2005-12-20

Venezuela gives Exxon ultimatum

Venezuela has given the world's biggest oil company, ExxonMobil, until the end of this year to enter a joint venture with the state.

"
Much of the oil revenue in Venezuela goes into social projects in shanty towns and poor rural areas."

I supposed Paul and Slinger are outraged that a rich country would actually go out of its way to help its poor people. They should just let them starve and die like the U.S.

3 comments:

Paul Hue said...

Whose "starving and dying" in the US? Barely anyone.

What is the net US-Venezuala immigration balance?

Which country has the greatest average rates of poverty?

Governments feeding people, rather than people feeding themselves (with governments getting out of the way) has resoundingly failed. I expect it to fail here as well, though ignorant people will prefer the dream of a magic government that can solve their problems, to the hard work and intelligence required to create a society that achieves the best-possible outcome.

The people of Venezuala seem to have legitimately voted for socialism, which is a form of tyrany, in which they find themselves dependant on "the state." We shall again see this experiment played out. Keep your eye on the US-Venezuala citizen exchange; I expect a boom in Venequalan immigrants.

Paul Hue said...

I expect this deal to result in an enormous catastrophe for Venezueala. Foriegn investment will shrink due to two enormous dis-incentives: loss of faith in contracts, and increased tax rates.

It is possible that past governments have taxed these operations too low; I don't know the petro production tax structure in Venizquala versus nations charactorized by prosperity/freedom. But surely government-run operations offer the poorest possible mechanism for delivering nearly any service (in this case, petroleum), ESPECIALLY services that hold hope for profit.

God help the Venezualen people. How much of this impending catastrophe is of their own making? How much can we blame on previous right-winged dictators, for setting the stage for a left-winged disaster?

Regarding the new leftist/socialist president in Bolivia, I applaud him for rejecting the totally retarded US anti-cocaine offensive; massive Bravo for that.

Paul Hue said...

Also: I do not think that governments should "do something for poor people". I think that governments should merely protect people from having other people violate their rights, enforce contracts, and protect against foriegn invasion.