a minimum, then you purchase more on top of the ration goods at the ration price (which is as close to free as you can get). Americans and capitalists will never explain this to people, they will forever use the term ration as an evil to fight against. They won't explain the benefits of all citizens in your country having a basic minimum standard that you can purchase on top of. Another fantastic thing about your video is explaining to people the concept of relativity. The US does everything in its power to ensure Cuba is poorer than it otherwise would be. Despite this, it has few unhoused people, the quality of the housing is better than many capitalist peer nations (Haiti rings a bell). And it is incredibly safe, which isn't true for many areas of Latin America in the capitalist realm. They also have enough science and technology to have developed not one, but 2 covid vaccines on their own. Amazing feats to accomplish given how poor the US tries to make Cuba by oppressing it. One more thing... When I visit Cuba, while there are shortages of products at times, one thing I didn't see is starvation. People are well fed. And there's plenty of people who are heavy. YET, so many westerners say people are starving. Cubans aren't starving, and the annoying shortages they have are almost always directly linked with the US embargo. For example, farmers in Cuba that cannot run tractors to make their farms produce more, because of oil shipments that can't come in due to US actions. The US blockade is almost always the source of the problem. I have a friend who always tells me "If Cuba has a shortage of cars, why don't they just build them themselves?" I have to remind him that Cuba is an island with limited resources. It has to trade to obtain certain goods, or to manufacture them and procure materials from abroad. And with the US blockade, it makes it impossible to do these things. This INCLUDES China, even though its an ally. Why? China is part of the WTO, and it adheres to the US's ridiculous rules being a part of the 'global capital market'. So even allies can't help Cuba the way they'd like to. So, again, many people in the capitalist world just hate communism and they don't want to hear logic. BUT, great video explaining the reality! And yes, your bit on the Internet is spot-on. The Internet was freely available on my visits. The 4G LTE coverage from ETECSA is fairly decent, and it allowed me to do anything I wanted while there. It was the same access that Cubans get. You can get a SIM card at any corner store or the airport in Varadero. So the new underwater fiber cable network is helping tremendously. The data speeds were quite decent, and YES they didn't get it until the past 5 years specifically because the US keeps blocking them. So people need to stop blaming Cuba and start blaming the US. The US really is the problem. In other words, Cuba is a relative success. Because relativity is reality.
It's cool to have lots of physicians but when the requirements that you need to become a physician are that you live in Cuba and aren't dead, all those physicians are gonna do a whole lot of nothing.
Cuba should not exclude anyone from the welfare programs because that creates a two tier class system and makes things worse. They should just increase taxes on higher income earners in Cuba. Thus, leveling the playing field.
I know the history section of the video had to be brief but I think one thing you didn’t mention is important. After the US was humiliated by its defeat at the Bay of Pigs a second much greater and fiercer invasion was anticipated. Cuba would not have stood a chance. That’s when the USSR came to Cuba’s defence. They only removed their nuclear weapons from the island after a sworn declaration that the U S would never again invade Cuba.
Good report. The US has shot itself in the foot with this senseless hatred towards Cuba. Not only has the Cuban economy been destroyed, but so has the US economy with this senseless trade embargo against Cuba. US sanctions directed against countries harm the innocent people in those countries, not the leaders. China trades with any country it can, and in the process is winning the hearts and minds of the entire world, and benefitting economically. In marked contrast, America's economic warfare via economic sanctions, is harming not only the people it is directed against but it is also harming the American people as our trading opportunities here in America and the jobs involved in those trades are also harmed.
My parents went on vaca to cuba a couple years ago. When they came back i asked my dad “howd you like the communism?” And he said “enh its not REAL communism.” It sounds like “real” communism
I had colleague (Danish) that took a vacation to Cuba in the mid 2010's, she praised their healthcare system after having to use it because of a broken leg.
idk if revoking access to subsidised goods for the self employed would be a good solution tbh. part of why this system appears to be so effective at preventing poverty is its universality and imposing restrictions to access feels to me like a step backward, towards the reintroduction of/more defined class system and slips back into a more market capitalist organisation. surely raising taxes on the self employed and raising govt. incomes would facilitate the broadening of access to those luxury goods while maintaining equal access and classless/less divided social order, ne?
Thank you for what you do. Been trying to edumacate myself a lot recently and I think yours and others channels do a great job of looking at things critically and staying relatively unbiased and has helped me develop a more realistic outlook of the world.
OMG I wish there were portuguese subtitles so I could show this video for my friends here in Brasil that do not speak English. Is there a way I could help with that?? Thanks bad empanada I really love your videos. 🙏🏴🚩
@@pedra_esp24 I think that if the video has subtitles in English you can download a document with the English subtitles and timecodes. I don't remember exactly how but I found it clicking around in the subtitles page
@@BadEmpanada got It Do tou have the whole text transcripted already? I could try to add those in English and Portuguese. I arleady looked up a software to make the subtitles archive.
Most often when the media and politicians say something is bad the truth is normally far different. Politics are designed to keep people from being united so that the rich can prosper while the poor squabble amongst each other. Cuba is probably a good place if ur not a rich capitalist. I personally don't desire riches or material things. I'm interested in my basic needs being met and living cheaply
Thanks so much for this video Empanada. Every time I do basic research on google about Cuba it’s always about government repression and anecdotes about how oppressive Castro and the communists were, leading me to doubt whether or not Cuba is as good as my comrades make it out to be. Thanks for putting yourself through grueling hours of research for those who don’t have access to academic resources
Just got back from 10 days there and what I'll say is that living is easier in the US, however in Cuba, your survival is guaranteed. Like in Cuba, you never have the fear of homelessness or debt, which is a constant fear of the US
There are welfare programs here in the US that provide for you if you are jobless, homeless, low income, etc. They even aid you in obtaining a job and getting you on your feet. If anything the pandemic was an example of the sheer amount of money the government will give you when you are given unemployment assistance. So there's no need to be in fear of such things.
Cuba has a lot more homelessness and child malnutrition than America. US homelessness rate of 0.17% is one of the lowest in the developed world. And no one is starving in the US Meanwhile in Cuba they have rolling blackouts and famine on widespread scale. It takes a lot get people angry enough to protest in an authoritarian dictatorship
Sounds like they need to nationalize the tourism industry and most of those "small businesses" raking in foreign cash so they can distribute it more equitably.
