Venezuela could have become the Latin American equivalent of Norway if it chose to create a large rainy day fund with its oil wealth instead of giving away all of its earnings like there’s no tomorrow.
I lived in Venezuela for 23 years, and personally I think the country is a lost cause. I am glad i was able to leave to Spain 3 months ago despite all the obstacles i had to go through. Exiting Venezuela as a Venezuelan is harder than entering Spain in my experience.
That’s why when people act like america is the worst country in earth I cringe. Like ofc we’re not perfect we have very high crime rates in cities like Chicago and Detroit and Baltimore and places that look like 3rd world. But we’re at peace, no wars, a high standard of living and many things we take for granted.
@@danielmessi1092 I wouldn't consider a country with almost daily mass shootings to be a peaceful one lol The USA is not a good example of a country for many reasons.
I'm an American but spent around a year living in Ecuador. Not as a tourist but just like any other Ecuadorian. The amount of Venezuelan migrants I saw was staggering. It's really pretty sad especially seeing how well run a country like Ecuador is (not perfect but you have the basics in good order).
@@goldhawk151 Yeah its sad. I mean, there are some pretty hardcore slums in Ecuador, but for the most part the basics are in order. It is a tragedy that Venezuela is unable to meet its basics despite its massive oil reserves. I wish the US could work closely with Venezuela to get things setup properly there so that America benefits from a stable/free Venezuela and Venezuela gets all the benefits of economic stability/growth. Quite the man would be needed to get that done though
@P T Well, maybe Venezuela shouldn't threaten to nationalize private foreign property and hostilize the countries they need to trade with. It's simply staggering that venezuelan socialism and others thrive on the propaganda that they can sustain themselves without capitalism and there are still people blaming their failure on sanctions from capitalist countries.
@P T Yes. All your problems are caused by us Americans. It was not the rampant corruption, tying your economy to oil or any of the policy blunders made by your government leaders. Its all the US's fault. I mean, all of the allies of the US do terribly economically by working with us as friends. Poor victims of America
@@22andresmiguel venezuela went to shit long before sanctions. you really know nothing about how Venezuela works if you thnik the sanctions are what caused this fucking disaster
Thanks for making this video! I'm a Venezuelan diaspora currently visiting my grandparents. My entire family was anti-government from the very beginning, my mom was at the 2002 Protests when she was shot at by pro-Government forces in the Llaguno Overpass. She managed to get out uninjured. We left in 2010, but our grandparents stayed in Margarita Island. Since 2010, the situation has become critical. Venezuela is a beautiful country plagued by corruption and tyranny. God bless you for this video. Love from Margarita Island ❤
if you talk to spoiled university students (usually rich white kids who've never had to work for anything in their lives) in 1st world countries, you'll notice that socialist rallies are common. a lot of them are convinced that us venezuelans who decry the government are the children of "wealthy politicos" that are mad that the socialist government took over and started "serving the people". nevermind my grandmother's apartment getting ransacked by the military. nevermind my cousin getting stabbed repeatedly, then thrown in a jail cell by the police instead of being taken to a hospital. nevermind my uncle trying to work an honest living, only to get his truck robbed multiple times by people even more desperate than him. these kids are completely delusional. we should send them to venezuela and see if they last a week
No, the elite always do as they please. They are unaccountable. In Norway and America they gave a fuck about their lesser men, in Norway it was altruism, in America it was fear of reprisals because those lesser men, they had guns. So many guns.
Most nations have already failed. The US for example is just a blatant oligarchy(matbe corpo state would be better) masquerading as a democratic republic So is most of Europe, if my country being told to vote again because we voted wrong...several times isn't obvious enough Your elites are most likely corrupt and they will never be held accountable
@@commisaryarreck3974 the brainwashing has gone so far you think the US should ideally be a DEMOCRATIC Republic... It's a Republic, it was specifically designed not to be democratic, tyranny of the majority. smh
I was born and raised in Venezuela, I've lived abroad, I have travelled across the world, and still I won't surrender to the crisis, I will continue working and give opportunities to my people. I dont criticize those who have left nor try to convince people who stay, but I do ask that wherever they go, help other Venezuelans, because not everyone can withstand migrating without help.
@@just_another_internet_man755 Actually most of the Middle East are kinda wealthy or average, but the one that constantly broadcasted in media is only conflict countries like Yemen, Syria, or Libya
Fun fact: Not sure if it's still the case, but the Venezuelan currency was actually worth less at one point than the gold in Old School RuneScape, due to in-game gold "farmers" making more IRL money for themselves than they could at a real job for Venezuelan bucks.
It was a real, I've met a couple guys doing that, they made a considerable amount of money at the time. This actually extended to all forms of gaining money through the internet (fiver, commissions, TH-cam. Etc) but to use RuneScape to make money definitely was quite surprising.
Venezuela has the standart latin american mentality on steroids, and I say this as a Brazilian, we are on election year and honestly, both major candidates are populists using lame ass speeches about god, family, gender rights and etc to classify themselves as either right or left wing candidates. Both are corrupt ones, and the people know it, some choose to ignore it, but deep inside they know it, but since the country isn't in deep shit, we are complacent about it, that's until things start falling apart, and they will. We sacrifice long term prosperity for some 3-4 years of "golden years" fueled by public spending and corruption, just for it to bite us in the ass later on.
Well, looks like you found out who the crook was and who the real populist was. Who, in their right mind would vote for that corrupt s.o.b. Answer, no one did. Just another example of the use of rigged machines to discount votes. Chavez was the first to exploit them. He thenh exported his expertise to other surrounding socialist regimes. After the planned debacle using paper ballots and hand counting in 2000. The stage was set to gradually infiltrate these machines in to our elections resulting in the mess we are in now.
Venezuelan here. I find it hilarious you used Tropico’s music lol. Your review is highly accurate (even when your pronunciation isn’t but it’s alright)
I've been living in southern Brazil for over a year now and i get an existential crisis and a "is that how i used to live" moment everytime I remember my country. Truly sad that not everyone has the opportunity to escape
As a Venezuelan, I gotta say this is one of the better takes. Though, that's kind of a low bar, since most try to oversimplify this to either "Socialism" (a word that basically means nothing anymore), or US Sanctions (which are indeed exacerbating the country's problems, but aren't the actual cause).
As young Venezuelan who left the country pretty recently , this is accurate to a certain extent , some of the numbers are off , our diaspora has been on part with the Syrians after the Arab spring of 2011 , but without going on the details is a summary. We had intellectuals like Uslar Pietri (famous Venezuelan scholar) that promoted and exhaustively demanded to cultivate oil (diversify the economy and promote other sectors besides the oil sector) but never actually made it and the anti-elitist , far left economic measures on Chavez-Maduro regime eroded whatever other industries were left in the country by expropriation and mismanagement. To whomever is fascinated by the events that led to Venezuela’s downfall , it is still being studied because it’s modern downfall on catastrophic levels. People lost jobs, businesses , family, savings, quality of life , freedom and hope and yet the country stands , our people dance , party, study, marry and live despite the utter chaos but any Venezuelan (that is not under the thumb of the party that runs the government or still indoctrinated ) will tell you about the social, economic and political erosion that has happened and how it has affected them in their daily lives, no matter their class or part of the country they are from.
Brazilian here, glad you are in a better situation, we had a huge number of venezuelans coming to Brazil as we share a border. I'm glad to share a border with such amazing people and culture, hope our latin american brothers be in a better situation soon
He mixes education and funny quotes which rhyme really well. You are having fun and also learning something! I also absolutely love that he represents countries as its national animals,so clever! Keep it up
I am half Venezuelan and my Venezuelan grandfather talks about how amazing the country was when he lived there, but is now ashamed to be Venezuelan due to the events that took place. He always says it is a slippery slope what the government did and what many do today. Mind you, he grew up very poor. I wish to one day visit Venezuela and see its nature. Maybe some time soon
Some did alright, but it really seems the curse of the Spanish Encomienda System and state-sponsored corruption really made reforming the political culture very difficult.
Venezuela was a country closed to the world great part of its history, the oil boom in Venezuela emerged thanks that the government was reached, by a caudillo (juan vicente Gomez) managed by a venezuelan banker educated in new york (Manuel antonio matos), and the banker saw an opportunity in the oil industry, and created with the help of the caudillo that he manipulates, a liberal legal-frame, for first time in the history of the country and that allows many oil companies from USA and Europe invest in the oil industry of venezuela, venezuela for itself wouldn't developed the industry, because had not capital, and the knowledge of the industry, were the US oil companies that builded in venezuela the greatest refineries of all latin america (as the refinery San lorenzo) and the wells, that helped a lot the country get out of the extreme missery that lived at the beggining of the XX, and helped be the 4 richest country at the world in the 50's, but the venezuelan mentality, and the new government with socialist-communist trends, ( the majority of presidents of venezuela since 1960, were exiliated for be suspicios of comminist, during marcos perez jimenez dictatorship), they tore down all the foreign investment that the country was receiving for years and took full control of industry, not only the oil, also the steel, banking etc, and they dilapidated the money of the industries in subsidies, corruption, etc, they made the population more dependent of government welfare, the system of itself was unsustainable, and exploded in the 80's and that brough many dismay and uprising, the same president that nationalized the oil tried to turn the situation, and apply liberal policies and take off subsidies but received a social uprising, two coups, and the politics took him out of power for dirty political ways, and then the people preferred a more socialist and leftist, leader as hugo chavez thinking that the problem were for the government that tried liberalize the economy ( that didn't liberalise significantly).
Thanks for this. I'm viewing this from Venezuela's nearest island neighbour, Trinidad. This video clip gives a clear description of Venezuela's path over the last two hundred years or so. It reminded me that nothing occurs in a vacuum.
I subscribe to a lot of history, geopolitical, and news-centric channels, and this is one of those that I always click on first after I get home from work when I see it in my feed. I'm sure it'll hit 250k subs before too long because these videos are consistently pretty good and informative, even for me who is a history buff.
This was a great insight for understanding the situation of my Venezuelan neighbors. Consider doing Peru next, we also had hyperinflation and violence during the 80s but managed to recover. Over our 200 years of independence our economy has been based on extracting natural resources like guano, rubber, copper, etc. Might be cool for a video.
@P T It was thanks to capitalism and the 1993 Constitution that we had the economic boom we had in the last 30 years. And not it's going to shit because of populism and idiots who think changing it is a good idea.
It's all too easy for braindead gringos to hear anything being used as a talking point towards their own idiotic "political" "parties", and to not call bullshit on it.
I used to work with a bunch of Venezuelans back in the mid-80s in Dallas TX, they always talked about how great, rich and educated Venezuela was, and how everyone else in South and Central America were ignorant peasants who couldn't even speak proper Spanish. I wonder how they are doing now?
Yes the Venezuelans still suffer to this day from an over inflated ego. Their self entitlement and lack of gratitude towards the host countries they immigrate to rubs many of their fellow Latin Americans brothers the wrong way. The sheer amount of violent crimes some of their nationals have and continue to commit in Colombia, Perú and Chile is astounding! Their problems has affected the entire continent in a negetive way.
As a Venezuelan, I want to congratulate you because you know more about the economics of Venezuela than a common Venezuelan, I think that's the problem most of the people in my country are just stupid, and candidates that offer a bag of food are more likely to win than others, thanks for the vid
@@aordaz41 I agree with you. I am Venezuelan, and it is rare to witness someone that is willing to admit that there are many other issues beside "socialism." I personally think that scapegoating socialism stems from Mcarthism, for some reason there is brutal fearmongering regarding leftist ideals in the culture of our state. It could, perhaps be because, the governments that led the country to the horrid state of brutal anarchy it is now, were all leftist governments. However, it is essential to recognize that leftist ideologies and values themselves were not the problem, but the rather the governments themselves. I have witnessed engineers with PHD'S, lawyers, doctors, people who had incredible higher levels of education deciding to simply deny any historical evidence and just start lambasting leftist ideology. I even get called a marxist and a "chavista," whenever I try pointing it out. It is insane. So yeah, I agree with you. Some people's level of education exceed their intelligence.
