China is, roughly speaking, on the other end of the spectrum from Venezuela: import mainly low value stuff like raw materials, manufacture and export almost everything else, create as large a trade surplus as possible, educate your work force, force people off rural land and into the cities to work, emphasize capital formation. Seems to have been quite successful.

Saudia Arabia seems closer to Venezuela than it is to China, and yet, it has at least saved a huge pile of cash, much of which is invested in valuable companies like Twitter.

My guess is that the US is closer to Venezuela than it is to China.

Is it just me or is this show just a really bad explanation ? I'm not even talking about the subject per se. They constantly jump from one thing to anoter, interrupt, ... and the explanations of the concepts I know are just pretty bad. They make enormous leaps without so much as an attempt to justify them ...

Not worth listening to. They're repeating some of the soundbytes in newspapers, and that's all.

Although the bad policies have contributed to the current state - it is really about the ideology and corruption of the rulers - billions of $$$ have been stolen. Anything from the "imperio" (USA) is evil- including paying for the bills towards maintaining the oil industry - the only source of income - add to that falling oil prices - leaves most of the money available for stealing - and the little left is used towards demagogic promises to keep buying votes. But the people have wised up and are no longer buying it - which has made the government violate clauses of the constitution to stay in power and continue to empty the coffers while they last...

A real tragedy.

A socialist utopia that was so hell-bent on opposing any economic policy tainted by USA or UN hands, it basically did the opposite, every step of the way.

This is a great counter-example showing how modern economic theory is probably a good thing.

Serious Question: What happened to all the Gold that Chavez repatriated?