Ime Romanian and I can say that most people own there own houses there and that was because of the "first house program" in whitch the government helped you get your first house but receantly they changed the "first house program" and now it's not as good as it was before
Thank you for this video! As someone who was honestly very confused about Cuba, this was incredibly informative. I’ll definitely be subbing for more content! Edit: typo
the ration book is normally called "Libreta", but in English sounds way worse than what it is, I've had wide open eyes as a reaction to that translation, is kind of funny
I hoped to learn a bit more about Cuba’s political system (I assume it’s a little bit more complicated than "the President decides everything alone") but having such a nuanced account of the economic system and daily life is already pretty nice!
Almost came watching this video. You say that the things are not bad for average cuban but it's not getting better. Well everywhere else things are getting way worse for people. Lot more people are being pushed into poverty and are unable to sustain themselves thanks to increasing prices. Atleast they don't have to go though that.
Not to mention the fact that cuba is way more democratic than the US Like anyone can get in to politics unlike in the US where unless your rich or got financial banking you better forget getting in to politics
10:49 India is in the top 10 in that list?? What exactly does that percentage mean? I find it hard to believe my country is so high up on a "home ownership rate" list
its a bit of a weird metric. you get the home ownership rate by taking the number of owner-occupied homes and dividing it by the total number of residential units. a high percentage of homeownership is essentially just a low level of landlordism, where the owner of a home leveraging their position over tenants to extract a portion of their wages as rent. basically people living on the street or in slums that lack proper deeds are not counted, meaning that is not necessarily an indicator of how well overall housing needs are being met. fwiw homelessness is an issue in Cuba, but it is at a much lower rate than other countries with similar levels of gross wealth. there is debate within Cuba about how to manage housing, but its hard to make sweeping reforms since the vast majority of citizens already own a home and don't have to pay land tax, mortgage, or rent. hope this helps!
This sounds like any (serious) analysis of Cuba I've ever heard: poor, but doing really well with the circumstances it has. I've never really heard from anyone calling Cuba a utopia in the first place.
no me habia tropezado con este video o.o gracias por hacer analisis serios, en medio de esta crisis y de tantas otras mierdas corriendo, es como una bocanada de aire fresco :)
That last part where he mocks the Miami Cuban was funny but spot on. I went my whole life being uncritical of the Miami Cuban narrative of Cuba. Equating Castro to Hitler and hyperbole like that.
When someone says 'would you rather live in America or Cuba?' that's the wrong question. The right question is 'would you rather live in Cuba than Nicaragua, Guatamala, Panama or Mexico?' and that is a no brainer.
Exactly. I was always thought it was the height of foolishness to compare advanced Capitalist economies, for whom Imperialism played a big part in their enrichment, with much smaller less advanced economy like Cuba's. A more apt comparison would always be with places that started with the same conditions. If your average Haitian woke up in Cuba tomorrow they'd think they'd died and gone to heaven, even with the sanctions hanging on Cuba heavily . This is what many refuse to understand.
Also quite funny that they imagine themselves living as wealthy people by default. Why not take the socioeconomic roulette and see how good your chances are of getting a decent life? 'Cause right now in the US there's a rapidly increasing chance of ending up unemployed, homeless and starving.
Is Mexico really worse than Cuba? I mean, I understand those other countries could be worse, but that would really shock me. Then again, I'm not very informed about that part of the continent.
Also like are you in the top 10% or the bottom 10% of the society? If you’re in the top then Cuba might feel a little stifling, but it’s fine. If you’re in the bottom though you will definitely live in Cuba, whereas your chances are much worse in the states.
@GazB Sounds like the place I live here in Brazil
I’m from Florida and all I ever heard from Cubans was literally the meme “they took my family’s (insert rich person thing here)”.
My favorite was “My father had a dentist office and when it was destroyed in a hurricane the government didn’t build him a new one”
As if they think the US government would have done that.
89ji
I owned slaves and plantations !
They took them from me !
This violates my human rights !
REEEEEEEEEE
@@cezarcatalin1406 NAP is a very important right
They took my family's sla.. uhm indentured servants, mines, and plantations. Castro also killed seventy bajillions the whole island was empty. SoChUliSm BaDdDddd.
Péter Kiss Imagine for a sec that you have some generational wealth, and lead a decent, comfortable life. Then you wake up one day and the state has taken all of it, and imprisoned or killed everyone who tried to hide their wealth, forcing you to flee your home country. Wouldn’t YOU also be at least somewhat bitter about that, even if, I’m the grand scheme, you are “wrong” to?
@@leovalenzuela8368 why did they have to flee exactly? Didn't they know to work for a living? I guess that can happen when you're born with a silver spoon in your mouth.
"the death of fidel castro (RIP king)" what do you mean? he's literally narrating this video.
GazB So he’s brothers with Justin Trudeau, damn
True
There was over 30 or so attempted assassinations against Castro. Yet he lived to 90. Long live the revolution
@@ImperiaGin r/technicallycorrect he survived 638 assassination attempts
@@BadEmpanada youve gotten the castrolookalike thing commonly?
Fun fact, ex dictator Fulgencio Batista's daughter is now homeless in Florida
@GazB he did, yet his daughter is homeless. It's quite Karmic really.
Tess O. She should have stayed in Cuba lol
lmao
I see...
Was she a bitch? I kinda feel bad without the context. I'm admittedly ignorant about Cuban history.
@GazB the fact that she wears usa shirt while homeless make me laugh th-cam.com/video/H6vDgkkM17c/w-d-xo.html
"The point of an economy is, after all, to serve human needs, not to just make numbers go up for the sake of it." 🤔
*Capitalists:* Now wait a Walt-Disney-dime-a-dozen-kentucky-fried-chickening-finger-licking-minute, pardner! 😤
That was freaky. I scrolled down to read the comments during the video and I literally read this comment exactly as he was speaking it.
Capitalists be like "communism kills people for the state, now die so that the dow can go up you worthless peasant"
@@hectorandem2944 LULW
This quote is so true
Just imagine how successful Cuba would be if it didn't have to deal with the US embargo
@@Nosirrbro It's deeper than that. The embargo also has the US dunking on anyone who trades with Cuba. They're literally holding the world at gunpoint because they are *that* scared of Cuba actually being able to establish itself.
@@BadEmpanada though the sugar thing is probably for the best. fuck cash crops.
Not really. Cuba trades a lot with Canada and China
@@MonolithicEthos Canada has enough juice as a major trade partner to the US, that they can do what they like. If Canada cut off the maple syrup alone, US people would riot.
