Based on Accomplishments, White People ARE Superior

I'm tired of hearing from minorities complaining about "White Privilege" or otherwise denigrating White people as if white people are the big problem in our country. Nearly all of these complainers are minority Democrats; who have become the anti-white party in a country of 70% white people.

The simple truth is that basically all of the world's technological, scientific, medical, engineering and philosophical advancements and inventions were conceived and developed by white people. Not only that, but white people, mostly English-speaking people, invented political, personal and economic freedom, religious freedom, rule of law, guaranteed rights and personal liberty that are now uniquely enshrined in our law. The US and the US Constitution is the envy of the world.

Yes, East Asians have even higher median IQs compared to Northern Europeans and their descendants, and could have invented many things, but they haven't. Even today they don't have ability to invent ground-breaking technologies or political philosophies. They merely copy or steal from the West and perfect the mass production of technologies.

The US benefits from a 1000 year history of Anglo ideas and philosophies, dating from Pre-Norman times to the Magna Carta and beyond, that ultimately culminated in the exceptional US Constitution. These outstanding ideas, combined with the work ethic and Judeo-Christian ethic of mostly white European immigrants to the US, led to the most successful and vibrant political, economic and social "experiment" ever seen in world history: the USA. Our Constitutional government and our prosperity has been the envy of the world for 230 years now. You could say that it is white people who invented modern civilization. And few nations, except the mostly white nations of the British commonwealth, have successfully emulated the US success.

Yes, history is a brutal, unfair and bloody place for all of mankind, but it was white, mostly English-speaking people, that were the first cultures to eliminate slavery that was a scourge of the earth for 5000+ years. By the late 18th century, in Philadelphia, Paris and London, concurrent discussions about eliminating slavery were taking place and soon after, slavery was eliminated in their countries and colonies.  In contrast and as an extreme example, slavery was only outlawed in Mauritania in 2007!

Here's just some of the zillions of other accomplishments of white people (from Burning Platform):

Look around you. Can you find anything with a moving part that was not invented by whites? Anything electronic? Cars, telephones, computers, aircraft, antibiotics, on and on–all sprang from the minds of white people. You are not supposed to say such things, and could be run out of a university for it–but ask yourself, if you have the courage: Is it true? [Of course it's true.]

The Hubble Space Telescope: twenty-five hundred years of phenomenally complex math, physics, electronics, optics, and chemistry went into the Hubble. It is entirely a white man’s show. Nobody else has come close. Your professors will not want you to think this. They will not want you to think. But you have a mind. Use it.

Look around your university. Who do you see taking the hard subjects–math, chemistry, physics, engineering, philosophy, computer science? Whites and Asians…right? Are they the kind of people who complain constantly about White Privilege? You may notice a pattern here: Those who can, do. The rest bitch and moan.

Take the Hadron Collider, a gigantic particle accelerator at CERN, in Switzerland, a massive instrument for research in subatomic physics. It is one of the greatest and most challenging projects of humanity. The Japanese could do this if they wanted to badly enough and soon, perhaps, the Chinese. They didn’t. The technology is a white man’s show, starting from Athens 2500 years ago. Are you sure you should be ashamed of this?

Here's just a few other mostly-white accomplishments: Euclidean geometry. Parabolic geometry. Hyperbolic geometry. Projective geometry. Differential geometry. Calculus: Limits, continuity, differentiation, differential equations, integration. Physical chemistry. Organic chemistry. Biochemistry. Classical mechanics. The indeterminacy principle. The wave equation. The Parthenon. The Anabasis. Air conditioning. Number theory. Romanesque architecture. Gothic architecture. Information theory. Entropy. Enthalpy. Every symphony ever written. Pierre Auguste Renoir. The twelve-tone scale. The mathematics behind it, twelfth root of two and all that. S-P hybrid bonding orbitals. The Bohr-Sommerfeld atom. The purine-pyrimidine structure of the DNA ladder. Single-sideband radio. All other radio. Dentistry. The internal-combustion engine. Turbojets. Turbofans. Doppler beam-sharpening. Penicillin. Airplanes. Surgery. The mammogram. The Pill. The condom. Polio vaccine. The integrated circuit. The computer. Football. Computational fluid dynamics. Tensors. The Constitution. Euripides, Sophocles, Aristophanes, Aeschylus, Homer, Hesiod. Glass. Rubber. Nylon. Skyscrapers. The piano. The harpsichord. Elvis. Acetylcholinesterase inhibitors. (OK, that’s nerve gas, and maybe we didn’t really need it.) Silicone. The automobile. Really weird stuff, like clathrates, Buckyballs, and rotaxanes. The Bible. Bug spray. Diffie-Hellman, public-key cryptography, and RSA. Et cetera again and again.

