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Comment on YSK the Venezuelans community in the US is not representative of Venezuelans as a whole.

Most Venezuelan refugees cite crime, access to food and healthcare as reasons for leaving.
Guess what US sanctions were causing. If you guessed lack of food and supplies for healthcare which caused an increase in crime, you'd be correct.

If socialism doesn't work, why do they spend so many resources making sure it fails?

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Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
Of course, of course. Nothing to do with corruption and incompetence of an authoritarian regime.

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- idiomaddict@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
  Would have been nice if you’d engaged.
  
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Limerance@piefed.social ⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
What sanctions do you mean, specifically? The US had barely any sanctions against Venezuela. Most sanctions were against members of the regime, not the country. The US remained the biggest customer for Venezuelan oil long after Chavez gained power.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanctions_during_the_Venezuelan_crisis

Early sanctions came in response to repression during the 2014 and the 2017 Venezuelan protests, and activities both during the 2017 Constituent Assembly election and the 2018 presidential election. Sanctions were placed on current and former government officials, including members of the Supreme Tribunal of Justice(TSJ) and the 2017 Constituent National Assembly (ANC), members of the military and security forces, and private individuals accused of being involved in human rights abuses, degradation in the rule of law, repression of democracy, and corruption. Canada and the E.U. began applying sanctions in 2017.

Chavez took power in 1999. More than a decade before these sanctions started.

The utter mismanagement by the Chavistas in power are the main reason Venezuela has been doing badly for years leading to a fucked economy, rising crime, lacking healthcare and food.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Chávez

The high oil profits coinciding with the start of Chavez’s presidency[^[15]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-FPpoverty-18)resulted in temporary improvements in areas such as poverty, literacy, income equality and quality of life between primarily 2003 and 2007,[^[16]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-UN-19)[^[15]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-FPpoverty-18)[^[17]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-IACHRRequests-20) though extensive changes in structural inequalities did not occur.[^[18]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-NACLAcrimeREV-21) On 2 June 2010, Chávez declared an “economic war” on Venezuela’s upper classes due to shortages, arguably beginning the crisis in Venezuela.[^[19]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-ECONwarCHAVEZ-22) By Chávez’s death in 2013, economic actions performed by his government during the preceding decade, such as deficit spending[^[20]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-ELPAISfeb2015-23)[^[21]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-FPmarch2013-24)[^[22]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-FPdontblame-25) and price controls,[^[23]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-ECONfood-26)[^[24]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-ENfood-27) proved to be unsustainable, with Venezuela’s economy faltering. At the same time, poverty,[^[15]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-FPpoverty-18)[^[25]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-28) inflation[^[26]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ch%C3%A1vez#cite_note-29) and shortages increased.

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- JayTreeman@fedia.io ⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
  From your source: 'Beginning in January 2019, during the Venezuelan presidential crisis, the U.S. applied additional economic sanctions to individuals or companies in the petroleum, gold, mining, and banking industries'
  
  If you check the GDP per capita of Venezuela it was increasing at positive rate immediately after Chavez took power.
  
  Life expectancy was also increasing after Chavez had taken over. https://data.who.int/countries/862
  
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  - Limerance@piefed.social ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    2019. Venezuela already had a decade of severe decline before that. Things got bad way before sanctions.
    
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Venezuela
    
    Economic conditions continued to deteriorate in 2016 when consumer prices rose 800% and the gross domestic product contracted by 18.6%,[^[39]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Venezuela#cite_note-39) causing hunger to escalate to the point that the “Venezuela’s Living Conditions Survey” (ENCOVI) found nearly 75 percent of the population had lost an average of at least 19 pounds in 2016 due to a lack of proper nutrition.[^[40]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Venezuela#cite_note-40) Luis Almagro, secretary general of the Organization of American States(OAS) stated, “I have never seen a country going down so fast, at every level: politically, economically, socially”.
    
    On 1 May 2017 following a month of protests that resulted in at least 29 dead, Maduro called for a Constituent Assembly that would draft a new constitution that would replace the 1999 Venezuela Constitution.[^[42]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Venezuela#cite_note-USAmay-42) He invoked Article 347, and stated that his call for a new constitution was necessary to counter the actions of the opposition. The members of the Constituent Assembly were not to be elected in open elections, but selected from social organizations loyal to Maduro.[^[42]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Venezuela#cite_note-USAmay-42) It would also allow him to stay in power during the interregnum and skip the 2018 presidential elections, as the process would take at least two years
    
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