There is a lesson to everything, we do send gay people to work camps in the 60's -and- -never- -make- -an- -apology- -for- -it- , we also ban music, like the beattles, and throw egg or beat a neighbour cuban becouse they were leaving the country and were a "gusano", only to be a few years later thanking them for any little detail like a docen of eggs. Proud and ego are dangerous thing, living under the impresion that you are always right will only couse pain to those who live under your falacy of self righouness. There some more caveat with the housing, if else, it is true that we have a high porcent of owenership, however that is only true for older generations, for millenials and forward there are in a rent free state but don't really own anything, meaing that is common to have up to 3 generations under the same houshold. This is a problem a few can sort out, leaving a big bunch with no life project ahead in a meaninfull time span, there for, people just leave the country. Cuba already show patterns like develop nations like japan with their old populaton and low birthrates.
I make a decent salary in japan and still can’t afford an apartment with a kitchen nearly as big as those.
Ive been thinking of studying abroad in japan, is the cost of living comparably bad to western countries
Obviously space will be ridiculously expensive in Japan since the population density is so high.
@@dgc4059 yeah true
Paddy O'Door Tokyo and Osaka will be really expensive. Think basically the price of New York but your apartment will be smaller.
As a student your living place will probably be decided for you so the cost will probably just depend on the study abroad program. Which is lucky because foreigners face massive (and totally legal) housing discrimination here.
I assumed that everyone in Cuba just got a cut of worldwide sales of Che Guevara t-shirts but now I'm watching this video to learn really what happens
I’d buy one just to do that
That would be fucking awesome if it were true. I'd distribute it in Australia if that were the case haha
Jesus, I just laughed so hard.
If Cuba got that, I'd absolutely have a Che shirt.
if anything the profits of che guevara t shirts should go to his home country 😤 (pls send help everything is falling apart)
but really, it is very funny how everyone asumes el che was cuban, even people from the country he was actually from (including me before i turned 13) 🤣
TL;DR: Cuba has the unique problems of an isolated transition economy which exists in a capitalist world
Not really its more like the problem of a country that the US doseant like
@@a.n.l.aantineoliberalismas4504 Underrated comment
@@a.n.l.aantineoliberalismas4504 its almost like an imperialist superpower bully is the natural result of a capitalist world
It's a country that's unable to stand on its own legs.
@@djgroopz4952you mean a country that is getting its kneecaps continually batted in by the US assholes
When I visited Cuba last year I heard a diverse mix of opinion from Cubans themselves on all sorts of issues, almost as if anyone saying "GO ASK A CUBAN" as support for their argument is being disingenuous and pretending that they know the universal opinion of a nation of 11 million people
it's almost as if cubans are actually people with their own opinions
@@cageybee7221 Truly unexpected, isn't it?
@kr tu But apparently it's not a problem that the US government will literally shoot people protesting against it?
@kr tu there is a documentary called Cuba And The Cameraman, and thats exactly what they do, but surprise, they openly criticize what they think of the government on camera, and even Fidel himself participates on this AMERICAN documentary wich is looking at the better and the worse in Cuba, and has no problem with it,
@kr tu that is not even The point of what you were saying
Castro started out as a centrist liberal(ish) lawyer & wanted to work with the US. The intransigent hostility of US interests to his basic social justice/national autonomy demands helped to drive him in a much more socialist direction than he'd originally planned.
All in all - as far as I can tell (I have close family ties through marriage) this is one of the most accurate & fair representations of life in Cuba I've seen for a while. Good work.
@angry troll
Damn you're funny
If Castro had been just a LITTLE bit better pitcher and gotten a contract with the New York Giants, none of this would be a thing and Cuba would be a capitalist shithole.
@CWW I mean tbf he was as liberal in a dictatorship, that was actually a fairly progressive stance and it's what motivated him to rebel. Like he was a liberal in the sense that he believed in stuff like equal rights and democracy. Going further left was somewhat of a natural evolution for him with the conditions of the times.
Though also it should be noted that he actually had a lot of support in the US at first, many people in the US thought of him as a freedom fighter before he took power. It was after he came to power that it became clear that he couldn't work with the US so he sided with the USSR which pissed off the US obviously.
Same happened with Ho Chi Minh btw
Cuba is a wonderful country, it's an example of what every other country in the world should strive to be. Viva la revolucion and viva Castro.
honestly the biggest shocker i learned from this is that romania is the leading home ownership country...
As a Russian I gotta say that home ownership is one of the most significant blessings of post-soviet countries. At least most of us don't have to deal with landlords, and even old houses are still pretty decent and sturdy.
@@Miraihi I've heard that for however simplistic brutalist soviet architecture is, it was definitely made with the intention to last
From what I figured hanging out in Romania, families just don't sell houses, and generations live there together. It's not that everyone owns, but that most don't have to rent.
@@andrestorp I personally live in Stalin-era apartments in Moscow. While the age is showing, there are three huge rooms with really high ceilings. The flat is in a dire need of a fresh coat of paint and new windows, but this is still much better than most newly built houses here.
@@ernststravoblofeld Been born in Romania in 94, and that's kind of a wrong perception. Yes, it's true most Romanian families don't sell houses, but I know very few Romanians where more than 2 generations (parents and their children) live together. Your grandparents would almost always own a different flat/house. It is a poor country by European standards and I admit it shocked even me that it's number 1 in home ownership (I expected maybe a top 10-20, but not this lol), but it's not the 3rd world either to have "generations" share the same house - the number of people per household is very similar to the country I currently live in, the UK, at about 3 or 4 usually.
In short:
*US shoots Cuba*
"I can't believe they're doing so poorly!"
A man of culture. 👌
@@labadaba5088 capitalists love victim blaming, it's like blaming a rape victim "she was asking for it" "she's not a victim she just wants attention" "she shouldn't have been wearing those slutty clothes"
this analogy can be applied to all of latin america in general tbh
@Cian Abroad Literally my thought when Obama criticized them for having cars from the 50s. "Oh really, ya think that might have something to do with the EMBARGO THAT'S BEEN ACTIVE SINCE THE 50s???"
@@5PctJuice Also those cars look gorgeous
I was fortunate enough to visit Cuba for a study abroad program in 2016 before the trump administration tightened travel restrictions again, and (though I am by no means an expert) I witnessed a lot of what you described in your video, such as the dual currency system and discrepancies between housing in the city and the country. Cuba is by no means a rich country, but I was impressed by the way the country was structured around providing basic needs despite the crushing pressure of the embargo.
While I was there, I did research on Cuba’s agricultural system. Because of the embargo Cuba is more limited to what it can produce on the island, and a lack of access to things like fertilizer and farming machines makes this more difficult. In order to sustain productivity, Cuba has invested research into ecological practices, such as raising insects that eat crop pests. It was really interesting to learn about given the nature of unsustainable agriculture in places like the USA.