@@latonitobonitopeople seem to think whatever bad happens in socialist government, is wholely due to socialism and not possible external factors, poor leadership and corruption are not exclusive to socialist countries, these factors affect a large number of countries
One very interesting development is that with the remittances of so many people abroad, the economy has stabilized(just a little) not enough to stop the inflation but enough to eliminate the scarcity of basic resources like food and medicine but in USD, so assuming you have a relative sending you some money for food you can survive, but that is were it ends, The country has become a lawless land, at this point, the government doesn't care about it citizens so you are on you own, no water? tough luck you better drill a water well for that, No electricity, Well you can buy an electric generator if you have the USDs, The police AND gangs are robbing you? well non of my business you can always buy a gun Not a very nice place to live or visit, for my part the best desition of my life was to leave in 2019, not to the best country(Colombia) but light years away better than Venezuela
@@asierro2007 The funny thing is that we(me + my family) did exactly that, but the low-budget version, we didn't have the money for a filtration system or a big tank, so we used a couple of plastic barrels, the water wasn't particularly crystal clear but adding a little bit of chlorine + letting the sediment sink to the bottom of the barrel, was enough to make it usable, not drinkable (we still had you buy that), but it helped a lot, those were very dark days for me
Except that you actually CAN'T own a gun since Chávez made it ilegal to do so, and if cops find a gun in your house you get arrested, or more likely extorsioned.
@@jameskamotho7513 There aren't many environmental regulations and the ones that exist are ignored, Thus there are a lot of older cars and trucks without catalytic converters, thus a small fill of soot is created everywhere exposed to the elements, walls, floors, and roofs... the where the rain falls, the rain would wash the soot of the roof and thus would be contaminated, (cleaning the roof before it rains was useless because it only takes a couple of days for the soot to reaper)
Exactly! Every other video just uses socialism as an excuse but in reality what happened in Venezuela was not socialism. Social welfare programs do not instantly make a country socialist. A real life example of socialism in a country would have been Burkina Faso. You see Thomas Sankara Attempted Socialism in Burkina Faso and in just 3 years rose literally rates drastically, eradicated meningitis and measles, provided food housing and healthcare to millions and prevented famines by increasing the amount of food produced and reducing the amount of food imported. The only reason things went south was because he was overthrown and murdered by French Colonial Sympathizers. Since then Burkina Faso has been unstable and unsafe. So when socialism fails it is either a problem that isn’t integral to socialism like Military overspending and corruption or it fails because of western intervention. I still remember when I was first studying to learn Eccomoms I went in think “Socialism is Cuba and Cuba is poor and dictator” but after learning the factors that actually effect countries and I learned just how similar Scandinavian Social Democracy is to socialism and that is what encouraged be to become more open minded and learn what Socialism really is, what capitalism really is and even what communism is.
I’m part Venezuelan. My parents are Venezuelan. My dad’s parents are Columbian and they moved before my father was born. I’m born in the US. My grandfather had a good life in Venezuela until it was in shambles.
Venezuela is like this person who had everything. He later had a car crash and his mood changed drastically cause he had a brain damage. After he started to have heavy drinking, and he causes vandalism in his town. Tell me what Venezuela is like in your opinions.
That kinda reminds me of Caligula where in his early reign he was a better empire than his predecessor, Tiberius. But after a “brain fever” he went batshit insane
@h0ser This is my first time watching one of your videos and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I thought your use of sound facts, witty sarcasm, decent music, decent animations, and well structured out analysis culminate in a quality video. That being said, I have one, critical yet constructive complaint. I thought your pace of talking was to fast. Personally, I could follow. However, I love history and already have a rough understanding of the history of Latin and Central America. One of my personal favorite you tubers who is in the same niche as yourself is Kraut. He is the polar opposite and utilizes a very slow, yet precise and intentional use of language. I prefer it because it opens the marketability of the video to those who are new to the field of historical analysis and also enables him to dissect topics over a longer period of time and to highlight interesting and intelligent views that appeal to ardent historians. Anyways, I look forward to watching more of your videos!
As a Venezuelan, I think our people is dammed from the beginning, we only care about money, money and more money and didn't take the good opportunities to invest in education, science and more technology, we are just a bunch of people surviving in other countries and in our own country...and it's painful to see it
You really nailed it, they never found democracy before greed aka oil. Politicians in Venezuela literally went for office just to be like “aight how am I gonna sell oil and not give a shit about anything else going on”
Actually unlike many would like you to believe, Chavez was a great president and he was about to succeed in nationalizing Venezuela’s oil when our country’s “energy interests” prevented that from happening.
@@josea1707 Venezuela should focus on industrializing in order to make their weird brand of socialism actually work, overreliance on oil isn't going to do them any favors, not now nor in the future. Cuba is suffering from a weak industrial sector as well. But it's understandable that US sanctions make that goal very hard to achieve.
@@electricdazz Buddy im not just talking about sanctions. I'm talking about active military coup attempts covertly sponsored by the US against Chavez and the giant international pressure against Chavez due to the US painting him as a ruthless dictator. Also the US having a hand in installing Maduro as dictator to keep the Venezuelan people weak.
@@josea1707 I haven't heard that about Maduro. Sounds a bit like a conspiracy theory in my opinion. If the US was involved in establishing Maduro's dictatorship, then why are they now trying to replace him with Guaido?
hey h0ser, you're video on Venezuela has been very enlightening on the history and difficulties in Venezuela that plague the countries society to this day, it has also made very interested in my own country, the nation of Malaysia, and its history as has also benefited from oil wealth as well. I would love to see a video on Malaysia as might give a more nuanced understanding on oil wealth as we aren't exactly a Norway but we are a relatively successful state but also really screwed by certain actors, ideas and people over the decades
The major different between Malaysia and Venezuela is that in Malaysia, Malays govt just took the money ,waste it like no tmr , BUT didn't buy up its other industries with the oil wealth and let it rot. So unlike Venezuela , even when Malaysian oil money disappear, they still have other industries to fall onto. While it isn't Norway, people still have job and food on the table.
I'm from Belo Horizonte, a city in Brasil (a bit close to São Paulo and Rio de janeiro), and my city has a LOT of venezuelans. It's a sad situation because a lot of them ended up in the streets, but still, our government has a few welfare programs for them and society as a whole wants to help, offering shelter, food and jobs. I can only imagine what the cities near the amazon are facing, since mine is more than 1500km from Venezuela and we are still able to see the consequences of the regime.
The discovery of massive oil reserves in Venezuela can be compared to someone winning millions of dollars in a lottery and spending it recklessly. There have been numerous stories of major lottery winners blowing all of their huge fortune and going deep into debt and misery. Some of those winners have ended up going homeless, being dependent on welfare, suffering a divorce, becoming a drug addict and even committing suicide etc. If you ever win a huge prize, you should hire financial advisors and lawyers to inform you how to manage your new riches.
Put 5% a side to party and put the rest into EFTs and live of the dividend. Tell everyone the money is locked and you have no way of getting to i to give out loans.
@P T you need to travel more. Corruption and Nepotism is the problem and an oligarchy who has no insentives to bring poor people into the middle class. We can at least hold our politicians accountable and there are checks and balances in place. On top of that rich Venezuelans spend their money abroad so it doesn't even trickle down into their own economy. Go to Venezuela or perhaps neighbouring Colombian and see for yourself.
Latin America is not as simple. Brazil in 2010s followed this path after discovery of pre-salt oil fields. They invested a lot in R&D, built a whole industrial complex around it, to the point the state-owned gas company became one of the most advanced players in the world, also investing revenue in things like education and other industries... All this to the country ending being crippled down to the ground on the verge of a far right coup
@@jotareiss I'm in awe at what Brazil managed to achieve. Becoming a top player in the hydrocarbon game, becoming a top player in engineering projects, being poised to become an actual superpower. And what did you guys use all those advancements, land, and manpower for in the end? More violence, political drama, and advanced forms of corruption.
@@necromax13 but corruption and political drama is how we do it since... ever? The story i told, although extremely frustrating, is nowhere near surprising in the global south. There a lot of interests, both external and internal, in these countries being a mess, because corruption, political drama etc is profitable. In the process of Petrobras being gutted, it becames the gas company that paid the highest dividend payouts at expense of the gas prices surging to the highest value in this century and refineries being sold to foreign investors as cheap as 2 years of its revenue. To further illustrate how fucked up things are down here, as for today mainstream media is fearmongering how the stock markets are falling because the new president vowed to fight hunger in the country.
One tiny error you commit, the official number of emigrees is 6 million by international estimates, though the suspected unofficial approaches the 9 million mark. One fourth/third of Venezuelans have left, this comment as a Venezuelan myself.
I'm >4000 Kms away from Venezuela and now and then see refugees begging on the streets, during a freezing cold winter. It's like they went from the pan to the fire, may God help them...
Dutch disease is a concept that describes an economic phenomenon where the rapid development of one sector of the economy ( particularly natural resources) precipitates a decline in other sector
As a Venezuelan, I can tell you socialism did fucking ruin us a lot. The gvt (still) cant a find a way to break the private sector to make the populace dependant on them for food or services.
Socialism has alot to do with it, mass confiscations of private assets, state run monopolies, coercitive economic measures against the private sector, banking etc. Socialism is not limited to public funded goods, you can have that with a modern capitalist economy.
@@XxLIVRAxX none of those things are related to socialism tho, even if Venezuela were a capitalist country same things would've happened, because the government was plagued with corruption
@@XxLIVRAxX socialism is not when "too much state" A country 100% state would still be capitalist if the dominant class were the bourgeoisie and had a market economy (price control is not planned economy) The only exception is Yugoslavia, because even though it had a market economy, it was based on cooperatives (worker's control of work environment), so we consider it market socialist.
Hey thanks a lot for the video, I've lived here my entire 20 years of life and I honestly don't imagine myself living here 5 years from now on. We have reached a point where we can survive but the long term future seems bad
I'm Venezuelan. From the beginning, Simón Bolívar was a dictator, yes, like the traitor of Miranda and Paez. During the period of Gomez and Perez Jimenez, most of the Venezuelan infrastructure was built. However, they were heavily criticized because they used prisoners as labor and were not well known for upholding current human rights. For Venezuela it was impossible to diversify from oil if they lacked the necessary infrastructure to do so and they knew it, also the Venezuelan universities were improved in an attempt to expand the economy in the future. But unfortunately, later came the "democracies" that never had anything of democracy, they were a bunch of populist parties, since now they should not get power with a coup, but by offering any kind of free or better thing in the most socialist and populist way. It was a race to see who would be the new dictator. Of course the central nor central left won with the promises to improve the quality of life in the simplest way; with public spending this led to the part you mention in the caracazo. Most Venezuelan politicians have always been on the left, but the final blow was with Chavez's extreme left. Where the generation like mine from 1990 to 2010 had nothing to do with the boomers who voted for him, but we pay the consequences of those who voted for him and by the wat, fled the country after a few years looking for a better place like the US. From abroad people always criticize that the Venezuelan people do nothing to get rid of Maduro, but the reality is that there are countless dead and missing people of my age and even minors who tried to protest or demonstrate against it. But it is impossible without military help. Venezuela is one of the Latin American countries with the best army, even better than other countries outside of Latin America, and as you know, they are on the side of the government. In Venezuela it used to be legal to use weapons like in the United States, but this was abolished by one of the Venezuelan "democracies" and only organized crime, military and police cartels can have weapons, all on the socialist side. Not even the lowest seat: the police are on the civilian side, all the great positions in this country are bought, but what hurts Venezuelans the most is that the supposed presidency of Juan Guaido is also corrupt. In Venezuela there is no true leader, only people aspiring to be the new dictator... So there is no way that a civil war will happen in Venezuela either. The most serious thing that could happen, and what many Venezuelans really want, is an intervention, like the Panamanian one. Those who really do not agree with an intervention are the politicians and Venezuelans affiliated with Guaido, another politician of the bunch. Personally, I think it will never be done until there is a good Venezuelan leader. However, I already resigned myself to the fact that Venezuela will be like Cuba.