If you talk about these accomplishments on college campuses, in front of black kids, you will be labeled "white supremacist!" But this is just sour grapes. US blacks should also be more realistic about their abilities and they'd be more happy. Their 'sour grapes' attitude brings unhappiness. And miserable they are.

Conversely, most Latinos and Asians correctly respect white people and their unmatched accomplishments. They accept that they are not as accomplished as the Northern Europeans and their descendants. Instead, they work hard to emulate this success. Here's the thing; acceptance of yourself realistically in the "pecking order" of abilities and culture leads to personal happiness. Latinos and Asians are happy people as they leap-frog blacks to prosperity. 

Rather than be angry, black folks should be more grateful too. Black people in modern America are able to enjoy our peace and prosperity. Unlike pre-1960 America, they can freely live in white and/or Latino neighborhoods and enjoy the peaceful, orderly, prosperous communities that whites and Latinos have created. Where they are forced by poverty or choice to live in majority black neighborhoods, the conditions are dangerous, impoverished, unhealthy and unhappy. Keep in mind, it could be worse, they could be living in the still deplorable conditions of Africa!  Count your blessings, people.

On campuses, you hear ignorant, uninformed black and Latino students, most of them unqualified to even be in college, complain about "white privilege" or even try to reverse-discriminate against whites. I am reading more and more cases where blacks are self-segregating meetings, dorms, lectures and speeches etc to exclude whites. It's because these black students can't compete with whites in reasoning and logic and they know it.

I'm still thinking about the all-black cast of the Broadway play "Hamilton" where whites were told not to apply to casting calls! Then those same people, all Black, who only read aloud what others have written and therefore only "appear" to be learned and intelligent, lectured the newly-elected VP, Mike Pence, a man who is actually leading the nation. Sorry, but Blacks for the most part are arrogant, ignorant and know nothing.

The entire Leftist culture, blacks, Big Corporate (corrupt) media and Hollywood tries to minimize the wildly successful history of the white northern Europeans who "invented" the social, technological and political foundations for the prosperity, freedom and happiness that a billion people enjoy today in Europe, Canada, USA, Australia and New Zealand. The problem for the Left is that our genius white Founding Fathers had values that are the very definition of Conservative: They founded a culture that champions self-determination, self-sufficiency, personal responsibility, charity that takes care of your own, the primacy of family, community and church, the worship of God, minimal government and minimal regulation. The Left wants to change all that thinking they have a better way. And they have largely succeeded in upending our conservative heritage. Now we have big government and big corruption that is threatening our financial and social stability, We have excessive regulation and too many idle people living at the expense of others causing our nation to careen toward complete financial and social collapse mostly due to corruption and unsound policies of a massive and incompetent government, a government that is unable to fix all the problems that IT caused.

White persons are under attack in this country by ignorant minorities and the Leftists who dominate our schools and universities. The ridiculous complaint of "White Privilege" shows how intellectually bereft blacks and the so-called social justice warriors are. There is so much ignorance in our country-- and it's mostly found in the ranks of Blacks and Democrats.

Is The US a Failed State?

You know we're becoming a 3rd World country when the politicians, the well-connected and the "elites" are immune from the rules that govern everyone else and where the politicians care not one bit about the good of the country but are only focused on their own benefits and agenda of personal gain. This is what happens in dramatically collapsed countries like Venezuela and Argentina. Now it's happening in our own country.

