As we know Venezuela has been suffering from the imposition of idiot socialism. No, that’s not a tautology, there’s non-idiot socialism as workers’ co-ops like John Lewis show. There is also, as Owen Jones shows, idiot socialism. One rather good definition of the idiot part being the imposed part but that’s another story.
What we can show though is that Maduro and confreres in Venezuela are mere pikers on that imposition and idiocy point.
Venezuela: about 3m have fled political and economic crisis since 2015, UN says
3 million’s a lot of people. But:
The exodus of Venezuelans fleeing economic and political crisis in their homeland has accelerated dramatically, reaching a total of about 3 million since 2015, the United Nations has announced.
The new figures show that about one in 12 of the population has now left the country, driven by violence, hyperinflation and shortages of food and medicines.
One in 12, about 8%. They’ve still got some way to go here. East Germany’s (1990) population was some 16 million. Before the Berlin Wall went up in 1962 some 3.5 million fled that version of socialism. Call that 20% of that population. Venezuela’s got some way to go then, about 12% of the population.
Come along now, we really do have to call Bolivarian socialism a failure. They’ve not even managed to get the exodus, let alone anything else, up to East German standards.
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