@@auguaauaguga6517 a. Why’d you put 0 instead of o’s and b. It’s a unified language that the people there would know so they kept it as the official language it’s the exact same reason the us speaks English and didn’t decide to make up their own language or use a different already existing one
As a Venezuelan currently still in Venezuela. This is a very good summary of the roots of the issue. And it makes my blood boil whenever the older folk blame all of the problems on the current populist practices of the governement, blaming corruption all around, despite the periods of most growth being in an ALSO insufferable, fascist dictatorship during the economic boom from the Juan Gomez/Perez Jimenez periods, but oh well, those periods ended in the 50's, and the ''Democratic'' Era was really well off riding that wave of being one of the richest countries. But as that wealth ran out (and dont get me wrong, Chavismo did a lot of damage as well), and we didnt invest into actually developing the country. We reach the current state of affairs I am part of the minority that believes in a future here and would rather people stay. But with the current state of political affairs I do not blame anyone emigrating in the slightest, there's no real nation-wide leaders, and so the corruption problem remains... I do love our land and people, its just a sad reality that the country has had corruption issues since its inception
One of my mom's friends is from Venezuela. Thanks to the regime Hugo Chavez put in place she lost every single penny she had because according to the government she doesn't need money to survive and took her business too so she couldn't make more money, she had to gather what little she had left and come here to the states for a better life.
Quite sad, but Chavez was voted into office, so his government technically doesn’t qualify as a regime. Still, the was the first of this cursed wave of socialism that is hitting Latin America right now.
Dissapointing thing to see is how much of a cult personality he has even though it was his socialism program that led to the rise of corruption, Maduro, and the eventual collapse of the economy.
@@zyco9188 Did you not read, the multiple coups, slavery, exploitative systems before hand. There are socialist-capitalist hybrid nations that do fine. Vietnam
always love seeing political discussion without bias, just a genuine passion for learning about people, nations, and how all that works and what's happened so far in human history. I think they call it anthropology.
Fun fact: there once used to be a German colony in modern Venezuela, called Klein-Venedig And this video reminds me on how the Kongo Kingdom was dependant on exporting slaves and the Saudis depend on exporting oil.
Klein-Venedig is in fact the origin of the name Venezuela. When writing about the indigenous peoples from the coastal areas, the early German explorers noted how similar their construction techniques were to those of Venice: laying a foundation of tree trunks underwater and then constructing stilt houses atop the water (named Palafitos), making it easy to fish from their own homes. Because of this, they named the place Klein-Venedig (meaning "Little Venice" in German) which Spanish courts translated as Vene-zuela.
there's still a german colony-ish near Caracas. Its a tourist site now, they grow flowers in those hills and you can stay the night in some European-looking hostals. Its pretty cool.
@@juanm8582 yes, Colonia Tovar is in my home state of Aragua. That settlement has nothing to do with the Klein-Venedig expeditions though. It's a much later colony of Allemanic-speaking immigrants from the late 1800s. Fun fact: their dialect is mutually intelligible with Pennsylvania Dutch!
Honestly, the fact that a foreigners recap of my country and the things that I see everyday is some of the only reliable sources of information I have to understand shit without bias in it's really depressing, but I'm already Venezuelan so...
Well, a foreigner talking this explicitly, though, respectfully about our situation is kinda refreshing. I would contribute the cause of the instability was and still being the power-hungry and egotistical notions behind the ideals of the politicians. Every turn since 1946 resume in some various intents to form democracy and peace being obliterated by politic sectarism, corruption, populism and mainly greed. The rise of Chavez is the infamous consequence of all the past mistakes; above all, wanting that savior-like figure that the average venezuelan sees in the military men
I disagree about how much blame should be on Chavez's shoulders. As someone familiar with another extremely corrupt oil rich country (Nigeria), I can tell you that everything Venezuela went through before Chavez was also experienced there. However, because Nigeria never had a Chavez and thus never implemented socialist, anti entrepreneural policies, things never got close to as bad (at least economically). The combination of over generous welfare AND rabid anti business policies that many South American countries have implemented just seems like complete madness to me. How can a government promise a safety net on one hand while penalizing the sector of the economy that is supposed to fund that safety net? It's thr main difference between Scandinavia and LatAm. They are wise enough to have very pro market policies to support their welfare states. (Also, they're far less corrupt but that's another matter, lol)
@@qwertylolmjuyhnpolza3255 ¡SI! Yo me nací en Canadá y hablo Español en casa ¡También aprendí portugués! Nunca aprendí Francés. :( Ahora estoy viviendo en Corea del Sur y estoy aprendiendo Coreano
I have friends from Venezuela 🇻🇪. They told how it is there. I pray 🙏🏻 that things would get better there in the future. They need to make the right decisions to move the country forward. I am from Barbados 🇧🇧 and my country is north of Venezuela 🇻🇪.
Venezuela is inverse of Taiwan. Venezuela has great geography and tons of oil and is the poorest country in Latin America. Taiwan is a tiny island with like nothing and like 15 countries even recognize them as a country and is one of the most wealthy nations on the planet.
People forget or didn't know but Taiwan actually even went as far as starting development projects in Africa back in the day. Many Taiwanese even involved themselves in the economic development of their now rival, the PRC. This sounds dumb but for many of the former Nationalist soldiers their family and home was in China and people were more optimistic back then so it seems a bit more reasonable. I wish H0ser would make a vid about the development of Taiwan and thinking about it, things kind of went exceptionally well. Japanese colonialism ironically created many highly educated Taiwanese (a lot of doctors for some reason) while the KMT losing the mainland brought China's best and brightest to the island.
This series is amazing. I never thought I would enjoy watching videos that concerned economies and governments, but you do such an excellent job packaging it up in an ‘easy to swallow pill’, the images are a plus. Excellent job!
This is why Saudi Vision 2030 aims to decrease they're dependence on oil. It's impossible to stay rich forever if you get all your money from one industry.
Except that their "plans" aren't particularly future proof. NEOM is a joke bound to fail at best, and beyond that they don't have much going for them. Sounds good on paper but when the oil runs out I doubt they'll fare a whole lot better.
Venezuela didn't fall because oil, but because Chávez and Maduro greedy theft ass, drying out every single penny to their own pockets and doing alliance with the worst countries in the world, Cuba and Russia
as Venezuelan i'll add that other reason of the actual situation is because Chavez and Maduro didnt learn about the mistakes commited in the past "or" They wanted that sussy oil from the begginings, which ended up doing the country more dependent of petroleum and being more corrupt than ever. I would like to tell other things but i dont want to do a bible, so nice vid and God bless Venezuela.
You should make a video on the American Rust belt. I think that your style of discussing failed states would really work when talking about one of the biggest brain drains occurring right now.
Nice thing about the US is you can pick up and move to another state. It's happened throughout our history. I love where I live. No problems whatsoever. So if the rust belt isn't working for you, move. Simple
@@Rjsjrjsjrjsj No you're wrong, it's never that simple. Moving costs money. Changing jobs. Leaving friends & family. You're completely delusional if you think the simple solution is to just move. Bruh.
Yes oil is always a curse. Any industry that in a short period of time gets bigger than the whole rest of an economy is a curse - it totally throws off the systems the economy used to run by, it guarantees all sorts of foreign interference, and it requires a ton of tricky adjustment to manage. Yeah some places get through it, but not easily, and a lot of places run into very serious problems. The most helpful thing when you find a huge windfall of a natural resource is to already have a large diversified economy so it doesn’t totally take over everything and devalue and marginalize every other industry. But nobody really has control over whether they have that or not.
@@zyanego3170Oil is a curse to countries with corrupt governments that can’t afford to extract the resource themselves and so they let private multinational corporations use and exploit the natural resources found in their country
Venezuela was one of the poorest regions of the Spanish Empire, most of its exports were just cocoa and sugar. Spain never found the Venezuelan gold. Ironically, when Venezuelans found the gold in the Amazon they called the town "El Dorado"
I’m a catalan history student and last quatrimester we talked about that. The Conquistadors were nobles and rich people from all Europe, not only Castille and Aragon, who bought a license to the iberian monarchy in order to get the right to go to the “new world” and conquer ir for them. Then they were allowed to forge hiciendas in that land. The funny thing is that this whole process didn’t cost a Damm coin to the monarchy. And about Cortés, he did it without a licence. The monarchy wanted him dead, but he was quick enough to dedicate “his conquests” (which cannot have happened without the locals who joined his Army as the Federation of the three cities (the mexica/aztecs) were universaly hated) to the crown, so they just accepted and gave him a remote hicienda. It was a moment when the “encomenderos” of Colòmbia and Veneçuela tried to rebel and become hereditary lords like the nobles of Europe, but that failed. It seemed like the natives prefered to fight for the crown that to fight for the “encomenderos” who were the ones directly above them. Maybe they thought like the remences in catalonia that siding with the crown would mean the end of the hiciendas… Another thing, the conquistadors tried to invade places which already had some organization in order to suplant it. That explains things like the fact that the Yucatan peninsula in Mexico wasn’t properly “civilized” until the independence of Mexico, as the Mayan city-stat system collapsed before Columbus sailed to the Caribean thinking he was on the indic sea, or that when the castilians saw How similar the cultural supremacism of the incans was to their own, they decided to respect the quechua people more than the other conquered ones (the quechuas tried to form a homogenizing empire in the Andes making many smaller cultures dissapear into them). The independence of the americas might have been changed If the Bourbons remained faithful to the constitutions of Cadiz after the napoleònic wars. There is much there that was liked by the natives in america. The think they liked the most was that it would grant them all spanish citizenship and make them legally Equal to the encomenderos. Of course that was also because the constitutions of Cadiz said that every man older than 20 could vote when in France and USA only the richest could. That idea was really powerful. In fact there was many natives that fought for the crown, as independence would mean that the criollos would rule the countries and they would be far worse than before. There are lots of terrifying histories of natives being persecuted after the independence wars to be punished for siding with the crown.
Venezuela followed their Spanish colonial government economy policy, Spanish at 16-17th century were heavily rely on silver export and when the silver oversupply the price of silver dropped a lot, when build a country u needs to diversification your economy
Spain really had nothing to diversify apparently, they didn't even had industry. And the gold just kept flowing so why bother building and investing into industry like the accursed English? 😋
@@nunyabiznes33 when product oversupply the price drop furthermore British has better mercantilism that's why they had EIC at 17 century and industrilized at 18 century
@@nunyabiznes33The industrial revolution happened in the English countryside, something would have hardly happened in Spain since the Spanish countryside is so uninhabited
3:30 Before even USA became independent, Haiti did. So Haiti is the real precedent, and the inspiration was more the French Revolution than the USA independence.
You are right about the Haitian revolution probably being more than likely inspired by the French Revolution. But the American revolution happened before the French Revolution and by proxy the Haitian revolution. I know this because one of the earliest topics of debate was if they should intervene in the French Revolution (they decided not to and stayed isolationist for a while).
I gotta say, as a venezuelan living abroad, this is pretty on point (more than most of the stuff I see on TH-cam anyways). I would just add that the exodus nowadays is closer to 7 million venezuelans abroad.