I wrote in July 2016 that the US was marching toward 3rd world status.  Now I'm wondering if the US is a failed state?  I wrote the following just over one year ago:

Hillary's entire intent of her off-the-record and insecure personal email "arrangement" was all about avoiding any record of her hustling for political contributions to her slush fund. She's sold access to anyone with money, including foreign enemies, all for her personal enrichment to the tune of $100 million or more. It's all about "pay to play." She completely failed as Secretary of State because her only intent was to use her office for her financial gain. She doesn't give a shit about anyone but her. She's a total disaster for this country. And we're told that she is the most qualified candidate ever by the most incompetent President ever.

After her buddy Jim Comey let her off the hook, the lesson is that law and order is now bought and paid-for if you are one of the "connected" or "privileged ones." Never mind that General Petraeus was prosecuted vigorously for his pillow talk and supposedly endangering national security. (I guess he was Republican?) The little guy goes to jail for a marijuana roach in his pocket, but thieving, lying Hillary, who has enriched herself immensely by using her office for her own benefit, is allowed to break the law and endanger the security of the country, and faces no consequences or accountability. Hillary is the equivalent to Christina de Kirchner, who was allowed to do huge damage to Argentina while enriching herself immensely. Law and order under Obama is largely gone (except for repeated slap-downs by the Supreme Court) and is replaced by propaganda, crony connections and manipulations for the "elite" and "connected." Obama is Chavez-lite and Hillary is De Kirchner.

Those words and that blog post have aged very well indeed. Now it's even worse.

Before and after the election, Democrats have used extensive propaganda, fake polls, fake "dossiers," fake news and/or fake allegations by every "talking head" to get rid of Trump. Since the election, they put nearly all of their eggs in the "Russian Collusion" basket--trying to paint Trump as a traitor who used Russia influence to defeat Hillary. This despite no specific "smoking gun" allegations---only lies (propaganda) from Brennan, Clapper, Powers, Rice, Obama, Hillary, Comey and basically every Democrat. The Democrats demanded and got a special prosecutor to "investigate" their bullshit allegations, all to try to depose Trump.

None of these people care one iota about the welfare of this country or any of the largely helpful Trump agenda for which the PEOPLE voted. The truth is that they don't want any reform to improve the country! 

But the whole thing has been a massive and phony charade. The entire Russia collusion allegation was based on a made-up "opposition research" called the Trump Dossier, which, when released, was immediately debunked as it contained obvious inaccuracies. The DNC and Hillary campaign paid $6 or $9 million for this pile of shit (which should prove once and for all that every one of these people should be nowhere near public office or public money!!)  Then the hopelessly compromised (and criminal?) Comey used it as a basis to start this whole Russia witch hunt and start the extensive surveillance of the Trump campaign which led to the illegal unmasking of this surveillance by the lying Obama administration. The media went with this fake story too.

It gets worse and even more treasonous. Now we know that Hillary, the DNC and all of her allies in positions of power in the FBI and everywhere else, were the ones in fact colluding with Russians to sell strategic US uranium assets to the Russians for bribes. Then they all colluded to cover-up the whole thing.

Hillary, Obama, Comey, Robert Mueller, Rosenstein and the entire top echelon of the FBI and Obama administration were all part of or knowledgeable about this bribery scheme.  Now these same scumbags, Rosenstein and Mueller, are leading this outrageous and treasonous effort to oust Trump?!

So Hillary (and others) got huge money from the Russians; all while she held public office. And it has put the US in a precarious position of having to import 90% of our uranium to power our nuclear industry. How is this not TREASON? 

Hillary had accepted bribes during her entire time as Secretary of State in return for future influence in the US government. It's no wonder that Hillary and Obama's foreign policy was a unmitigated disaster of 100% failures, flops and fiascos followed by lies, spin and cover-ups.  It's because they were entirely busy selling out the interests of the US and the American people.

I think they should all be lined-up on a wall and executed by a firing squad (or at least jailed). The world would instantly be a better place. We desperately need a new American revolution. Only a revolution or collapse will bring the massive reset that we need. This is exactly what happens to 3rd world countries.