Watch Micheal parent's lecture over imperalism and other topics. And you'll understand how devasting they are and will give more context to what poor vs rich means
@@ImperiaGin .
the embargo isnt to blame cuba is just inept at running their country
@@VMan29397smartest american
My mother is a dentist who works on a public hospital here in Brasil. I've met 2 Cuban doctors who worked with her (before Bolsonaro kicked them out cause LeFTiSts aRE RuINinG BrAZil) and both said mostly the same things. Is not a perfect country, but some things are better and some are worse. They seems to really love their country, not the "they are forced to say that they love" people here love to propagate.
Now they want them back.
peoplesworld.org/article/amid-coronavirus-pandemic-bolsonaros-brazil-begs-for-cuban-doctors-after-expelling-them/
@@lolcatjunior Bolsonaro doesn't want them. He doesn't even want the quarantine. He just fired the ministry of health. His economy plan, that elected him, was failing (the dollar reached 5,20 reais, the highest it has ever been, just before the Covid-19 reached here) so he prefers to kill the poorest and the oldest than loose than loose power. He prefers to burn bridges with long economic allies, like China, Cuba, Latin America, etc. to be friends with Trump.
@@corneliahale7871 bosanro is a fascist
@@corneliahale7871 I hope you guys get rid of that fascist soon
@@pinheadlarry1977 based on opinion polling they should
I don't believe this. Castro himself is narrating this so the whole thing is biased.
You misspelled "based".
U can share ur own
My mother went to Cuba in the early 1990's "special period" as part of a religious exchange program, and some Cubans likewise came to the US as part of that program. Some key parts of her experience that seemed pretty representative:
- The people she met were basically healthy. They didn't have a lot of extra food, and definitely wouldn't waste it the way many Americans would, but they did have enough to survive reasonably well.
- The medical system put a big emphasis on public health measures and prevention. For instance, the local doctor would be consulted whenever someone was planning on building a latrine to make sure that water and food supplies were protected from disease.
- Another important adaptation in their health system is that Cuban doctors were (and probably still are) trained extensively in herbal medicines that can be used as less-potent alternatives to pills. A doctor's office can even be identified by the herb garden out front. That said, Cubans who can get pills absolutely will use them, and sometimes take more than recommended doses.
- There's more political freedom than you might think for Cubans. For instance, her hosts would sometimes crack jokes about Fidel Castro, and my mother and her group weren't followed around by government minders or anything like that.
Sorry but that thing about political freedom is not true. I’m Cuban, when I was a child and I complained about my country my mom would tell me to be quiet, because if “chivatos” heard us we could go to prison or be fined. Also one of my neighbors went to jail for speaking against the government
@@kimobrien. What does this have to do with my comment? I literally lived there for 15 years, why would I need to get anything from any “US propaganda”? *I was there*
@@kimobrien. They do have names you just don’t care enough to look for them, I doubt you’ve actually engaged with many people living in the island. Honestly this is a ridiculous argument, you’ll never understand if you didn’t live there because you’re in denial. Everyone in Cuba knows this is true, literally everyone
@@kimobrien. Of course there’s common crime in Cuba, but there’s also the fact that it’s prohibited to speak against the government, it’s that simple. Even Fidel Castro admitted this in an interview
How do America continue to justify their embargo? I assume it's not openly addressed often in politics
Most don't think about it, but if its brought up its justified because the missle crisis
I've never heard any politicians bring it up. Sadly, people in the US don't tend to care about Latin America.
To keep the Cuban exile psychos in Florida voting for the right party
Americans should realise Cuba is no threat to the world. Sanctions should be removed and I support sanctions on countries like Iran which is destroying the middle East
It received some attention when Obama lifted the embargo. I remember that the Republicans flipped out because he took a photo with Cuban government officials in front of a Che Guevara mural.
Focusing on preventative care is the best way to handle healthcare, it makes healthier people and it's cheaper than alternatives.
In my country Bulgaria a YT channel guy called Kiro Breika explains it well. Basically they as children were put into exercise and sport a lot and out of 15 hundred 2 would be fat not obese and 2 may wear glasses. That ofcourse be over stretch but people generally would be fa healthier. Especially with their food. Food then was way more natural and kids didnt have access to freakish amount of sugar. The peasants had quantity of food that the city people couldnt dream of thou. My mother tells me the city people had to line up vast quantity of people in front of the supermarket. No I dont mean 100 or 200 hundred people rather double triple or quadriple than that possibly. Yes there were pluses and minuses. After all we didnt have 50m subjects as slaves and didnt had the back up of ww2 America which had minor worries compared to the Soviets who faced the largest invasion in human history. So we got the war torn 1 as an allies instead of the fresh. Anyways as vassals we wouldve been so much better today than American by fact militarily occupied colony.
The reason they have preventive care is because the government knows that if a person gets sick the government will have to pay for it, unlike the US.
What a coincidence that the rate of home ownership is high in countries that used to be "socialist" or at least tried to be... Almost as if the citizens of such countries benefit from some form of policy that helped the people at the expense of landlords.
I don't know about anyone else in the USA right now, but there's are shortages of types of staple meats right now in my area. Pretending that a system that only operates in the most optimal setting is the basis for any standard is just hubris disguised as pride.
@TheMatron'sMilitia while I get your point, meat is absolutely a staple food item in the US just because it's such a common part of the average diet
@TheMatron'sMilitia People are talking about food shortages and here you are being That Kind of vegan. You're not winning any prizes here dude. Let it go.
@TheMatron'sMilitia "The pandemic and thereby the shortages were caused by carnism"
you could have just said "china eat bat lmao" and shown your arse without the pomp.
"We grow enough grain alone to feed 10-12billion people but it gets wasted to fatten livestock for the tables of the privileged."
cattle feed =/= human-edible grain but okay
"It takes 1/8th as much land and 1/5th as much water to grow a vegan diet over a standard American diet."
so you, by bringing up America, admit the problem is *over*consumption and not consumption in general, then, since America's diet is influenced by capitalism i.e. just-in-time supply chains, built-in wastage and consumerism
"Veganism is a necessary part of the total elimination of food shortages"
your veganism is just another product of capitalist propaganda sloughing responsibility for ecological damage off onto the individual instead of the system but ok
@TheMatron'sMilitia but no seriously dude no one is buying your capitalist veganism bullshit. take a hike.
@TheMatron'sMilitia while I haven't been able to be vegan yet, keep up the good fight. Your points stand strong here
What cuba needs is to invest in production of biomedical supplies, internet infrastructure, and green energy. The combo of CA deficits with lack luster growth is slowly killing the country. Tourism is not a solution, tourism is an economic drug for small countries because its unsustainable and if you only have infrastructure supporting that then prepare for economic ruin.