I was working in Venezuela in 1992 when Chavez attempted his failed coup. I couldn't believe when only 6 years later the people there voted him as their president! I told my new Venezuelan wife back then "are you people crazy?" Wtf? I said to her "you'll never get him out of office once he's president. Ever!" Worse than that, they continued to vote for him election after election until he died of cancer. Personally, I don't feel empathy for the Venezuelan people. They knew what he was when they willingly handed over the reigns of power to him. Similar to how I feel if our own failed coup plotter is voted into the WH in 2024. We have brought whatever comes our way on ourselves. Why are so many people so darn naive?
Seems like the hatred for the "elites" just blinds peoples' judgement completely and nobody is safe from this shit - more and more countries vote complete lunatics into power seemingly just to see the downfall of the politicians they don't agree with.
Most of the people I know started hating Chavez after his first reelection. To be honest, I find it incredibily difficult to blame the average person for voting for him. Chavez was an innate leader. If you can speak spanish, you should search his speeches. Even his bodyguards frequently denounced how difficult it was to keep him safe because he tried to be so close to the people. Handing out hugs, receiving and drinking random cups of coffee, speaking to people like, y'know, _people_ instead of wild cattle... He had decent proposals (that declined after his first reelection) and knew how to understand, listen to, and talk to people. Very few in human history have had their qualities. That made people like him a lot, like, cult-level a lot. Of course it's dangerous and we know that now, but I still find it hard to blame those who first voted for him. Even though they had quite the mountain of reference material, you have to understand that before Chavez, things were not too different from today. I nowadays only hate on those who continue to believe in his joke of a "legacy".
@@AdamSmith-gs2dv on the website freedom house Bolivia is considered a partially free nation which isn’t great at only a 66/100. But Venezuela is full on 14/100 with the lowest political rights of the hemisphere it’s not even a close comparison
@@Blockxolotl it’s around the 3rd most democratic continents. Behind Europe and Oceania although Europe has more problematic regions. South America isn’t a role model for democracy as most are one bad election away from slipping into dictatorships, but it’s the most consistent continent besides Venezuela in terms of democracy and human rights. Chile and Uruguay even have better freedoms than the U.S
Why does former Spanish colonies keep falling into debt, military govts and bankruptcy despite having so many resources and riches they can literally dig out of the ground? The contrast is quite different from former British colonies like Singapore, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and to some extent the USA
It's all the fault of the English, Spanish America was prosperous, the English invested to arm the independence rebels, and when the countries "liberated", the English plundered the resources of these countries (investigate the amount of money stolen by the English of the funds in the city of Lima), English liberalism favored the small elite that governed the countries, since they became rich providing the raw material for the English industry, while the rest of the population remained subjugated, poor and ignorant
@@Ozcar_The_Dark_knight rebellions wouldn’t have happened if the Spanish haven’t been excluding the commoner from the riches they accumulated via farming or plantations. You are blaming the current failures on rebellions 100 years ago. Take Singapore for example , they are relatively undeveloped when they gained independence in the 60s, why can’t any former Spanish colony achieved in 100 years anything similar what they did in 50 years alone
@@hkchan1339 The answer already explained it to you, but here it goes again. When Spanish America became independent, the groups that ruled were that small elite of landowners who had supported the rebellion for their own benefit, they created a discriminatory system towards other ethnic groups (indigenous and mestizo) applying the ideas of the French Enlightenment and ideas of the r@ci@l supremacism of the Anglo-Saxons, they kept these ethnic groups subjugated and ignorant, they used them as cheap labor in their lands, education was only provided to this small wealthy elite, they never bothered to industrialize these nations, because the business of selling raw materials to the British was very profitable for them, even today many people with great power in the governments of these countries are direct descendants of that elite, it is very easy to trace their origins, they always cared only for themselves, and they still continue to do so, they sell their countries to large foreign corporations for money, they keep ignoring Against the population, they continue to maintain the system of corruption imposed since independence.
@@Ozcar_The_Dark_knight Most of the "White people" in the Spanish/Portuguese colonies are of Spanish or Portuguese ancestry with a sizable portion oi Italian and even Germans. Japanese too for Peru Stop the blaming the "Anglo-Saxons" who are mostly in the English speaking colonies instead. I suggest you check out Kraut's youtube channel video - " The Mexican American Border | A Tale of two Colonies " to understand the different governance approach of UK and Spain in their colonies and how it still affected the people today
am binge watching your chanel right now, your stuff makes me crak uppppp and learn - just a comment though, I don't know if you talk fast naturally or are trying to keep the audience engaged, but I think you can slow down a bit :) I've put it to .8 speed and that feels comfortable and I actually understand it haha
As a Venezuelan, i must say, its rare to find balanced and nuanced takes like this one. Often times, people just reduce the problem to whatever is convenient to their political beleifs. Great video!
Venezuelan here, the video basically covers everything, good shit. I used to go back every year but cant do so anymore cause its consistently getting more dangerous. Itl be a WHILE before we see any major progress.
As a Venezuelan guy who had to do research on the subject, I can tell this is pretty accurate People like to blame current politicians for the current crisis, specially when they are even more thieving and corrupt than any of their predecessors, but the venezuelan government had always been corrupt in one way or another, as well as overly reliant on oil
@@22andresmiguel con pocas excepciones todas las naciones de latam tuvieron q realizar esos paquetazos siendo los más duros los vividos en Perú y Bolivia El precio del populismo durante décadas anteriores fue fuerte,pero solo venezuela colapso. El resto logro superarlo
It's enough to blame spanish colonization. 200 years ago, we let Venezuela. If you are not able to deal with your own country after that, it's not a Spain Empire problem. Look for the cause into yourself, instead...
Venezuela could have become the Latin American equivalent of Norway if it chose to create a large rainy day fund with its oil wealth instead of giving away all of its earnings like there’s no tomorrow.
You are assuming socialists are smart. They aren't
Basically almost every oil country can become Norway if they know their way
But gotta have that socialism tho
Yes. The one thing rightoids got right is that too much spending, especially if the fiscal policy is asymmetric as I like to call it, is a disaster.
@@CantusTropus Not necessarily. Norway has done an excellent job creating a thriving capitalist economy.
I lived in Venezuela for 23 years, and personally I think the country is a lost cause. I am glad i was able to leave to Spain 3 months ago despite all the obstacles i had to go through. Exiting Venezuela as a Venezuelan is harder than entering Spain in my experience.
That’s why when people act like america is the worst country in earth I cringe. Like ofc we’re not perfect we have very high crime rates in cities like Chicago and Detroit and Baltimore and places that look like 3rd world. But we’re at peace, no wars, a high standard of living and many things we take for granted.
Glad you got out. Hope you aren't voting for the same leftist morons who ruined Venezuela
Guay tio, en que parte de españa estás???
Yo soy parte venezolano. Mis padres son de Venezuela
@@danielmessi1092 I wouldn't consider a country with almost daily mass shootings to be a peaceful one lol The USA is not a good example of a country for many reasons.
I'm an American but spent around a year living in Ecuador. Not as a tourist but just like any other Ecuadorian. The amount of Venezuelan migrants I saw was staggering. It's really pretty sad especially seeing how well run a country like Ecuador is (not perfect but you have the basics in good order).
Yeah I noticed that too when I studied there. So many Venezuelans were trying to make a living there. Plus met a bunch doing the same in Peru
@@goldhawk151 Yeah its sad. I mean, there are some pretty hardcore slums in Ecuador, but for the most part the basics are in order. It is a tragedy that Venezuela is unable to meet its basics despite its massive oil reserves. I wish the US could work closely with Venezuela to get things setup properly there so that America benefits from a stable/free Venezuela and Venezuela gets all the benefits of economic stability/growth. Quite the man would be needed to get that done though
@P T Well, maybe Venezuela shouldn't threaten to nationalize private foreign property and hostilize the countries they need to trade with. It's simply staggering that venezuelan socialism and others thrive on the propaganda that they can sustain themselves without capitalism and there are still people blaming their failure on sanctions from capitalist countries.
@P T Yes. All your problems are caused by us Americans. It was not the rampant corruption, tying your economy to oil or any of the policy blunders made by your government leaders. Its all the US's fault. I mean, all of the allies of the US do terribly economically by working with us as friends. Poor victims of America
@@22andresmiguel venezuela went to shit long before sanctions. you really know nothing about how Venezuela works if you thnik the sanctions are what caused this fucking disaster
Thanks for making this video! I'm a Venezuelan diaspora currently visiting my grandparents. My entire family was anti-government from the very beginning, my mom was at the 2002 Protests when she was shot at by pro-Government forces in the Llaguno Overpass. She managed to get out uninjured.
We left in 2010, but our grandparents stayed in Margarita Island. Since 2010, the situation has become critical. Venezuela is a beautiful country plagued by corruption and tyranny. God bless you for this video.
Love from Margarita Island
❤
if you talk to spoiled university students (usually rich white kids who've never had to work for anything in their lives) in 1st world countries, you'll notice that socialist rallies are common. a lot of them are convinced that us venezuelans who decry the government are the children of "wealthy politicos" that are mad that the socialist government took over and started "serving the people". nevermind my grandmother's apartment getting ransacked by the military. nevermind my cousin getting stabbed repeatedly, then thrown in a jail cell by the police instead of being taken to a hospital. nevermind my uncle trying to work an honest living, only to get his truck robbed multiple times by people even more desperate than him. these kids are completely delusional. we should send them to venezuela and see if they last a week
I hope your family is doing well in Venezuela!! Best of luck to them
You complain, yet you left.
@@Halcon_Sierreno What?
@@bronzy9826 Go back and fix your country.
If this channel doesn’t tell you how critical keeping the corruption and elite accountable to the people is, idk what else will.
No, the elite always do as they please. They are unaccountable. In Norway and America they gave a fuck about their lesser men, in Norway it was altruism, in America it was fear of reprisals because those lesser men, they had guns. So many guns.
Most nations have already failed. The US for example is just a blatant oligarchy(matbe corpo state would be better) masquerading as a democratic republic
So is most of Europe, if my country being told to vote again because we voted wrong...several times isn't obvious enough
Your elites are most likely corrupt and they will never be held accountable
@@commisaryarreck3974 the brainwashing has gone so far you think the US should ideally be a DEMOCRATIC Republic... It's a Republic, it was specifically designed not to be democratic, tyranny of the majority. smh
And look at Brazil, they just have robbed an election to put the biggest criminal corrupt again on the power...
Now if only people applied that both sides rather than the one thats popular to hate
I was born and raised in Venezuela, I've lived abroad, I have travelled across the world, and still I won't surrender to the crisis, I will continue working and give opportunities to my people. I dont criticize those who have left nor try to convince people who stay, but I do ask that wherever they go, help other Venezuelans, because not everyone can withstand migrating without help.
Good luck to you man may you bring prosperity to you and your people
Sure 😂
@@javiruiz8365 A 9 meses del comentario sigo aquí echandole bola e incremente el personal de las empresas en las que trabajo. No hay que rendirse.
@@AndresVargasArevalo that’s a good thing man! I salute you.
st1nky vinny’s
Sucks that Venezuela ended up from a promising oil-rich Latin American nation to the worst ending
it's not the ending tho.
some day, hopefully, Venezuela will be rich and happy place
This is the fate for most oil rich countries, just look at what is happening to the Middle East
@@mmaksymko any country can flourish if it wasn't 𝓬𝓸𝓻𝓻𝓾𝓹𝓽𝓲𝓸𝓷
basically, they're becoming Yemen
@@just_another_internet_man755 Actually most of the Middle East are kinda wealthy or average, but the one that constantly broadcasted in media is only conflict countries like Yemen, Syria, or Libya
The moral of the story is: When nation building, never ever ever ever ever leave all your eggs in one basket.
In other words, diversify your economy.
Oil has a tendency to have the prices jump up and down so that's one basket I'm not putting my eggs in.
