The suffocating life of the venezuelans, after a year of hyperinflation

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Mature increased by 150% the minimum wage in full hyperinflation objections of Cuba and Venezuela ask for in Chile more solidarity and regional chinese Companies paid 176 million in bribes in Venezuela

The numbers, in Venezuela, no longer say nearly anything. In November last year recorded an inflation record: the prices increased this month by 57%, according to the follow-up that makes the National Assembly. Venezuela entered the dreaded hyperinflation that was seen for two years. Although the number of this nov is still unknown, in October, already more than tripled that recorded a year ago, a percentage that is shocking to the economists that becomes sweltering in the daily life. On Friday, venezuelan authorities announced a devaluation of the bolivar of 43%. A day before they had raised the salary by 150%.

Karina Cancino, 42 years old, was until last year a manager of his production company. She does not need figures to measure inflation: “I have reduced the quality of life of my daughters. English classes, dance and sport are up this year. Also the health insurance. Nor have we traveled: from two years ago, when we went to New York city, not on vacation. Work only to keep the girls”, he adds.

Cancino now lives in the small snack bar that opened at a clinic in Caracas at the beginning of the terrifying 2018 that painted by the experts. Had six months without work, after that disolviese the company had with other partners resident abroad. “All the months they renounced the staff, because he was going in the country. All the months we had to train new employees, it became impossible to continue working here. It was very difficult to be adjusting salaries, retain the people, deal with rent increases, and failures of services.” The few savings in dollars that they she, her husband and her daughters of six and 12 years of age, preserved as an insurance: for when you come to a medical emergency.

Karina Cancino, yesterday at his coffee stand in a clinic in Caracas. F. S.

For the venezuelan people, the hyperinflation —a phenomenon that the region did not know from the beginning of the decade of the nineties, when Peru suffered a strong price rise— has led to an impoverishment to be greater than has ever been recorded before in Latin America. First, because the voracity of the climbing inflation occurs in a country with barely any industry and no agriculture and totally dependent on the import, what has cronificado the stock. Second, because a year after the problem —at least in the technical definition of hyperinflation, because the climbing had begun long before— the Government of Nicolas Maduro or even refers to the evil by its name, but that gets into the sack of the so-called "economic war" that has dealt with measures contraindicated. In an economy infested with liquidity, the authorities will continue adding money with consecutive increases in salaries and bonuses that the state treasury is not able to support, so that you are forced to print more and more banknotes. The dog that bites the tail.

Caesar Queen, 45, has lost weight, although with the extra income says it has spare: eat one or two times a day

Caesar Reigns, 45 years of age, performs miracles with the minimum wage he earned as a messenger in a company. "Before, one could save a bit of salary and get together to buy something. Now lives on the day". Live a day in a neighborhood in La Guaira, outside Caracas, and from two months ago began to occupy the hours that are left free by doing masonry work on a piecework basis. "I paint, repair things, do whatever. With that I was able to pay the registration and school supplies for my little daughter, because only the pants to the school I found it hard to 1,800 bolivars [to the minimum wage in place since August until this Thursday, when the Government increased it to 4,500 bolivars sovereign]". The largest of his daughters, 21 years of age, immigrated to Chile at the beginning of November without even being able to finish the career of Social Communication. "There already has a job and is better".

Caesar Queen, yesterday in Caracas. F. S.

the Queen acknowledges that he has lost weight, although with the extra income says it has spare: eat one or two times a day. The sardine has become common in your diet. “In my neighborhood was tradition on Sundays Betxlarge to make a soup from ribs and chicken to share with the neighbors, but you can't do soup much less share.”

From the populous Petare, near the capital, Maura Garcia also makes magic with the minimum income it receives to cover the bills and support children and brothers and sisters. In his sector arrived with the regular bags of the Clap, the program of low-cost food that did Mature to compensate for the difficulties in accessing food in a country where deaths due to malnutrition are on the increase. Since more than a month ago did not arrive and during the last year the energy of the day, more at work, he spends it on getting food: with exchanges between peers or waiting in long queues when they get the products with regulated prices in supermarkets. “A long time ago that I don't know what it is to eat meat or fruits.” With his salary can barely buy 15 eggs. As in the case of Queen, one of his sons emigrated to Colombia a year ago. Even in an irregular situation, you can send some money for her mother to be able to eat.

Without prospect of change

The Living Conditions Survey, released this week by the Andrés Bello Catholic University, shows that 48% of venezuelan households are poor, two points higher than a year before. That is one of the reasons that has pushed the migration, which is estimated at nearly 700,000 people this year alone, an exodus that has further stimulated an economy of remittances that gives some slack to a group. As in all hiperinflaciones recent, the dollar has become increasingly common for transactions: foreign currency have replaced the devalued bolivar in medical consultations, professional and technical services and even to buy something as basic as corn flour in the black market.

Maura Garcia, yesterday in the barrio of Petare, in Caracas.

“When we go into hyperinflation not imagined to be so aggressive. We expected something like what had already happened in South america, 20,000% or 50,000% as in Bolivia, but this has exceeded everything,” explains the deputy Joseph War. Hyperinflation venezuela is already the third longest of all, have shaken Latin America, only surpassed by that of Bolivia in the eighties -18 months— and that of Nicaragua, also at the end of that decade -58— months.

The IMF forecasts that Venezuela will close by 2018, with inflation of seven digits, in the neighborhood of 2,500,000%, a figure that sand makes it even difficult to pronounce. The recent measures announced by Maduro to increase wages projected in an upward spiral of prices: to honor the commitments it has increased the money supply by between 15% and 20% each week. “The hyperinflation is going to continue next year, because the causes that motivated it remain and it seems that the Government has closed access to external financing”, adds War.

The brothers Nils and Manuel Rodriguez Dominguez closed in November, the bar family that remained for 28 years, in Chacao, a zone of revelry on the east of Caracas. Bid a fond farewell to regular customers of the bar he put a hasty closure to a cycle. “The last year has made it very difficult to sustain the rate of prices”. The business lived from the beer, he began to increase so fast that it was difficult to offer it at a price that people could pay and that they would be income to replenish the inventory. These juggling have become common among the traders, but the brothers have thrown in the towel: they have sold the business and emigrate to Galicia, in Spain, to the land of their fathers. A year ago, the price of the parallel dollar reached the 100,000 bolivars (which today is equivalent to a bolivar sovereign), so that it was possible to drain the distress of the crisis with up to six beers. This week, the green ticket is changed by almost 500 bolivars: it doesn't even a couple.