Well it's kind of hard all the embargo and all.
What Cuba (and the rest of the global south) needs is for someone or something to dismantle the US and capitalism, and get the fucking boot off their necks.
NightfallGemini I’m willing to bet that if the Cubans tried a bay of pigs invasion in Washington it’d go over really well. There’d be plenty of Americans to support them.
@@WeDwellinaFiefdom As much as I wished that was true, unfortunately the fact that we elected Trump and that the US has imposed capitalist propaganda on everyone from cradle to grave to "worship the line (GDP growth)" and the belief that "socialism bad, capitalism good" and "muh individualsm" and "merica is good" and "muh second amendment" can be a serious problem for Cuba being able to hold ground on American soil for long, given the embargo, I suspect that getting raw materials for the most basic needs let alone building up a sizable, modernized war machine to try and stand toe to toe against the world's current biggest superpower who's military budget dwarfs literally every other country on the planet can only result in a catastrophic failure and impending doom for the Cuban Republic, I mean when the US was busy in the middle east, it even took the time to literally invade Haiti in 2004 on a whim to help the far right militias overthrow Haiti's Leftist President Aristide.
@@jorgeamadosoriaramirez8953 what I really mean is that cuba has to not rely on producer good imports and increase it's own producer good production such as medical equipment because they have enough doctors and engineers to do it. Before castro cuba had generous amount of imports come from the US and once castro came to power those generous imports cames from the ussr and once that ended cuba went into the special period it needs to try to increase investment in production like the USSR did.
weird that a young fidel is telling us about his home country...
El tipo ese es argentino y por eso se parece a el porque ambos son españoles*
@@franciscoacevedo3036 A what
@@NA-AN hes australian of greek heritage >.>
Kinda sus ngl.
@@franciscoacevedo3036its a joke
Needed this. I live in Florida and it can be difficult to explain the situation over there, especially to anti-Castro immigrants. Solidarity!
Ya show some of them this videos at least some of the ones that will listen. Btw I'm a cuban American, not all of us are right wingers
@@james192599 for real?! Now that's refreshing to see. Solidarity✊
A completely glossed over factoid: Bernie won the Cuban primary vote in Florida while Biden beat him with Puerto Ricans
What makes you think you have the right to tell real Cubans what their country is like? I swear this ignorance is incredible. A Cuban’s word about Cuba is worth 50 times more than anyone else’s
@@Johnnysmithy24 cope and seethe you don’t know shit
US: shoots Cuba
“How could socialism have done this?!”
CURRENCY UPDATE:
Cuba is now transitioning to a single currency.
The convertible currency 'CUC' is being phased out this month (June 2021) leaving just the Cuban Peso.
oh rely is it working comrade or not im intrasted
CURRENCY UPDATE:
Cuba now have 3 currency.
The convertible currency 'CUC' is being phased out this month (June 2021) leaving just the MLC, USD, CUP. and devaluation of 500%
That was interesting as hell. I really liked the idea of not paying rent and actually be able to afford a house. That will make living in California hell of a lot better.
We should all implement rent strikes in California, especially now a days given Coronavirus is fucking over the working class.
Even something as basic as rent control is common in other parts of the world, it's been the accepted law here in Denmark for decades and people often speak up about unfair rent hikes. And even something like that can do a lot. I do wish we could also adopt something like that where housing was just guaranteed, seems like the obvious next step.
That’s because California’s vote for Democrats dummy
So I actually decided to look up the "Doctor vs Taxi driver" thing in my country and it actually turns out that a newly trained doctor here will earn a similar wage as the top 2/5ths payed taxi drivers. And also a trash collector here is payed similarly or more than a newly trained doctor, being payed anywhere from 23 to 29 dollars an hour.
As it turns out this isn't a bad thing, strangely paying people a proper wage doesn't hurt anyone and it just gives people more freedom of choice. Denmark isn't running out of doctors because everyone is running off to become a taxi driver or trash collector because education is also free here so people are just gonna do what they want.
Have you looked at wealth inequality, working conditions, or cost of living? Compared to these metrics, life sucks in Central Europe.
19:17 'What's normal for us isn't close to normal for the majority'. Como argentino viendo un video en inglés, esto es algo que siempre tengo en cuenta. Soy alto cheto
They "It should have" Posadas moment had me cracking up.
I missed it, when was it?
Thanks, you did your homework. Im cuban and your video very accurate. No country is perfect and Cuba need a lot of work is not as bad as many people want it to be.
heloo ther ar you in a internet cafe and byw whats your opinion on maiamians
Another amazing video from our Interim President of the United States of America
tl;dw: above all expectation given the circumstances
I literally just read up on this yesterday. Had to try to read between the lines on western sources. Nice to have a more even report with sources. I'll have to read up through these!
This guy's got the Greek philosopher look going
nah its Fidel himself
Finally going for the Patreon pledge. This video convinced me. We need you to keep making great content like this. Gonna share this with my friends.
Thank you, it is hard to cut through all the hysteria when it comes to anything slightly socialist, let alone Cuba.
That’s interesting. I’m usually against means testing but I guess Cuba’s growing inequality is happening under pretty different circumstances than in most of the world.
BadEmpanada so maybe it should be more categorically based on private work rather than like a set income cap, idk, maybe it’s just me being an anarchist that makes me feel torn on this.
Patria Grande, hermanos! Viva Cuba and the United Latin America!
Gilberto Borello United Socialist States of latin america in order to counter usa's hegemony.
@@Videogamer12203 yes you damn yankee
@@γιουργια so you want to fight an empire with another empire?
@@thecreepnextdoor7560 TIL an alliance of nations that are victims of Imperialist exploitation is "an empire"
still waiting for the URSAL thing becoming a reality...
Hardly an ideal system but at least they got something decent going for them.
Jamaican here, i really do wish that jamaica follows the path of Cuba in terms of progression to socialism
2:45 US response to Castros regime which made them reliant on the USSR
4:20 collapse of USSR crashed Cuba’s economy
4:45 ships that land on Cuba cannot land on the USA for 6 months, the US made the embargoes harsher after the collapse
10:30 free housing
13:00 what housing looks like, richer families can renovate
14:15 free healthcare and checkups
17:30 Cuba second sources of income and second economy
18:40 non extreme food scarcity
23:00 new dollar economy
26:00 most banned Cuban websites are blocked due to US embargos
26:50 US embargos prevent shipping of medical supplies to Cuba
28:30 solutions
Without embargo’s then Cuba would be in much better condition, however even with embargo’s Cuba is in a much better state than most Latin America countries. Cuba is pretty cool
El problema es que los yankees tampoco llegan a comprender el estilo de vida Cubano. Les parece ilógico, antinatural y prehistórico que una persona prefiera tener salud y educación de calidad, viviendo tranquilo, sin las presiones del consumismo y los "lujos".