@@ReviveHF Facts
And well, never vote for the guy who promotes free stuff instead of a more stable economy.
Especially not on a non-renewable resource, like oil... which... y'know... RUNS OUT eventually and massively fluctuates in price?
Fun fact: Not sure if it's still the case, but the Venezuelan currency was actually worth less at one point than the gold in Old School RuneScape, due to in-game gold "farmers" making more IRL money for themselves than they could at a real job for Venezuelan bucks.
It was a real, I've met a couple guys doing that, they made a considerable amount of money at the time. This actually extended to all forms of gaining money through the internet (fiver, commissions, TH-cam. Etc) but to use RuneScape to make money definitely was quite surprising.
Woooaa this blew my mind
Venezuela has the standart latin american mentality on steroids, and I say this as a Brazilian, we are on election year and honestly, both major candidates are populists using lame ass speeches about god, family, gender rights and etc to classify themselves as either right or left wing candidates.
Both are corrupt ones, and the people know it, some choose to ignore it, but deep inside they know it, but since the country isn't in deep shit, we are complacent about it, that's until things start falling apart, and they will.
We sacrifice long term prosperity for some 3-4 years of "golden years" fueled by public spending and corruption, just for it to bite us in the ass later on.
Voto nulo detected
@@arthurg.calixto3338 Nem votei :v
that's something only living in poverty can create
Well, looks like you found out who the crook was and who the real populist was. Who, in their right mind would vote for that corrupt s.o.b. Answer, no one did. Just another example of the use of rigged machines to discount votes. Chavez was the first to exploit them. He thenh exported his expertise to other surrounding socialist regimes. After the planned debacle using paper ballots and hand counting in 2000. The stage was set to gradually infiltrate these machines in to our elections resulting in the mess we are in now.
Venezuelan here. I find it hilarious you used Tropico’s music lol. Your review is highly accurate (even when your pronunciation isn’t but it’s alright)
Oh yeah, when he said "arapa" instead of arepa I was going to have a stroke.
este no sabe una mierda del la conquista española
@@ghost.8836"arrapa" "HHHyugo SHavez"
I've been living in southern Brazil for over a year now and i get an existential crisis and a "is that how i used to live" moment everytime I remember my country. Truly sad that not everyone has the opportunity to escape
And what you think about Lula the Socialist corrupt again on the criminal scene, the government
😢☝
You live either in Rio de janeiro or são Paulo right?
@@pillow69420 Parana, actually
Rio or são Paulo are in the southeast
As a Venezuelan, I gotta say this is one of the better takes. Though, that's kind of a low bar, since most try to oversimplify this to either "Socialism" (a word that basically means nothing anymore), or US Sanctions (which are indeed exacerbating the country's problems, but aren't the actual cause).
*Can you make another comment without you mention the western world or japan and South Korea?*
@@ZhouEnlaiOriginal That's one of the dumbest replies I have ever seen, this is Venezuela, so those countries are 100% relevant.
@@ZhouEnlaiOriginal shut
It's more to do with corruption and bad decisions
Maybe you should make a video you seem to know what's going on
As young Venezuelan who left the country pretty recently , this is accurate to a certain extent , some of the numbers are off , our diaspora has been on part with the Syrians after the Arab spring of 2011 , but without going on the details is a summary. We had intellectuals like Uslar Pietri (famous Venezuelan scholar) that promoted and exhaustively demanded to cultivate oil (diversify the economy and promote other sectors besides the oil sector) but never actually made it and the anti-elitist , far left economic measures on Chavez-Maduro regime eroded whatever other industries were left in the country by expropriation and mismanagement.
To whomever is fascinated by the events that led to Venezuela’s downfall , it is still being studied because it’s modern downfall on catastrophic levels. People lost jobs, businesses , family, savings, quality of life , freedom and hope and yet the country stands , our people dance , party, study, marry and live despite the utter chaos but any Venezuelan (that is not under the thumb of the party that runs the government or still indoctrinated ) will tell you about the social, economic and political erosion that has happened and how it has affected them in their daily lives, no matter their class or part of the country they are from.
Brazilian here, glad you are in a better situation, we had a huge number of venezuelans coming to Brazil as we share a border. I'm glad to share a border with such amazing people and culture, hope our latin american brothers be in a better situation soon
I’m dating an older Venezuelan woman who was from a rich family and they lost everything. She makes me arrépa (spelling lol) all the time
LOL. Chavez and Maduro aren't far left though.
ok great propaganda😂😂..
@@AholeAtheist They absolutely are.
It's scary how the horrible decisions of a few can condemn a country of millions with so much promise, to lives often misery
A little correction. The actual number isn't 3 million, but 6 million who have left the country in the last decade.
He mixes education and funny quotes which rhyme really well. You are having fun and also learning something! I also absolutely love that he represents countries as its national animals,so clever! Keep it up
I love the animals, more personable than the countryballs
I am half Venezuelan and my Venezuelan grandfather talks about how amazing the country was when he lived there, but is now ashamed to be Venezuelan due to the events that took place. He always says it is a slippery slope what the government did and what many do today. Mind you, he grew up very poor. I wish to one day visit Venezuela and see its nature. Maybe some time soon
Every single Latin American country should be fully developed. The current situation is absolutely insane!
Alot of debt through public spending
I wish
At least they got hot women there haha
The corruption and bad economy policies keep them in poberty
Some did alright, but it really seems the curse of the Spanish Encomienda System and state-sponsored corruption really made reforming the political culture very difficult.
I will say it again: the success of a society does not come from its resources but from the quality of its government.
Just look at Singapore
@@sheltonyukevich7722 And Botswana!
Ressources play a big role too.
@@zyanego3170
But management is even more so.
Venezuela was a country closed to the world great part of its history, the oil boom in Venezuela emerged thanks that the government was reached, by a caudillo (juan vicente Gomez) managed by a venezuelan banker educated in new york (Manuel antonio matos), and the banker saw an opportunity in the oil industry, and created with the help of the caudillo that he manipulates, a liberal legal-frame, for first time in the history of the country and that allows many oil companies from USA and Europe invest in the oil industry of venezuela, venezuela for itself wouldn't developed the industry, because had not capital, and the knowledge of the industry, were the US oil companies that builded in venezuela the greatest refineries of all latin america (as the refinery San lorenzo) and the wells, that helped a lot the country get out of the extreme missery that lived at the beggining of the XX, and helped be the 4 richest country at the world in the 50's, but the venezuelan mentality, and the new government with socialist-communist trends, ( the majority of presidents of venezuela since 1960, were exiliated for be suspicios of comminist, during marcos perez jimenez dictatorship), they tore down all the foreign investment that the country was receiving for years and took full control of industry, not only the oil, also the steel, banking etc, and they dilapidated the money of the industries in subsidies, corruption, etc, they made the population more dependent of government welfare, the system of itself was unsustainable, and exploded in the 80's and that brough many dismay and uprising, the same president that nationalized the oil tried to turn the situation, and apply liberal policies and take off subsidies but received a social uprising, two coups, and the politics took him out of power for dirty political ways, and then the people preferred a more socialist and leftist, leader as hugo chavez thinking that the problem were for the government that tried liberalize the economy ( that didn't liberalise significantly).
Thanks for this. I'm viewing this from Venezuela's nearest island neighbour, Trinidad.
This video clip gives a clear description of Venezuela's path over the last two hundred years or so. It reminded me that nothing occurs in a vacuum.
I subscribe to a lot of history, geopolitical, and news-centric channels, and this is one of those that I always click on first after I get home from work when I see it in my feed. I'm sure it'll hit 250k subs before too long because these videos are consistently pretty good and informative, even for me who is a history buff.
This was a great insight for understanding the situation of my Venezuelan neighbors. Consider doing Peru next, we also had hyperinflation and violence during the 80s but managed to recover. Over our 200 years of independence our economy has been based on extracting natural resources like guano, rubber, copper, etc. Might be cool for a video.
Creo que no habla inglés XD
eres de la sierra?
we are going to shit lmao
How are things going now? I read that there was a coup attempt or something
@P T It was thanks to capitalism and the 1993 Constitution that we had the economic boom we had in the last 30 years. And not it's going to shit because of populism and idiots who think changing it is a good idea.
The full story is always more complex than anyone with a political agenda wants to admit or even bother finding out.
That with a lot of history people only use history that fits what’s belief’s instead of the other factors
It's all too easy for braindead gringos to hear anything being used as a talking point towards their own idiotic "political" "parties", and to not call bullshit on it.
Exactly
Confirmation bias is the term you're looking for.
H0ser: explains why and how Venezuela got to where it is today
Me: is the background music the sound from breaking bad
Also h0ser: 3:08
I used to work with a bunch of Venezuelans back in the mid-80s in Dallas TX, they always talked about how great, rich and educated Venezuela was, and how everyone else in South and Central America were ignorant peasants who couldn't even speak proper Spanish. I wonder how they are doing now?
Sound like karma hit them like a train
well it was true at the time. And its still true most central americans and chileans cant speak proper Spanish lol.
@@juanm8582 lmaoo tf is proper spanish
Yes the Venezuelans still suffer to this day from an over inflated ego. Their self entitlement and lack of gratitude towards the host countries they immigrate to rubs many of their fellow Latin Americans brothers the wrong way.
The sheer amount of violent crimes some of their nationals have and continue to commit in Colombia, Perú and Chile is astounding!
Their problems has affected the entire continent in a negetive way.
@@ddurlon Spanish that is closer to Spain. Argentina has Italian qualities and Mexico has its own Spanish. That's why we have different accents
As a Venezuelan, I want to congratulate you because you know more about the economics of Venezuela than a common Venezuelan, I think that's the problem most of the people in my country are just stupid, and candidates that offer a bag of food are more likely to win than others, thanks for the vid
Uneducated is not the same as stupid.
@@Bori.1776 true on that, but having seen engineers and doctors on socialism stupid 100%
@@aordaz41 Ideology is a virus that corrupts the mind. I agree.
@@aordaz41 I agree with you. I am Venezuelan, and it is rare to witness someone that is willing to admit that there are many other issues beside "socialism." I personally think that scapegoating socialism stems from Mcarthism, for some reason there is brutal fearmongering regarding leftist ideals in the culture of our state. It could, perhaps be because, the governments that led the country to the horrid state of brutal anarchy it is now, were all leftist governments. However, it is essential to recognize that leftist ideologies and values themselves were not the problem, but the rather the governments themselves. I have witnessed engineers with PHD'S, lawyers, doctors, people who had incredible higher levels of education deciding to simply deny any historical evidence and just start lambasting leftist ideology. I even get called a marxist and a "chavista," whenever I try pointing it out. It is insane. So yeah, I agree with you. Some people's level of education exceed their intelligence.
@@latonitobonitopeople seem to think whatever bad happens in socialist government, is wholely due to socialism and not possible external factors, poor leadership and corruption are not exclusive to socialist countries, these factors affect a large number of countries
The ballad of Heisenberg at the beginning killed me
I’m so glad someone else pointed that out. But it’s such a good song, so I’m not mad about it lol
I knew someone else heard it!
The song is Mexican btw
One very interesting development is that with the remittances of so many people abroad, the economy has stabilized(just a little) not enough to stop the inflation but enough to eliminate the scarcity of basic resources like food and medicine but in USD, so assuming you have a relative sending you some money for food you can survive, but that is were it ends, The country has become a lawless land, at this point, the government doesn't care about it citizens so you are on you own, no water? tough luck you better drill a water well for that, No electricity, Well you can buy an electric generator if you have the USDs, The police AND gangs are robbing you? well non of my business you can always buy a gun
Not a very nice place to live or visit, for my part the best desition of my life was to leave in 2019, not to the best country(Colombia) but light years away better than Venezuela
Or make a water distiller from the rain and Buy tanks of water like 7 o 8 in total to Survive a few months without paying thousands in water cisterns
@@asierro2007 The funny thing is that we(me + my family) did exactly that, but the low-budget version, we didn't have the money for a filtration system or a big tank, so we used a couple of plastic barrels, the water wasn't particularly crystal clear but adding a little bit of chlorine + letting the sediment sink to the bottom of the barrel, was enough to make it usable, not drinkable (we still had you buy that), but it helped a lot, those were very dark days for me
Except that you actually CAN'T own a gun since Chávez made it ilegal to do so, and if cops find a gun in your house you get arrested, or more likely extorsioned.