Trump Keeps Winning

The most energetic and persistent man in Washington DC keeps winning and winning and winning:

• He is winning with his travel ban designed to increase US security. He is winning against all the scumbag Obama-appointed judges that were overruled by the Supreme Court.
• He is winning against the corrupt and lying media complex
• He is winning against the NFL scumbags and fools and the clueless NFL corporate "leadership" 
• He is winning and entirely correct to overturn the illegal DACA action taken by Obama  
• He is winning for the American workers by overturning TPP and renegotiating NAFTA
• He is winning for American workers to approve the Dakota pipeline and removing regulations that closed coal mines.
• He is winning on the economy -- now above 3% growth for 2 quarters which is first time that's happened in 8 years.
• He was right to de-certify the Iran deal. It needs to be approved by the Senate. That whole charade and travesty is over. Winning!
• He was correct that he and his campaign were surveilled by wire taps. Winning!
• He is winning against the Russia collusion witch hunt. It turns out that those "investigating" Trump were themselves operatives in a bribery scheme to deliver 20% of US Uranium to the Russians for Hillary's financial gain! That's Mueller, Rosenstein, Comey, Clinton, Lynch. All of these people are criminals and liars. Same with Brennan, Clapper, Rice, Obama. They are all disgusting people
• Trump won by firing Comey even before it was known how compromised and corrupt the FBI has become.
• He is winning against Kim Jong Un of N. Korea. 
• He is winning cooperation from the international community, including China and Russia, in response to the N. Korea threats
• He is winning jobs for Americans by rolling back regulations from Obama's war on business and jobs
• He is winning against ISIS in the Middle East. Their main stronghold in Raqqa has been dissolved.
• He is winning against the immigration crisis created by Obama and previous administrations as border crossings are way down and criminal illegals are being rounded up across the country.
• He is winning by appointed justice Neil Gorsuch
• He is ended Obama's war on police and border patrols

Tune into more winning in the near future.

Perspective on 1400 Years Of Violent, Supremacist Muslim History

A very brief but worthwhile summary of Islamic history that puts into perspective what is happening in the world today and why Muslims are fighting, murdering and creating problems wherever they are found in significant numbers; from the Philippines, Thailand, Myanmar, China, India, the entire Middle East and much of Africa.

I have also written of the Arab Muslim problem in the former British Mandate for Palestine territory and how Muslims have been attacking Jews in that region for hundreds of years. That changed after WWII and the creation of Israel.  Also see my Are Muslims Bad People?

I'll embed the YouTube video below, but it often doesn't display in my browsers so, here is the link:
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uj8J62BqRMo)

We're Reaching the End of the Road

I'm afraid that we're reaching the end of a very long road.

Unsound money ("fiat" money not backed by gold) has led, in recent decades, to huge and unsustainable global imbalances in trade and debt. But because trade deficits REDUCE our nation's GDP, persistent trade deficits in our country have led to rising debt at every level as we try to maintain the "appearance" of a rising standard of living. This is partly why the US ran $10 Trillion in government deficits in the past 10 years alone. Can you imagine what our economy would have looked like without all that money? It would have been outright Depression. (I'm not even going to mention the $4T bank reserve creation by the Federal Reserve).  See this chart:

US Government Spending (Debt) Has Masked Depression In US and All Other Countries (Esp. China) By Creating Demand Where There Is Insufficient Organic Demand

All of that debt is masking depression. Even so, the number of full-time jobs is barely above 2007 levels (only +3M) and "good jobs" or good-paying "breadwinner jobs" are still lower than the last peak.

Even with our still rising debt (deficit spending) in the last year, China has seen a fall in exports. World trade is flatlining or declining. Why? Because the US and Western consumers can't afford the imports! Trump is right about trade. Our economy is hollowed-out by the loss of manufacturing jobs and it has killed jobs and hurt our people. Now the US consumer is tapped-out. Furthermore, demographic trends have turned negative in most of the West and China just like Harry Dent predicted and has slowed the economy.