@angry troll Giving your name justice. I like that😆
Buen dicho. Y yo ha visitado 🇨🇺 dos veces.
This is what my dad said after I read your bullshit comment to him. “Tu eres mal informado o un comunista descarado. El pueblo Cubano se esta muriendo de hambre. No tiene agua ni comida ni ropa, nada! Estan viviendo en la miseria. Lo que tienen viene de la familia en los Estados Unidos. Los hospitales se ven como cuevas viejas y desbaratadas sin ventanad. A mi no me hagas cuento que yo naci en Cuba y vivi 35 años en Cuba. Ni la educacion sirve para nada. Hasta los doctores se estan muriendo de hambre. Toda my familia esta en Cuba y tengo que mandarle dinero para que no se muera de hambre. Ni con dolares consiguen las cosas.
Lujos ? Si ni siquiera hay arroz, si ni siquiera tienes internet que sea pagado por meses, solo por horas y a 1 dólar cada una de estás, la gente que mejor vive es por qué tiene familia afuera o trabaja para el gobierno
Goar Martinez Cardona Todos aqui defendiendo a Cuba son una plaga
@15:20 you cited number [18] but the source in the description gives me a study about cancer and not the one of UNESCO you showed in the video.
Except that minor issue, great video as always!
If I had the chance I would love to do my PhD of biochemistry in Cuba. Apparently molecular biology and biochemistry are the sciences Cuba specializes in.
@@BadEmpanada What is the right source then?
Cuba might not be perfect, but its very based.
May want to make an update version to this. They went through a lot in 3 years!
you are right, now is even worse
It seems to me that instead of means-testing the government provisions because there's the people who don't need them, instead Cuba should just tax those substantially higher earners a little more to pay for higher government salaries.
That's honestly what I think too. Seems like if the tourism industry is thriving, it should go straight to the people that can't benefit from it directly. So it mitigates a rising wealth inequality as much as possible.
The problem is going to be huge dissatisfaction with the people. There needs to be a solution where people dont feel like they are being “robbed”.
That all sounds pretty amazing given that the US has literally been trying to overthrow or destroy the country since Batista was overthrown... though I worry whenever some people get disproportionately wealthy - I'd hope they at least commit to a maximum acceptable wealth inequality before things get out of hand.
29:26 ironically, I bet if most Americans heard this out of context they'd think "liberalization" referred to making everything public and free.
Cuba strong 💪 🇨🇺
Sam Is A Moth Serbia Strong 🇷🇸
@@MonolithicEthos wait your from Serbia
As a brit earning more than 40% of the population, living in a van, house ownership an impossible dream, this seems pretty good.
I know my access to consumer goods is globally very high. But not having the chance of owning a house to put them in it seems pretty pointless.
If you stay in rental accommodation it's so easy to not find work for 3 weeks and get evicted. When that happens you chuck all those consumer goods in the bin and start again from scratch anyway. I think I've done that 4 times before I gave up and said fuck it I'm building a van house .
I'd sooner have guaranteed access to the essentials than easy access to none essentials. Like what's the point of a system that literally has people living in a bmw because it's worth less than a months rent on the tiny flat they just got kicked out of . The only genuine up side to Britain is food quality. If you cook at home you can eat fantastically for 1 hr of minimum wage. Probably one of the best food price to earnings ratio in the world.
But still about 10% of the population regularly visit food banks. This is because unemployment benefits are so low. They also take weeks to be issued hence the frequency of evictions .
Imagine what Cuba would be like without all the trade embargoes.
Really sad . Fuck USA.
Cuba is one of the only countries you should root for in world politics. Basically every other country in the world has no interest in redistributing wealth.
Empanada is posadist gang
"The point of an economy is, after all, to serve human needs, not to just make numbers go up for the sake of it." AHAHAHAHAAHAAA haaahahaha aaahhhhhhhhhh... wow, you're funny.
Imagine how *amazing* such a world would be, though. It's painful to think about, in contrast to what we have at present.
Omg. No wonder Cubans are so happy. Imagine a legal system that made sense. Tax law that can be described in a single breath.
How do I relinquish my US citizenship
Cubans are not happy, stop believing in propaganda. I’m Cuban and I can tell you most people hate it there. There’s a reason so many people risked their lives in boats to escape the country
@@Johnnysmithy24 I have a close friend who was born in Cuba.
You sound like a Cuban born to privileged parents who were upset the communists took away their slaves
@@Johnnysmithy24 Yes you guys are, just because you guys aren't the united states doesn't mean that you guys don't have good lives, you people have a nation that it's comparable to places like haiti and nicaragua but you guys have better quality of live than places like argentina and brazil (my native country). Stop being so entitled, you guys are never gonna have quality of live like the United States and Europe, because you guys are latino americanos, third worlders. And dictatorship or not (because i have seen how your country democratic system works) freedom doesn't really matter when people are below the line of poverty dying of hunger.
How many Cuban immigrants that fled Cuba had plantations?
Noh Buddy Almost all of the early ones
An exact statistic would be hard to find but I'd bet it's about 10% of migrants because plantation owners arent very populous but what I know is that a lot of upper middle class business owners/professionals in the major cities. Another big bulk of the population that left would have also been religious Christian's whom I also assume would have been from the cities. Rural Cubans would have been the least likely to migrate being as they were the poorest and beneficiaries of Castro's land reform. Alot of what I'm saying comes from my Cuban heritage and statistics about cuban americans in Florida.
My grandparents were city workers(grandpa was a Ford factory worker and grandma a office secretary) in Havana who left and now live in NY
Not that many really, however there were many other small-medium business, that were nationalized regardless, people lost their stuff,get mad and took off, anger is a very human response, if you gonna take my stuff and give me penny's worth for it.
Not all were plantation owners, some were landlords, like the one in the documentary Cuba Libre who complained about only getting 400 dollars in rent a month. Now that you've seen what the average wage in Cuba is now you can see how outrageous it was for that man to complain in the 1960s. I also checked and adjusted for inflation that'd be 41k dollars in todays money. So like already at the time he was earning more than 12x the wage of the average Cuban today and in today's money he's earning 1.464 times the wage of the average Cuban.