@@PianoWolfg I'm curious why the rain water is dirty. So for what has happened in your country...
@@jameskamotho7513 There aren't many environmental regulations and the ones that exist are ignored, Thus there are a lot of older cars and trucks without catalytic converters, thus a small fill of soot is created everywhere exposed to the elements, walls, floors, and roofs... the where the rain falls, the rain would wash the soot of the roof and thus would be contaminated, (cleaning the roof before it rains was useless because it only takes a couple of days for the soot to reaper)
As a Venezuelan, I am glad to see videos like this that go over this without some sort of agenda and looking for a political punching bag.
Exactly! Every other video just uses socialism as an excuse but in reality what happened in Venezuela was not socialism. Social welfare programs do not instantly make a country socialist. A real life example of socialism in a country would have been Burkina Faso. You see Thomas Sankara Attempted Socialism in Burkina Faso and in just 3 years rose literally rates drastically, eradicated meningitis and measles, provided food housing and healthcare to millions and prevented famines by increasing the amount of food produced and reducing the amount of food imported. The only reason things went south was because he was overthrown and murdered by French Colonial Sympathizers. Since then Burkina Faso has been unstable and unsafe. So when socialism fails it is either a problem that isn’t integral to socialism like Military overspending and corruption or it fails because of western intervention. I still remember when I was first studying to learn Eccomoms I went in think “Socialism is Cuba and Cuba is poor and dictator” but after learning the factors that actually effect countries and I learned just how similar Scandinavian Social Democracy is to socialism and that is what encouraged be to become more open minded and learn what Socialism really is, what capitalism really is and even what communism is.
Good luck to my brothers from Venezuela, here in Brazil we are at the edge of the abyss too, but we will die fighting for our country 🇧🇷❤🇻🇪
Lol
Why do you guys still speak languages of c0l0nizers
Brazil is at the edge of the abyss?
@@fforropesado something to do with their president
How are we in the edge of the abyss?
Is this some delusional speech?
As a Venezuelan, I'm glad this video exists
I gotta say, hoser actually makes some really good content. No BS, controlled bias. good shit.
I’m part Venezuelan. My parents are Venezuelan. My dad’s parents are Columbian and they moved before my father was born. I’m born in the US. My grandfather had a good life in Venezuela until it was in shambles.
Why do you guys speak Spanish
@@auguaauaguga6517 cause we do. Watch the video, it tells things about history
Why is Venezuela so lost cause, is there anyway to undo the hyperinflation
Soo... You are American
@@2163mechows yes
Venezuela is like this person who had everything. He later had a car crash and his mood changed drastically cause he had a brain damage. After he started to have heavy drinking, and he causes vandalism in his town. Tell me what Venezuela is like in your opinions.
That kinda reminds me of Caligula where in his early reign he was a better empire than his predecessor, Tiberius. But after a “brain fever” he went batshit insane
like that person who won the lottery but because of lack of education blew it all and is now living in the streets
@@DeathCrateRSA okay, that's a good one.
Venezuela is that person who has the communist devil whisper into his ear and then murders his entire family
The person who’s really rich but gambled all their money away
This channel has taught me more than 18 years of history / social studies
@h0ser This is my first time watching one of your videos and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I thought your use of sound facts, witty sarcasm, decent music, decent animations, and well structured out analysis culminate in a quality video. That being said, I have one, critical yet constructive complaint. I thought your pace of talking was to fast. Personally, I could follow. However, I love history and already have a rough understanding of the history of Latin and Central America. One of my personal favorite you tubers who is in the same niche as yourself is Kraut. He is the polar opposite and utilizes a very slow, yet precise and intentional use of language. I prefer it because it opens the marketability of the video to those who are new to the field of historical analysis and also enables him to dissect topics over a longer period of time and to highlight interesting and intelligent views that appeal to ardent historians. Anyways, I look forward to watching more of your videos!
As a Venezuelan, I think our people is dammed from the beginning, we only care about money, money and more money and didn't take the good opportunities to invest in education, science and more technology, we are just a bunch of people surviving in other countries and in our own country...and it's painful to see it
You really nailed it, they never found democracy before greed aka oil. Politicians in Venezuela literally went for office just to be like “aight how am I gonna sell oil and not give a shit about anything else going on”
That's why I follow this channel, you didn't take the cheap and easy out by blaming Chavez. Don't get me wrong he sucks but is a symptom, not a cause
Nah, he was the hard liquor for the hypothermia patient that was Venezuela.
Actually unlike many would like you to believe, Chavez was a great president and he was about to succeed in nationalizing Venezuela’s oil when our country’s “energy interests” prevented that from happening.
@@josea1707 Venezuela should focus on industrializing in order to make their weird brand of socialism actually work, overreliance on oil isn't going to do them any favors, not now nor in the future. Cuba is suffering from a weak industrial sector as well. But it's understandable that US sanctions make that goal very hard to achieve.
@@electricdazz Buddy im not just talking about sanctions. I'm talking about active military coup attempts covertly sponsored by the US against Chavez and the giant international pressure against Chavez due to the US painting him as a ruthless dictator. Also the US having a hand in installing Maduro as dictator to keep the Venezuelan people weak.
@@josea1707 I haven't heard that about Maduro. Sounds a bit like a conspiracy theory in my opinion. If the US was involved in establishing Maduro's dictatorship, then why are they now trying to replace him with Guaido?
hey h0ser, you're video on Venezuela has been very enlightening on the history and difficulties in Venezuela that plague the countries society to this day, it has also made very interested in my own country, the nation of Malaysia, and its history as has also benefited from oil wealth as well. I would love to see a video on Malaysia as might give a more nuanced understanding on oil wealth as we aren't exactly a Norway but we are a relatively successful state but also really screwed by certain actors, ideas and people over the decades
The major different between Malaysia and Venezuela is that in Malaysia, Malays govt just took the money ,waste it like no tmr , BUT didn't buy up its other industries with the oil wealth and let it rot. So unlike Venezuela , even when Malaysian oil money disappear, they still have other industries to fall onto.
While it isn't Norway, people still have job and food on the table.
I'm from Belo Horizonte, a city in Brasil (a bit close to São Paulo and Rio de janeiro), and my city has a LOT of venezuelans. It's a sad situation because a lot of them ended up in the streets, but still, our government has a few welfare programs for them and society as a whole wants to help, offering shelter, food and jobs. I can only imagine what the cities near the amazon are facing, since mine is more than 1500km from Venezuela and we are still able to see the consequences of the regime.
The discovery of massive oil reserves in Venezuela can be compared to someone winning millions of dollars in a lottery and spending it recklessly. There have been numerous stories of major lottery winners blowing all of their huge fortune and going deep into debt and misery. Some of those winners have ended up going homeless, being dependent on welfare, suffering a divorce, becoming a drug addict and even committing suicide etc. If you ever win a huge prize, you should hire financial advisors and lawyers to inform you how to manage your new riches.
Put 5% a side to party and put the rest into EFTs and live of the dividend. Tell everyone the money is locked and you have no way of getting to i to give out loans.
@P T you need to travel more. Corruption and Nepotism is the problem and an oligarchy who has no insentives to bring poor people into the middle class. We can at least hold our politicians accountable and there are checks and balances in place. On top of that rich Venezuelans spend their money abroad so it doesn't even trickle down into their own economy. Go to Venezuela or perhaps neighbouring Colombian and see for yourself.
Latin America is not as simple. Brazil in 2010s followed this path after discovery of pre-salt oil fields. They invested a lot in R&D, built a whole industrial complex around it, to the point the state-owned gas company became one of the most advanced players in the world, also investing revenue in things like education and other industries... All this to the country ending being crippled down to the ground on the verge of a far right coup
@@jotareiss I'm in awe at what Brazil managed to achieve.
Becoming a top player in the hydrocarbon game, becoming a top player in engineering projects, being poised to become an actual superpower.
And what did you guys use all those advancements, land, and manpower for in the end?
More violence, political drama, and advanced forms of corruption.
@@necromax13 but corruption and political drama is how we do it since... ever?
The story i told, although extremely frustrating, is nowhere near surprising in the global south. There a lot of interests, both external and internal, in these countries being a mess, because corruption, political drama etc is profitable.
In the process of Petrobras being gutted, it becames the gas company that paid the highest dividend payouts at expense of the gas prices surging to the highest value in this century and refineries being sold to foreign investors as cheap as 2 years of its revenue.
To further illustrate how fucked up things are down here, as for today mainstream media is fearmongering how the stock markets are falling because the new president vowed to fight hunger in the country.
One tiny error you commit, the official number of emigrees is 6 million by international estimates, though the suspected unofficial approaches the 9 million mark.
One fourth/third of Venezuelans have left, this comment as a Venezuelan myself.
A lot of them came here in Brazil
@@sand7861 And Mexico too
Yeah I read a year or two ago that about 7 million have left. A massive amount are next door in Colombia
@@QuantumNoir That might change soon...a sizeable amount of them is leaving...going through the Darien Gap and crossing the US-Mexico border
I'm >4000 Kms away from Venezuela and now and then see refugees begging on the streets, during a freezing cold winter. It's like they went from the pan to the fire, may God help them...
Dutch disease is a concept that describes an economic phenomenon where the rapid development of one sector of the economy ( particularly natural resources) precipitates a decline in other sector
Correct. You get fifteen points
*loud correct buzzer*
Thank you for this objective evaluation instead of solely blaming socialism like your average American news outlet.
Ye
As a Venezuelan, I can tell you socialism did fucking ruin us a lot. The gvt (still) cant a find a way to break the private sector to make the populace dependant on them for food or services.
Socialism has alot to do with it, mass confiscations of private assets, state run monopolies, coercitive economic measures against the private sector, banking etc.
Socialism is not limited to public funded goods, you can have that with a modern capitalist economy.
@@XxLIVRAxX none of those things are related to socialism tho, even if Venezuela were a capitalist country same things would've happened, because the government was plagued with corruption
@@XxLIVRAxX socialism is not when "too much state"
A country 100% state would still be capitalist if the dominant class were the bourgeoisie and had a market economy (price control is not planned economy)
The only exception is Yugoslavia, because even though it had a market economy, it was based on cooperatives (worker's control of work environment), so we consider it market socialist.
Hey thanks a lot for the video, I've lived here my entire 20 years of life and I honestly don't imagine myself living here 5 years from now on. We have reached a point where we can survive but the long term future seems bad
Thank you for this video. Very insightful and impartial. Love how it does not glorify or excuses socialism or capitalism. Just explains the downfall.
I'm Venezuelan. From the beginning, Simón Bolívar was a dictator, yes, like the traitor of Miranda and Paez. During the period of Gomez and Perez Jimenez, most of the Venezuelan infrastructure was built. However, they were heavily criticized because they used prisoners as labor and were not well known for upholding current human rights.
For Venezuela it was impossible to diversify from oil if they lacked the necessary infrastructure to do so and they knew it, also the Venezuelan universities were improved in an attempt to expand the economy in the future. But unfortunately, later came the "democracies" that never had anything of democracy, they were a bunch of populist parties, since now they should not get power with a coup, but by offering any kind of free or better thing in the most socialist and populist way. It was a race to see who would be the new dictator. Of course the central nor central left won with the promises to improve the quality of life in the simplest way; with public spending this led to the part you mention in the caracazo.