The persistent budget and trade imbalances over the past several decades could never have happened with "sound" money, as the deficit nation would have seen a loss of gold (money) that would have slowed the economy and reduced imports to a balance with exports. And debt creation would have been severely limited since new money would have to be backed by gold-- and gold is limited. Exchange rates would have been very stable too. That is the beauty of the gold standard. The gold standard will eventually make a return out of the ashes of the next financial/economic crisis.

Other reasons why we're reaching (or reached?) the end of the road financially and economically:

1) Rising debt in the US has hid the increasing poverty caused by the wealth transfer from US to China (and Japan before them) for awhile. But debt levels have risen everywhere and it's marginal utility to produce growth is nearly gone, even in China. Debt levels continue to rise faster than GDP (everywhere).  If the world economy continues to stagnate, there is potential of corporate debt defaults especially in Emerging Market countries. Even sovereign debt is at risk, first in commodity producing countries and peripheral EU countries like Greece and Italy then the rest. Interest rates might rise at the worse possible time as a result of debt distress and defaults.
2) Zero interest rates have prolonged the game for awhile but low or zero rates are unsustainable.  Pensions are already failing in many cities in the US and around the world as investment returns in bonds has dropped so low that pensions don't have enough money to pay benefits. Also, there are far too few workers per beneficiary now (see Demographics are Destiny below). The math doesn't work. Expect cuts in benefits which lower consumer income and spending. But the necessary higher interest rates would blow up the deficit here and kill the economy.
3) Trump is right, the US economy is hollowed-out with the loss of manufacturing jobs and the loss of entire industries. The non-elite workers in the US are financially tapped-out with stagnate incomes and burdened with rapidly rising costs of healthcare, healthcare insurance, rents, food, drugs. Our imports are way down. China is feeling this as their exports are way down. World trade is stagnating. The manufacturing sector in this country has been in recession for years now. General recession may be just around the corner.
4) The economy is in near-recession despite rising debt bubbles. The US government has racked up $10 Trillion in debt in just 10 years. In recent years, if you subtracted the debt racked up by the government, our nation's GDP would have been negative for much of the last 10 years. China racked-up double that amount of debt in the same timeframe. A vast expansion of US auto loans that some people say is reminiscent of another subprime bubble has propped-up the auto sector. A trillion dollars in student loans have been given to students in the past 8 years and 43% of these loans are now not being payed back.And the US is still making more of these loans!
5) Demographics are destiny. The working age population is beginning to shrink in all of the important economies. This portends shrinking demand for everything which means the end of growth for the entire world. Companies can automate, but who will they sell to?