Hilariously this guy though was so greedy that he decided to join the Bay of Pigs invasion which resulted in him becoming a prisoner of war. He could have lived like a fucking multi-millionaire but that wasn't enough so instead his greed led to him getting payback in the form of becoming a prisoner of war. It's absolutely hilarious.
When I went to Cuba as part of a sociology study abroad trip back in 2018, the internet situation was just as you said, the only difference I noticed was that 1) you needed to go to internet cafes to use it and 2) the connection was slow, about on par to some of the more rural places I've lived.
Admittedly, I had rose-colored glasses on when I went, since I was a budding socialist, but I'd love to go back and reevaluate with all this and what I've studied in mind and look at things from a less biased perspective
Internet cafes are probably just an economic thing, many people can't / won't bother affording a PC, internet cafes are popular in China too while many own personal devices. This just sounds like the avg internet situation in less developed countries.
Definitely would love to visit tho, but the embargo really does put Cuba in a difficult situation that doesn't leave many great options to move forward
@@My-nl6sg Well, in my country until 2017-2019 we have a lot of Internet Cafes, with a lot of Telefon Cabinet's. In my period of poverty, my mom have pay for 2 hours of Internet (A 2.50 Euro) for me in some days for entrenament (Me, a 12 years old kid whacked TH-cam) but by the COVID and the great access to Smartphone and cheaper PC's the Ciber Cafes are closed.
And in the High Schools now the students have access to a PC's of the Government and a lot of Public Library's whit PC's.
Beautiful country made even more beautiful by functioning governance!
"b-but vuvuzela"
Funny fish.
I've been to Cuba (less than half a year ago on this trip), and also visited a store with some locals. Westerners don't understand what rations are, they are a minimum standard, not a maximum. This means you get this at a minimum, then you purchase more on top of the ration goods at the ration price (which is as close to free as you can get). Americans and capitalists will never explain this to people, they will forever use the term ration as an evil to fight against. They won't explain the benefits of all citizens in your country having a basic minimum standard that you can purchase on top of.
Another fantastic thing about your video is explaining to people the concept of relativity. The US does everything in its power to ensure Cuba is poorer than it otherwise would be. Despite this, it has few unhoused people, the quality of the housing is better than many capitalist peer nations (Haiti rings a bell). And it is incredibly safe, which isn't true for many areas of Latin America in the capitalist realm. They also have enough science and technology to have developed not one, but 2 covid vaccines on their own. Amazing feats to accomplish given how poor the US tries to make Cuba by oppressing it.
One more thing... When I visit Cuba, while there are shortages of products at times, one thing I didn't see is starvation. People are well fed. And there's plenty of people who are heavy. YET, so many westerners say people are starving. Cubans aren't starving, and the annoying shortages they have are almost always directly linked with the US embargo. For example, farmers in Cuba that cannot run tractors to make their farms produce more, because of oil shipments that can't come in due to US actions. The US blockade is almost always the source of the problem.
I have a friend who always tells me "If Cuba has a shortage of cars, why don't they just build them themselves?" I have to remind him that Cuba is an island with limited resources. It has to trade to obtain certain goods, or to manufacture them and procure materials from abroad. And with the US blockade, it makes it impossible to do these things. This INCLUDES China, even though its an ally. Why? China is part of the WTO, and it adheres to the US's ridiculous rules being a part of the 'global capital market'. So even allies can't help Cuba the way they'd like to. So, again, many people in the capitalist world just hate communism and they don't want to hear logic. BUT, great video explaining the reality!
And yes, your bit on the Internet is spot-on. The Internet was freely available on my visits. The 4G LTE coverage from ETECSA is fairly decent, and it allowed me to do anything I wanted while there. It was the same access that Cubans get. You can get a SIM card at any corner store or the airport in Varadero. So the new underwater fiber cable network is helping tremendously. The data speeds were quite decent, and YES they didn't get it until the past 5 years specifically because the US keeps blocking them. So people need to stop blaming Cuba and start blaming the US. The US really is the problem.
In other words, Cuba is a relative success. Because relativity is reality.
Cuba also have the most physicians per 1000 people, hospitals aren't under staffed and everyone will get checked quickly.
It's cool to have lots of physicians but when the requirements that you need to become a physician are that you live in Cuba and aren't dead, all those physicians are gonna do a whole lot of nothing.
@@keyvoo you also need a license to perform medical activities. No one will just let random people conduct medical examinations and treatment.
Cuba should not exclude anyone from the welfare programs because that creates a two tier class system and makes things worse.
They should just increase taxes on higher income earners in Cuba. Thus, leveling the playing field.
I loved this. You should do Laos at some time. I’ve been trying to do research on Laos, but have been having a super hard time.
I know the history section of the video had to be brief but I think one thing you didn’t mention is important. After the US was humiliated by its defeat at the Bay of Pigs a second much greater and fiercer invasion was anticipated. Cuba would not have stood a chance. That’s when the USSR came to Cuba’s defence. They only removed their nuclear weapons from the island after a sworn declaration that the U S would never again invade Cuba.
Good report. The US has shot itself in the foot with this senseless hatred towards Cuba. Not only has the Cuban economy been destroyed, but so has the US economy with this senseless trade embargo against Cuba. US sanctions directed against countries harm the innocent people in those countries, not the leaders. China trades with any country it can, and in the process is winning the hearts and minds of the entire world, and benefitting economically. In marked contrast, America's economic warfare via economic sanctions, is harming not only the people it is directed against but it is also harming the American people as our trading opportunities here in America and the jobs involved in those trades are also harmed.
0:54 looking at the timestamps, this will not be quick
My parents went on vaca to cuba a couple years ago. When they came back i asked my dad “howd you like the communism?”
And he said “enh its not REAL communism.”
It sounds like “real” communism
'It wasn't as bad as the propoganda said so it can't be communism', damn that much have been some effective propoganda.
Amazing that Cuba turned him into a modern leftist so quickly /s
Real communism is a stateless, classless, moneyless society, so it definitely isn't really communist.
I had colleague (Danish) that took a vacation to Cuba in the mid 2010's, she praised their healthcare system after having to use it because of a broken leg.
idk if revoking access to subsidised goods for the self employed would be a good solution tbh. part of why this system appears to be so effective at preventing poverty is its universality and imposing restrictions to access feels to me like a step backward, towards the reintroduction of/more defined class system and slips back into a more market capitalist organisation. surely raising taxes on the self employed and raising govt. incomes would facilitate the broadening of access to those luxury goods while maintaining equal access and classless/less divided social order, ne?
obviously this is just a response to one sentence at the end of ur video though. otherwise, illuminating as always. thx n keep it up xo
yeah i was thinking that too. but yeah tough situation to be in when a country is forced to rely on tourism
Cuba sounds like stress free country. I’m jealous of the many programs they have for the citizens.