Most Venezuelan politicians have always been on the left, but the final blow was with Chavez's extreme left. Where the generation like mine from 1990 to 2010 had nothing to do with the boomers who voted for him, but we pay the consequences of those who voted for him and by the wat, fled the country after a few years looking for a better place like the US.
From abroad people always criticize that the Venezuelan people do nothing to get rid of Maduro, but the reality is that there are countless dead and missing people of my age and even minors who tried to protest or demonstrate against it. But it is impossible without military help. Venezuela is one of the Latin American countries with the best army, even better than other countries outside of Latin America, and as you know, they are on the side of the government. In Venezuela it used to be legal to use weapons like in the United States, but this was abolished by one of the Venezuelan "democracies" and only organized crime, military and police cartels can have weapons, all on the socialist side. Not even the lowest seat: the police are on the civilian side, all the great positions in this country are bought, but what hurts Venezuelans the most is that the supposed presidency of Juan Guaido is also corrupt. In Venezuela there is no true leader, only people aspiring to be the new dictator...
So there is no way that a civil war will happen in Venezuela either. The most serious thing that could happen, and what many Venezuelans really want, is an intervention, like the Panamanian one. Those who really do not agree with an intervention are the politicians and Venezuelans affiliated with Guaido, another politician of the bunch. Personally, I think it will never be done until there is a good Venezuelan leader. However, I already resigned myself to the fact that Venezuela will be like Cuba.
Yikes, that is a rather terrifying thought.
I agree with that u said of Marcos Pérez Jiménez this guy didnt pay atenttion to that
Jesus Christ loves you so much. Turn your life to him and pray for forgiveness. Have a good day. ✝️✝️✝️
@@Iamwolf134 Jesus Christ loves you so much. Turn your life to him and pray for forgiveness. Have a good day. ✝️✝️✝️
Stop blaming socialism for everything. Seriously, you right wingers toss that word around and don’t even know what it means.
Oh my country, I hope it can recover its glory someday. Thanks for making a video about it 🇻🇪
Why do you guys speak languages of c0l0nizers
@@auguaauaguga6517 a. Why’d you put 0 instead of o’s and b. It’s a unified language that the people there would know so they kept it as the official language it’s the exact same reason the us speaks English and didn’t decide to make up their own language or use a different already existing one
@@auguaauaguga6517 ¿hay alguna razin que no deveriamos, o solo estas maullando para llamar la atencion?
As a Venezuelan currently still in Venezuela. This is a very good summary of the roots of the issue. And it makes my blood boil whenever the older folk blame all of the problems on the current populist practices of the governement, blaming corruption all around, despite the periods of most growth being in an ALSO insufferable, fascist dictatorship during the economic boom from the Juan Gomez/Perez Jimenez periods, but oh well, those periods ended in the 50's, and the ''Democratic'' Era was really well off riding that wave of being one of the richest countries. But as that wealth ran out (and dont get me wrong, Chavismo did a lot of damage as well), and we didnt invest into actually developing the country. We reach the current state of affairs
I am part of the minority that believes in a future here and would rather people stay. But with the current state of political affairs I do not blame anyone emigrating in the slightest, there's no real nation-wide leaders, and so the corruption problem remains...
I do love our land and people, its just a sad reality that the country has had corruption issues since its inception
Can you make a video on Syria? I would love that because your videos are quite informative, concise and not as boring as history class.
The way he pronounced Arepa was the biggest tragedy in this video
mhm
If his channel name is what he is, his pronunciation can probably be worse
was better if he just said "bread"
That and the name pronunciation
@@stopreplyingtomycomments7954 ah reh pah
Socialism alone didn't lead to Venezuela's downfall, but it was a HUGE contributing factor.
One of my mom's friends is from Venezuela. Thanks to the regime Hugo Chavez put in place she lost every single penny she had because according to the government she doesn't need money to survive and took her business too so she couldn't make more money, she had to gather what little she had left and come here to the states for a better life.
Quite sad, but Chavez was voted into office, so his government technically doesn’t qualify as a regime. Still, the was the first of this cursed wave of socialism that is hitting Latin America right now.
Ah the horrors of seizing the means of production and distribution.
Dissapointing thing to see is how much of a cult personality he has even though it was his socialism program that led to the rise of corruption, Maduro, and the eventual collapse of the economy.
@@zyco9188 Did you not read, the multiple coups, slavery, exploitative systems before hand.
There are socialist-capitalist hybrid nations that do fine. Vietnam
@@CountingStars333 socialist-capitalist is an oxymoron.
Venezuela is like the popular kid that peaked in high school but fell off afterwards
always love seeing political discussion without bias, just a genuine passion for learning about people, nations, and how all that works and what's happened so far in human history. I think they call it anthropology.
Fun fact: there once used to be a German colony in modern Venezuela, called Klein-Venedig
And this video reminds me on how the Kongo Kingdom was dependant on exporting slaves and the Saudis depend on exporting oil.
Klein-Venedig is in fact the origin of the name Venezuela. When writing about the indigenous peoples from the coastal areas, the early German explorers noted how similar their construction techniques were to those of Venice: laying a foundation of tree trunks underwater and then constructing stilt houses atop the water (named Palafitos), making it easy to fish from their own homes. Because of this, they named the place Klein-Venedig (meaning "Little Venice" in German) which Spanish courts translated as Vene-zuela.
there's still a german colony-ish near Caracas. Its a tourist site now, they grow flowers in those hills and you can stay the night in some European-looking hostals. Its pretty cool.
@@juanm8582 yes, Colonia Tovar is in my home state of Aragua. That settlement has nothing to do with the Klein-Venedig expeditions though. It's a much later colony of Allemanic-speaking immigrants from the late 1800s. Fun fact: their dialect is mutually intelligible with Pennsylvania Dutch!
@@norik434 I love that place lol. Its cool, but a bit unsafe to drive to.
Kraut?
Damn, this one is personal. my poor country :(
Honestly, the fact that a foreigners recap of my country and the things that I see everyday is some of the only reliable sources of information I have to understand shit without bias in it's really depressing, but I'm already Venezuelan so...
Well, a foreigner talking this explicitly, though, respectfully about our situation is kinda refreshing. I would contribute the cause of the instability was and still being the power-hungry and egotistical notions behind the ideals of the politicians. Every turn since 1946 resume in some various intents to form democracy and peace being obliterated by politic sectarism, corruption, populism and mainly greed. The rise of Chavez is the infamous consequence of all the past mistakes; above all, wanting that savior-like figure that the average venezuelan sees in the military men
I'm agree with you
I disagree about how much blame should be on Chavez's shoulders.
As someone familiar with another extremely corrupt oil rich country (Nigeria), I can tell you that everything Venezuela went through before Chavez was also experienced there.
However, because Nigeria never had a Chavez and thus never implemented socialist, anti entrepreneural policies, things never got close to as bad (at least economically).
The combination of over generous welfare AND rabid anti business policies that many South American countries have implemented just seems like complete madness to me.
How can a government promise a safety net on one hand while penalizing the sector of the economy that is supposed to fund that safety net?
It's thr main difference between Scandinavia and LatAm. They are wise enough to have very pro market policies to support their welfare states. (Also, they're far less corrupt but that's another matter, lol)
My parents are from Venezuela and I am so thankful they left to Canada
You were born in Canada?
Hablas español?
@@qwertylolmjuyhnpolza3255
¡SI! Yo me nací en Canadá y hablo Español en casa
¡También aprendí portugués!
Nunca aprendí Francés. :(
Ahora estoy viviendo en Corea del Sur y estoy aprendiendo Coreano
Awesome video. Keep up the great work! Could you do Colombia too?
I have friends from Venezuela 🇻🇪. They told how it is there. I pray 🙏🏻 that things would get better there in the future. They need to make the right decisions to move the country forward. I am from Barbados 🇧🇧 and my country is north of Venezuela 🇻🇪.
I feel bad for the people
Venezuela is inverse of Taiwan. Venezuela has great geography and tons of oil and is the poorest country in Latin America. Taiwan is a tiny island with like nothing and like 15 countries even recognize them as a country and is one of the most wealthy nations on the planet.
People forget or didn't know but Taiwan actually even went as far as starting development projects in Africa back in the day. Many Taiwanese even involved themselves in the economic development of their now rival, the PRC. This sounds dumb but for many of the former Nationalist soldiers their family and home was in China and people were more optimistic back then so it seems a bit more reasonable.
I wish H0ser would make a vid about the development of Taiwan and thinking about it, things kind of went exceptionally well. Japanese colonialism ironically created many highly educated Taiwanese (a lot of doctors for some reason) while the KMT losing the mainland brought China's best and brightest to the island.
It’s crazy how pure good leadership can lead a shanty town into one of the richest country’s, and sadly the opposite also applies
This series is amazing. I never thought I would enjoy watching videos that concerned economies and governments, but you do such an excellent job packaging it up in an ‘easy to swallow pill’, the images are a plus. Excellent job!
This is why Saudi Vision 2030 aims to decrease they're dependence on oil. It's impossible to stay rich forever if you get all your money from one industry.
Absolutely. Having you entire country dependent on one shit alone is disastrous.
Not with vanity projects like NEOM
That's why Russia isn't even developed.
Except that their "plans" aren't particularly future proof. NEOM is a joke bound to fail at best, and beyond that they don't have much going for them. Sounds good on paper but when the oil runs out I doubt they'll fare a whole lot better.
Venezuela didn't fall because oil, but because Chávez and Maduro greedy theft ass, drying out every single penny to their own pockets and doing alliance with the worst countries in the world, Cuba and Russia
as Venezuelan i'll add that other reason of the actual situation is because Chavez and Maduro didnt learn about the mistakes commited in the past "or" They wanted that sussy oil from the begginings, which ended up doing the country more dependent of petroleum and being more corrupt than ever.
I would like to tell other things but i dont want to do a bible, so nice vid and God bless Venezuela.
Sussy 😂
as another venezuelan, why tf would you use an among us joke, im banning you from venezuels
@@korenaya lol
@@korenaya amogus
@@korenaya amboga
Man when you hear your country’s natural beauty being complemented, you know you’re in trouble
You should make a video on the American Rust belt. I think that your style of discussing failed states would really work when talking about one of the biggest brain drains occurring right now.
Rust belt is getting revived though.
@@vyros.3234 Actually? time to look stuff up
@P T sadness
Nice thing about the US is you can pick up and move to another state. It's happened throughout our history. I love where I live. No problems whatsoever. So if the rust belt isn't working for you, move. Simple
@@Rjsjrjsjrjsj No you're wrong, it's never that simple. Moving costs money. Changing jobs. Leaving friends & family. You're completely delusional if you think the simple solution is to just move. Bruh.
As a nigerian i understand how big of an oppurtunity venzuela missed its similar to nigeria , does oil always have to be a curse
Oil isn't a curse in Norway.
Oil isn’t a curse, corruption and ineptitude is
Yes oil is always a curse. Any industry that in a short period of time gets bigger than the whole rest of an economy is a curse - it totally throws off the systems the economy used to run by, it guarantees all sorts of foreign interference, and it requires a ton of tricky adjustment to manage. Yeah some places get through it, but not easily, and a lot of places run into very serious problems.
The most helpful thing when you find a huge windfall of a natural resource is to already have a large diversified economy so it doesn’t totally take over everything and devalue and marginalize every other industry. But nobody really has control over whether they have that or not.
@@zyanego3170Oil is a curse to countries with corrupt governments that can’t afford to extract the resource themselves and so they let private multinational corporations use and exploit the natural resources found in their country
Oil isn’t a curse for Norway and hopefully won’t be for Guyana.