6) The real money supply to the world, the "Eurodollar" and it's associated derivatives, has been in decay since 2011 (see HERE) and the great financial crisis. Since then, banks have been exiting these shadow banking markets at an increasing rate. Just look at bank stocks to see the decline in their trading and profits. Central bankers haven't noticed this most important development as they are willfully blind and/or incompetent . They don't know what they are doing!
7) QE doesn't work. That's obvious. Even the educated idiots at central banks can see that! They just can't admit it and it's making them look like fools. They are starting to tip-toe away from it.
8) NIRP and the risk of depositor "bail-ins" is killing the EU banking system! And NIRP and ZIRP is killing pension funds, insurance companies and retirees everywhere. The situation is completely unsustainable. Never in history have interest rates been zero or negative. It's absurd and causing more harm than good. EU banks are a systemic risk to the world. What can't be sustained, won't! The EU is likely the epicenter of the next financial crisis which may be triggered by a political crisis.
9) 30 years of declining interest rates is over. So just steady rates is a trend change. US and world rates are now rising as front-running investors can "smell" that the EU and Japan are about to get out of the QE business. Interest rates are rising now in the US; not falling.
10) EU banks are a royal mess. Chinese debt system is a royal mess. The risk of a sudden and substantial Chinese devaluation is increasing as they will surely nationalize huge amounts of bad corporate debt that they created since 2009. Already the Chinese currency is falling slowly this year and is back to 2010 levels. Even small devaluations have roiled markets recently.  A sudden and substantial devaluation would set off a world-wide crash. It's possible that civil unrest may lead to social disintegration if not outright revolution at some point in China.
11) The era of cheap energy is over. If the economy tries to recover, oil prices rise so high that it kills the economy/consumers. If we can't afford high oil prices, then we cannot have growth. (because growth causes unaffordably high oil prices!) And the price at which oil is affordable, ie., $30 to $40 per barrel, kills the oil producers and oil producing countries (and kills oil export country government revenues). The cost of extraction of a "marginal" barrel of oil is much higher now. So, energy production will eventually drop and all the oil and commodity producing countries will remain in recession or depression. What's needed to "save" us is cheap, ie., $10 oil, for an extended period or a miracle in cheap energy technology.
12) The Middle East and North Africa is already in a state of collapse, setting off a disastrous migration crisis into Europe. It's going to get worse as low oil prices will collapse Saudi Arabia and the other countries that have managed to avoid chaotic crashes. That entire region will collapse.
13) If growth is dead, then the mountain of debt, which continues to accumulate at a rate much higher than nominal GDP growth worldwide, is unsustainable. The end of the road is defaults, crises, recession and depression. Debt defaults by companies and entire countries will cause a new round of banking troubles and trouble in global supply chains. It happened in 2008 after all. Collapse is a real possibility. When it happens is the $64 Trillion question.
14) Economic stagnation, if prolonged, will cause political turmoil that will eventually affect markets and economies. Witness Catalonia, the recent Austrian election, Brexit, the election of Trump, etc. There is trouble brewing even in the US as the entire government is full of liars and cretins including the deep state, who is dedicated to overthrowing Trump's election and his plan to reform the economy. This means that, even in the US, a large portion of the US govt, the deep state, is engaged in sedition and treason.  The Deep State doesn't want reform!
15)  The USA may now be a failed state due to stupidity, corruption, and utter and complete collapse of competence of the Fed. Govt. There is utter gridlock of political discord as the Democrats have completely lost their minds along with their constituents. Corruption under Clinton and Obama is coming to light that may put an end to the Democratic Party. Meanwhile, everything is broken and un-fixed in the nation at the same time there is a non-functioning government. There will be consequences to such chaos especially when financial and economic crises erupt (very soon).

So, we really are reaching the end of the road. We're all in for a rude awakening at some point.

Another Lynching By Leftist Totalitarians

Market expert Marc Faber dared speak the obvious truth about the blessings of European (white) people in North America and the even more obvious problems with the black race and instantly had his livelihood taken from him.

It's the 2nd time I've recently seen a mob lynching of a truth teller by the radical PC cultists. The other was the lynching of Paula Deen for being truthful under oath that she had used the word 'nigger' in her lifetime. (Gee, who hasn't, since it's so fitting for an awful lot of black bastards?) Instantly, she and her family were denied their hard fought TV career and their livelihood. That, my friends, is a lynching.

Marc Faber said the most obvious truths in the world and has been crucified because of it. Everyone's history is full of terrible things, but White people have mostly been a blessing to the world:

I share the same opinions and I too am NOT racist since I always meet the next person hoping to be delighted with someone's depth of knowledge, character and/or superior reasoning and logic. I can always hope. Funny how such characteristics are basically non-existent in the US black population.

MLK's dream of black people being judged by their character, not the color of their skin, is more distant than it was in 1965. It's because a large portion of this population is devolving, not improving, and they are destroying their communities and everything else (including the Democratic Party, the NFL, etc). The simple truth is that blacks destroy everything and build-up very, very little. The NFL players are pissed off that police target blacks, but BLACKS ARE COMMITTING CRIMES AT 7X THE RATE OF WHITES.  NOT SURPRISINGLY, THEY ARE INCARCERATED AT THE SAME RATE!  A good portion of these people are sub-human scumbags. Majority black communities resemble war zones of violence, drugs, prostitution, HIV infection and total dysfunction. This is just factual. No wonder police, who have to patrol these areas, are extremely disgusted and short-tempered.

The truth will set you free??  Not in America or Europe. If you speak the truth, long knives will be drawn on you to protect the false memes of the Left. In Europe, you'll be prosecuted in a kangaroo court for speaking the obvious truth. In Europe, the most desperate false meme is that Muslims are wonderful people and if you say that mass migration of Muslims is a huge problem you will be prosecuted and crucified!!

