Javier Cardozo is a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
I lived in Venezuela for my first 23 years, where I saw the effects of socialism every day. With widespread poverty and crony elections, Venezuela is the perfect example of what happens when you try to implement socialist policies and ideas in a country. That is why I am so concerned about socialism coming to the United States.
I sadly see that many Americans who condemn the situation in Venezuela do not understand what went wrong. Socialist policies and political repression destroyed our economic system, causing the migration crisis that pushed out more than 8 million Venezuelans — including me. But at the same time, progressives want to implement the very same policies here.
Venezuela’s history with socialist ideas is longer than what some people presume. In 1958, Venezuela entered a democratic era where two parties shared power. But every decade after that moment, the Venezuelan public started to believe more strongly that the state had the duty to redistribute wealth, especially the income produced by the petroleum industry.
Those ideas gave power to a state that intervened a lot in the market and society. By the late 1980s and early 1990s, Venezuela had problems with inflation, poverty, and corruption, as well as the feeling that neither of the two main parties was able to resolve the country’s problems.
Many people at the time decided to give an opportunity to an “outsider,” a revolutionary military leader who promised to change the country.
That military leader was Hugo Chávez. And change the country he did. Since the beginning of his regime, we have faced the biggest crisis since before independence.
He sold an idea that is appealing to many: that the situation in the country was the fault of capitalist elites, that the poor needed to be defended, and that forgotten minorities, such as indigenous tribes, needed to be supported by the state.
The Venezuelan regime decided to seize houses, farms, companies, and many other properties. It also established price and currency controls. Being rich was seen as a sin.
Chávez and his regime used social justice as a flag to attack whoever was considered an enemy of the regime. A common practice of the Venezuelan government was to seize or take control of farms and agricultural land from private owners. In some cases, the affected landowners were considered opponents of the government, whether because they had protested against a socialist politician or because the authorities portrayed them as greedy capitalists.
These actions were often justified in the name of social justice, food security, or the national interest. Landowners could lose control of their property while receiving inadequate or zero compensation. Moreover, transferring productive farms to the state did not guarantee that they would remain productive. In many cases, poor management, lack of technical expertise, and inadequate investment contributed to the deterioration of formerly productive agricultural properties.
The regime also bought the votes of millions through the “social missions.” It is true that Venezuela was — and is even more so now — a country with a significant lack of educational opportunities. The possibility of buying a house and equipping it was remote for many. The government decided to do something that was applauded at the time: use petroleum revenues to create social policies to “help” people in different areas of their lives.
What actually happened was that those social missions were an opportunity for regime leaders to steal millions of dollars. The educational quality of the educational missions was terrible and more oriented toward indoctrination than acquiring knowledge.
Houses and equipment were of poor quality, and many people were threatened that, if they decided to show any disapproval toward the regime, their houses could be taken away and the programs that provided them with groceries or other goods could be suspended.
Once you see that the politician who “paid” for your goods or services punishes you for doing something that he dislikes, you will understand that socialism is one of the biggest traps in history. It attracts people with the idea of compensating them for their suffering, but in the end, it always cripples them further.
When the state behaves paternalistically and takes money from the “evil capitalists” to give it to others, when the entrepreneur is seen as an abuser of the system who cannot be trusted, and when the government believes that it knows better than you, you are heading down the road to serfdom.
If you believe in socialist ideas, look at the example of my country. Venezuela is the perfect example of socialism. Millions of people were pushed into poverty under the flag of social justice and equality. We achieved equality, but it was equality of despair.
The United States is the country of freedom, where it is possible to grow and have a better life. Be careful, Americans, because the ideas that leftists want to implement here would break the country.