Nice video... as a cuban that lives in cuba is a nice thing to see such a balanced and well informed opinion from a foreigner, 👍
This is the single best comment I have seen on this video
heloo friend it has benn alot of time since this video cud you edjucate me on curent cyba and how its doing
Thank you for what you do. Been trying to edumacate myself a lot recently and I think yours and others channels do a great job of looking at things critically and staying relatively unbiased and has helped me develop a more realistic outlook of the world.
OMG I wish there were portuguese subtitles so I could show this video for my friends here in Brasil that do not speak English. Is there a way I could help with that?? Thanks bad empanada I really love your videos. 🙏🏴🚩
@@BadEmpanada I will study how to add the subtitles if I do well I will add those to your videos.
Is there a way I could access the full text in English so that I wouldn't need to transcript in English before translating to portuguese?
@@pedra_esp24 I think that if the video has subtitles in English you can download a document with the English subtitles and timecodes.
I don't remember exactly how but I found it clicking around in the subtitles page
@@Gaby-wi4bx the subtitles in this video are auto-generated, do you know If it works in this case?
@@BadEmpanada got It
Do tou have the whole text transcripted already? I could try to add those in English and Portuguese. I arleady looked up a software to make the subtitles archive.
Most often when the media and politicians say something is bad the truth is normally far different. Politics are designed to keep people from being united so that the rich can prosper while the poor squabble amongst each other. Cuba is probably a good place if ur not a rich capitalist. I personally don't desire riches or material things. I'm interested in my basic needs being met and living cheaply
Thanks so much for this video Empanada. Every time I do basic research on google about Cuba it’s always about government repression and anecdotes about how oppressive Castro and the communists were, leading me to doubt whether or not Cuba is as good as my comrades make it out to be. Thanks for putting yourself through grueling hours of research for those who don’t have access to academic resources
Thank you for talking about Cuba. Cuba needs more coverage to expose the U.S. war on Cuba
Just got back from 10 days there and what I'll say is that living is easier in the US, however in Cuba, your survival is guaranteed. Like in Cuba, you never have the fear of homelessness or debt, which is a constant fear of the US
There are welfare programs here in the US that provide for you if you are jobless, homeless, low income, etc. They even aid you in obtaining a job and getting you on your feet. If anything the pandemic was an example of the sheer amount of money the government will give you when you are given unemployment assistance. So there's no need to be in fear of such things.
Cuba has a lot more homelessness and child malnutrition than America. US homelessness rate of 0.17% is one of the lowest in the developed world. And no one is starving in the US
Meanwhile in Cuba they have rolling blackouts and famine on widespread scale. It takes a lot get people angry enough to protest in an authoritarian dictatorship
Sounds like they need to nationalize the tourism industry and most of those "small businesses" raking in foreign cash so they can distribute it more equitably.
@BadEmpanada
I'm very, very interested about learning more about revolutionary Cuba. Are there any short reads you can recommend?
All ches and fidel books xD
Love how much info you pack in while still keeping it interesting 👌
Ime Romanian and I can say that most people own there own houses there and that was because of the "first house program" in whitch the government helped you get your first house but receantly they changed the "first house program" and now it's not as good as it was before
Thank you for this video! As someone who was honestly very confused about Cuba, this was incredibly informative. I’ll definitely be subbing for more content! Edit: typo
the ration book is normally called "Libreta", but in English sounds way worse than what it is, I've had wide open eyes as a reaction to that translation, is kind of funny
I hoped to learn a bit more about Cuba’s political system (I assume it’s a little bit more complicated than "the President decides everything alone") but having such a nuanced account of the economic system and daily life is already pretty nice!
Almost came watching this video. You say that the things are not bad for average cuban but it's not getting better. Well everywhere else things are getting way worse for people. Lot more people are being pushed into poverty and are unable to sustain themselves thanks to increasing prices. Atleast they don't have to go though that.
“Almost came” ????
Not to mention the fact that cuba is way more democratic than the US
Like anyone can get in to politics unlike in the US where unless your rich or got financial banking you better forget getting in to politics
In any country if u don't have money for politics just for get about it
I like that book in the background
Its gone downhill from 3 years ago, thanks to the pandemic, continued sanctions, embargo, world economic crisis and some Cuban government policy.
10:49
India is in the top 10 in that list?? What exactly does that percentage mean?
I find it hard to believe my country is so high up on a "home ownership rate" list
its a bit of a weird metric. you get the home ownership rate by taking the number of owner-occupied homes and dividing it by the total number of residential units. a high percentage of homeownership is essentially just a low level of landlordism, where the owner of a home leveraging their position over tenants to extract a portion of their wages as rent. basically people living on the street or in slums that lack proper deeds are not counted, meaning that is not necessarily an indicator of how well overall housing needs are being met. fwiw homelessness is an issue in Cuba, but it is at a much lower rate than other countries with similar levels of gross wealth. there is debate within Cuba about how to manage housing, but its hard to make sweeping reforms since the vast majority of citizens already own a home and don't have to pay land tax, mortgage, or rent. hope this helps!
@@andrewscheirer8982 yeah that makes a lot of sense. Thanks!
Asians have high ownership rates due to family traditions of passing properties through generations
Thank you for breaking this down FOR REAL.
This sounds like any (serious) analysis of Cuba I've ever heard: poor, but doing really well with the circumstances it has. I've never really heard from anyone calling Cuba a utopia in the first place.
no me habia tropezado con este video o.o
gracias por hacer analisis serios, en medio de esta crisis y de tantas otras mierdas corriendo, es como una bocanada de aire fresco :)
Cuba is awesome, don't be dumb and pay it a visit if you can.
Your videos are critically under-viewed. Here's a comment and a like for the algorithm.
its a shame that cubas economic system has been stunted by the embargo for this long, i hope that it one day will end, at least before it gets worse
It was very nice of them to bring Castro back to life and give us a history lesson on Cuba!
Cuba should be a good case study for people who support de-growth economic concepts.
I think that the standard that can reach a degrowth economy in first world economy is far higher from the actual cuban economic situation.
That last part where he mocks the Miami Cuban was funny but spot on. I went my whole life being uncritical of the Miami Cuban narrative of Cuba. Equating Castro to Hitler and hyperbole like that.
Advocates for free trade but doesn’t allow companies to trade with both US and cuba . What a irony