In America, you must never say the obvious truth, that the bedrock of the Democratic Party, ie., black people (especially black men), REMAIN the biggest burden to this country. If you disrupt that phony meme, you will be crucified and denied your livelihood. Just ask Marc Faber and Paula Deen.

Cautionary Tale: How Socialism Ruined Venezuela

Written by Rafael Acevedo and Luis B. Cirocco from the Mises Institute. h/t to the BurningPlatform Blog:

A Brief Economic History of Venezuela

The economic miracle began a century ago, when from 1914 to 1922, Venezuela entered the international oil race. In 1914, Venezuela opened its first oil well. Fortunately, the government did not make the mistake of attempting to manage the oil business, or own the wells. The oil wells were privately owned, and in many cases were owned by private international companies that operated in Venezuela. It wasn’t totally laissez-faire, of course. There were tax incentives and other so-called concessions employed to promote exploration and exploitation of oil. But most industries — including the oil industry — remained privatized.

Moreover, during this period, tax rates in the country were relatively low.

In 1957, the marginal tax rate for individuals was 12 percent. There was certainly a state presence, and the public sector absorbed 20 percent of GDP. But, government spending was used mainly to build the country’s basic infrastructure.

The area of international trade was relatively free as well — and very free compared to today. There were tariffs that were relatively high, but there were no other major barriers to trade such as quotas, anti-dumping laws, or safeguards.

Other economic controls were few as well. There were just a few state-owned companies and virtually no price controls, no rent controls, no interest-rate controls, and no exchange-rate controls.

Of course, we weren’t free from the problems of a central bank, either. In 1939, Venezuela created its own central bank. But, the bank was largely inactive and functioned primarily defending a fixed exchange rate with the US dollar.

Moving Toward More Interventionism

Despite the high levels of economic freedom that existed during those years, government legislation started to chip away at that freedom. Changes included the nationalization of the telephone company, the creation of numerous state-owned companies, and state-owned banks. That happened in 1950. The Venezuelan government thus began sowing the seeds of destruction, and you can see the continued deterioration in the level of economic freedom in the decade of the 1950s.

In 1958, Venezuela became a democracy when the dictatorship was overthrown. With that came all the usual benefits of democracy such as freedom of the press, universal suffrage, and other civil rights. Unfortunately, these reforms came along with continued destruction of our economic freedom.

The first democratically elected president was Rómulo Betancourt. He was a communist-turned-social democrat. In fact, while he was in exile, he founded the Communist Party in Costa Rica and helped found the Communist Party in Colombia as well. Not surprisingly, as president, he started destroying the economic institutions we had by implementing price controls, rent controls, and other regulations we hadn’t had before. On top of that, he and his allies created a new constitution that was hostile to private property.

In spite of this — or perhaps because of it — Betancourt is almost universally revered in Venezuela as “the father of our democracy.” This remains true even today as Venezuela collapses.

Of course, compared to today, we had far greater economic freedom under Betancourt than we do in today’s Venezuela. But, all of the presidents — with one exception — who came after Betancourt took similar positions and continued to chip away at economic freedom. The only exception was Carlos Andrés Pérez who in his second term attempted some free market reforms. But, he executed these later reforms so badly and haphazardly that markets ended up being blamed for the resulting crises.

The Rise of Hugo Chávez

Over time, the destruction of economic freedom led to more and more impoverishment and crisis. This in turn set the stage for the rise of a political outsider with a populist message. This, of course, was Hugo Chávez. He was elected in 1998 and promised to replace our light socialism with more radical socialism. This only accelerated the problems we had been facing for decades. Nevertheless, he was able to pass through an even more anti-private-property constitution.

The Top 20% of Taxpayers Support Nearly All The Rest

From Mark Perry who is a sane Professor of Economics and American Enterprise scholar:

The data is a bit old (2013), but it shows the truth about the takers vs the makers.  Mark is taking into account both payroll taxes and income taxes in his analysis.