I used to speak to a lot of venezuelans when playing oldschool runescape. usually nice guys who just wanted their country to be less of a joke
Who knew putting one export at a high % would turn out to be a bad idea.
Also the reckless public spending. Money doesn’t grow on trees
Reckless spending is especially bad if you don't have the infrastructure to support it.
Venezuela was one of the poorest regions of the Spanish Empire, most of its exports were just cocoa and sugar. Spain never found the Venezuelan gold. Ironically, when Venezuelans found the gold in the Amazon they called the town "El Dorado"
i swer this channel has teached me more about history then the entirety of history class
Do men even have feelings
Men: crying while reading/watching about the fall of Bolivar's Gran Colombia
he tried so hard and get so far... but in the end it didn't even matter
Poor Venezuela. An idea for the next video is a video about an Arabic country like Iraq or Yemen
I’m a catalan history student and last quatrimester we talked about that. The Conquistadors were nobles and rich people from all Europe, not only Castille and Aragon, who bought a license to the iberian monarchy in order to get the right to go to the “new world” and conquer ir for them. Then they were allowed to forge hiciendas in that land. The funny thing is that this whole process didn’t cost a Damm coin to the monarchy. And about Cortés, he did it without a licence. The monarchy wanted him dead, but he was quick enough to dedicate “his conquests” (which cannot have happened without the locals who joined his Army as the Federation of the three cities (the mexica/aztecs) were universaly hated) to the crown, so they just accepted and gave him a remote hicienda.
It was a moment when the “encomenderos” of Colòmbia and Veneçuela tried to rebel and become hereditary lords like the nobles of Europe, but that failed. It seemed like the natives prefered to fight for the crown that to fight for the “encomenderos” who were the ones directly above them. Maybe they thought like the remences in catalonia that siding with the crown would mean the end of the hiciendas…
Another thing, the conquistadors tried to invade places which already had some organization in order to suplant it. That explains things like the fact that the Yucatan peninsula in Mexico wasn’t properly “civilized” until the independence of Mexico, as the Mayan city-stat system collapsed before Columbus sailed to the Caribean thinking he was on the indic sea, or that when the castilians saw How similar the cultural supremacism of the incans was to their own, they decided to respect the quechua people more than the other conquered ones (the quechuas tried to form a homogenizing empire in the Andes making many smaller cultures dissapear into them).
The independence of the americas might have been changed If the Bourbons remained faithful to the constitutions of Cadiz after the napoleònic wars. There is much there that was liked by the natives in america. The think they liked the most was that it would grant them all spanish citizenship and make them legally Equal to the encomenderos. Of course that was also because the constitutions of Cadiz said that every man older than 20 could vote when in France and USA only the richest could. That idea was really powerful.
In fact there was many natives that fought for the crown, as independence would mean that the criollos would rule the countries and they would be far worse than before. There are lots of terrifying histories of natives being persecuted after the independence wars to be punished for siding with the crown.
There are too many historical errors in this video, there are also misrepresentations of various facts.
True
Venezuela followed their Spanish colonial government economy policy, Spanish at 16-17th century were heavily rely on silver export and when the silver oversupply the price of silver dropped a lot, when build a country u needs to diversification your economy
Venezuela was not a mining colony, rather an agricultural one, leather, coccoa, coffe, sugar were the commodities exported.
Spain really had nothing to diversify apparently, they didn't even had industry. And the gold just kept flowing so why bother building and investing into industry like the accursed English? 😋
@@nunyabiznes33 when product oversupply the price drop furthermore British has better mercantilism that's why they had EIC at 17 century and industrilized at 18 century
@@widodoakrom3938 yeah. But still, the Spanish could have used the money to emulate the industrial revolution happening elsewhere.
@@nunyabiznes33The industrial revolution happened in the English countryside, something would have hardly happened in Spain since the Spanish countryside is so uninhabited
3:30 Before even USA became independent, Haiti did. So Haiti is the real precedent, and the inspiration was more the French Revolution than the USA independence.
You are right about the Haitian revolution probably being more than likely inspired by the French Revolution. But the American revolution happened before the French Revolution and by proxy the Haitian revolution. I know this because one of the earliest topics of debate was if they should intervene in the French Revolution (they decided not to and stayed isolationist for a while).
9:03 small correction, the war you are referring to, was fought between Israel, and Egypt and Syria, so it's more of an Israeli Arabic war.
As a jew yes a agree
i*rael 🤢
I gotta say, as a venezuelan living abroad, this is pretty on point (more than most of the stuff I see on TH-cam anyways). I would just add that the exodus nowadays is closer to 7 million venezuelans abroad.
Today we are 8 million Venezuelans outside of our country 🫂 great video Hoser, thanks for making it and sharing
The Yom Kippur war was an Arab-Israeli war not a Palestinian-Israeli war
Palestinians are Arabs.
I was working in Venezuela in 1992 when Chavez attempted his failed coup.
I couldn't believe when only 6 years later the people there voted him as their president!
I told my new Venezuelan wife back then "are you people crazy?" Wtf?
I said to her "you'll never get him out of office once he's president. Ever!"
Worse than that, they continued to vote for him election after election until he died of cancer.
Personally, I don't feel empathy for the Venezuelan people. They knew what he was when they willingly handed over the reigns of power to him.
Similar to how I feel if our own failed coup plotter is voted into the WH in 2024.
We have brought whatever comes our way on ourselves.
Why are so many people so darn naive?
i laughed until i realize the US might do the exact same thing with Trump
Seems like the hatred for the "elites" just blinds peoples' judgement completely and nobody is safe from this shit - more and more countries vote complete lunatics into power seemingly just to see the downfall of the politicians they don't agree with.
And you are generalizing too much, my parents always hated Chavez not everyone voted for him
Yep✌🏽
Most of the people I know started hating Chavez after his first reelection.
To be honest, I find it incredibily difficult to blame the average person for voting for him. Chavez was an innate leader. If you can speak spanish, you should search his speeches. Even his bodyguards frequently denounced how difficult it was to keep him safe because he tried to be so close to the people. Handing out hugs, receiving and drinking random cups of coffee, speaking to people like, y'know, _people_ instead of wild cattle... He had decent proposals (that declined after his first reelection) and knew how to understand, listen to, and talk to people. Very few in human history have had their qualities.
That made people like him a lot, like, cult-level a lot. Of course it's dangerous and we know that now, but I still find it hard to blame those who first voted for him. Even though they had quite the mountain of reference material, you have to understand that before Chavez, things were not too different from today. I nowadays only hate on those who continue to believe in his joke of a "legacy".
U remind me of a old youtuber id watch back in the day. Nice vids keep up the great work
It’s crazy how a continent as democratic and free as South America makes Venezuela such an outlier.
It's not really, Bolivia is not far behind
As a Latin American, that is a hot take I had never seen before.
I wouldnt call south america extremely democratic
@@AdamSmith-gs2dv on the website freedom house Bolivia is considered a partially free nation which isn’t great at only a 66/100. But Venezuela is full on 14/100 with the lowest political rights of the hemisphere it’s not even a close comparison
@@Blockxolotl it’s around the 3rd most democratic continents. Behind Europe and Oceania although Europe has more problematic regions. South America isn’t a role model for democracy as most are one bad election away from slipping into dictatorships, but it’s the most consistent continent besides Venezuela in terms of democracy and human rights. Chile and Uruguay even have better freedoms than the U.S
Why does former Spanish colonies keep falling into debt, military govts and bankruptcy despite having so many resources and riches they can literally dig out of the ground?
The contrast is quite different from former British colonies like Singapore, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and to some extent the USA
funny thing is spanish empire had the same mindset too relying only on gold and platinum
It's all the fault of the English, Spanish America was prosperous, the English invested to arm the independence rebels, and when the countries "liberated", the English plundered the resources of these countries (investigate the amount of money stolen by the English of the funds in the city of Lima), English liberalism favored the small elite that governed the countries, since they became rich providing the raw material for the English industry, while the rest of the population remained subjugated, poor and ignorant
@@Ozcar_The_Dark_knight rebellions wouldn’t have happened if the Spanish haven’t been excluding the commoner from the riches they accumulated via farming or plantations.
You are blaming the current failures on rebellions 100 years ago. Take Singapore for example , they are relatively undeveloped when they gained independence in the 60s, why can’t any former Spanish colony achieved in 100 years anything similar what they did in 50 years alone
@@hkchan1339 The answer already explained it to you, but here it goes again. When Spanish America became independent, the groups that ruled were that small elite of landowners who had supported the rebellion for their own benefit, they created a discriminatory system towards other ethnic groups (indigenous and mestizo) applying the ideas of the French Enlightenment and ideas of the r@ci@l supremacism of the Anglo-Saxons, they kept these ethnic groups subjugated and ignorant, they used them as cheap labor in their lands, education was only provided to this small wealthy elite, they never bothered to industrialize these nations, because the business of selling raw materials to the British was very profitable for them, even today many people with great power in the governments of these countries are direct descendants of that elite, it is very easy to trace their origins, they always cared only for themselves, and they still continue to do so, they sell their countries to large foreign corporations for money, they keep ignoring Against the population, they continue to maintain the system of corruption imposed since independence.
@@Ozcar_The_Dark_knight Most of the "White people" in the Spanish/Portuguese colonies are of Spanish or Portuguese ancestry with a sizable portion oi Italian and even Germans. Japanese too for Peru
Stop the blaming the "Anglo-Saxons" who are mostly in the English speaking colonies instead.
I suggest you check out Kraut's youtube channel video - " The Mexican American Border | A Tale of two Colonies " to understand the different governance approach of UK and Spain in their colonies and how it still affected the people today
am binge watching your chanel right now, your stuff makes me crak uppppp and learn - just a comment though, I don't know if you talk fast naturally or are trying to keep the audience engaged, but I think you can slow down a bit :) I've put it to .8 speed and that feels comfortable and I actually understand it haha
Remember when Bernie said Venezuela was better than the us?
As a Venezuelan, i must say, its rare to find balanced and nuanced takes like this one. Often times, people just reduce the problem to whatever is convenient to their political beleifs. Great video!
Venezuelan here, the video basically covers everything, good shit. I used to go back every year but cant do so anymore cause its consistently getting more dangerous. Itl be a WHILE before we see any major progress.
I love how “Negro Y Azul” is playing at the background at the beginning.
As a Venezuelan guy who had to do research on the subject, I can tell this is pretty accurate
People like to blame current politicians for the current crisis, specially when they are even more thieving and corrupt than any of their predecessors, but the venezuelan government had always been corrupt in one way or another, as well as overly reliant on oil
you are one knowledgeable person !!!! and I love your style of teaching subjects that could at times be boring ..big thumbs up
Caracazo was a civil unrest for a very modicum rise of prices. No way compared to what happened later. Also, it was mostly sacking - no protesting
@P T yes bro, my bank account in the millions
@P T soy pelabola
@P T tienes razon!!!!!! la gente comia perrarina!!!!!!!! fueron 20 años pelando bola!!!!!
@@22andresmiguel con pocas excepciones todas las naciones de latam tuvieron q realizar esos paquetazos siendo los más duros los vividos en Perú y Bolivia
El precio del populismo durante décadas anteriores fue fuerte,pero solo venezuela colapso.
El resto logro superarlo
on today’s episode of ‘the spanish managed their colonies so horribly and with such arrogance that we still feel the consequences today’: venezuela
Venezuela's issue has always been the same: Venezuelans.
It's a great country, but is the people that live there that made it what it is today.
@@jorgeluis2247 this
Also the manner how the colonies got their independence only so they could hoard the resources for themselves.
It's enough to blame spanish colonization. 200 years ago, we let Venezuela. If you are not able to deal with your own country after that, it's not a Spain Empire problem. Look for the cause into yourself, instead...
According to your logic, Japan should be like the Congo after those 2 nukes