Welcome to Venezuela

[gouchobob]

I don't. I'm just putting it out there. The UN Human Development Index rates the United States at number 4 -- this alone should be enough to question it as a measure of quality of life.



The UN HDI uses purchasing power parity to form part of its index which skews its results towards developed western economies because of the difficulty of finding a suitable "basket of goods" for comparison throughout the world.

Also, between the 2009 and 2010 report the methodology was changed completely, so you really cannot argue that any country fell or rose in positions between the two reports.

You do make a good point though, that economic development and happiness aren't necessarily tied to one another. It's possible to have nothing and be happy or have everything and be miserable.



I'm not sure you're in a position to throw stones at the glass house of pushing one's personal ideologies!

Sounds like your a fan of Hugo. Maybe you could move there and report back to us on how good life is, maybe you could pop over to Cuba as well as Fidel seems to be Hugo's inspiration. Like I said before with things clearly deteriorating on a daily basis there and all illusions are quickly fading away to the unpleasant reality of this regime.

 

[jaredwb]

Sounds like your a fan of Hugo. Maybe you could move there and report back to us on how good life is, maybe you could pop over to Cuba as well as Fidel seems to be Hugo's inspiration. Like I said before with things clearly deteriorating on a daily basis there and all illusions are quickly fading away to the unpleasant reality of this regime.

Have to agree with you on this. Anyone that tries to defend Chavez's social disaster has to be either completely ignorant or just in complete denial of reality.

 

[jp]

Yes the Gallup poll is a telephone feel good interview. Doubt very many of the really poor in Venezuela have telephones, so I wonder how valid the survey is. The U.N. index is measuring the same thing and is a lot more comprehensive and objective.

There are more mobile phones in Venezuela than there are people.
http://www.economywatch.com/economic-statistics/Venezuela/Telephone_Statistics/

Go to a slum, and you'll find people living in abject poverty who still own a mobile. Most of latin american is on pre-pay, and plenty of older handsets are given away or disposed of.

Irrespective of the methodology - the results just demonstrate that you don't measure wellbeing or human happiness objectively. You can't tell people they should be either happy or unhappy according to a quantitative assessment - you are limited to asking them how happy they feel. Its the only measure that counts.

Happiness isn't measured in access to material goods and it isn't relative to development indices. Sometimes happiness is simply the feeling that things are getting better.

The assumption that people "must" be unhappy due to an external objective assessment of living conditions has resulted in a litany of foreign policy failures over the last century. I've absolutely no desire to live in Venezuela, and doubtless plenty of others here feel the same way but thats not to say the people living there aren't happy.

 

[elhombresinnombre]

Ok then how do you explain the disparity between this and the U.N. index?

Erme - because they are measuring different things?

 

[elhombresinnombre]

Sounds like your a fan of Hugo. Maybe you could move there and report back to us on how good life is, maybe you could pop over to Cuba as well as Fidel seems to be Hugo's inspiration. Like I said before with things clearly deteriorating on a daily basis there and all illusions are quickly fading away to the unpleasant reality of this regime.

Apologies: I must have fallen asleep in the middle of this. One moment we were talking about what Gallup measure and how they measure it and the next it seems that anybody who says that Gallup, a flagship company from the USA and one of the most, if not the most, respected polling organisations in the world, knows what they are doing and how to do it, must be a raging commie and should go (back) to Cuba, Venezuela (or North Korea too maybe?). What did I miss?

 

[marksoc]

Teabaggers and Randians have the philosophy that if you are not one of them you are a lemming. Thankfully the free market has spoken and nobody was in the cinema watching "Atlas Shrugged" in the US. Those people are akin to Scientiologists, but more dangerous, since they claim that they base their beliefs in some sort of "natural order". Imagine a meritocratic world,were those people define what is merit (hint: money). It is the protestant ethic gone wild.

I know that you will be tempted to say the sameabout Marxists, but since Marxism is based on science and falseable theories your comparison will not hold.

 

[gouchobob]

Apologies: I must have fallen asleep in the middle of this. One moment we were talking about what Gallup measure and how they measure it and the next it seems that anybody who says that Gallup, a flagship company from the USA and one of the most, if not the most, respected polling organisations in the world, knows what they are doing and how to do it, must be a raging commie and should go (back) to Cuba, Venezuela (or North Korea too maybe?). What did I miss?

Actually the discussion by the OP who started the thread was over concern that Argentina is becoming more like Venezuela. Then another poster said hey look at this survey it not that bad there. My response look at another index by the UN measuring the same things and they are at the bottom of the heap and getting worse at a rapid rate. You asked what did you miss, I guess the point of the whole discussion. I don't care if the Gallop poll is valid or not I just know the nature of the regime there and that anybody that tries to defend it is probably an admirer of Hugo. I never called anybody a commie, I do believe the naive people who admire these types of regimes should actually go there and spend some time. I think their delusions about these regimes would be quickly dashed by the oppressive reality.

 

[gouchobob]

There are more mobile phones in Venezuela than there are people.
http://www.economywatch.com/economic-statistics/Venezuela/Telephone_Statistics/

Go to a slum, and you'll find people living in abject poverty who still own a mobile. Most of latin american is on pre-pay, and plenty of older handsets are given away or disposed of.

Irrespective of the methodology - the results just demonstrate that you don't measure wellbeing or human happiness objectively. You can't tell people they should be either happy or unhappy according to a quantitative assessment - you are limited to asking them how happy they feel. Its the only measure that counts.

Happiness isn't measured in access to material goods and it isn't relative to development indices. Sometimes happiness is simply the feeling that things are getting better.

The assumption that people "must" be unhappy due to an external objective assessment of living conditions has resulted in a litany of foreign policy failures over the last century. I've absolutely no desire to live in Venezuela, and doubtless plenty of others here feel the same way but thats not to say the people living there aren't happy.

I am referring to landlines. Of course you are correct that material goods don't equate to happiness. Why are they happy? Be cause Hugo uses his oil money to subsidize all manner of life. The rest of the economy is quickly shrinking away. Once the oil money is gone the happiness will be gone as well. To bad all these riches couldn't be used to the long term betterment of the people there, not just to buy off the poor and finance an increasingly authoritarian regime.

 

[elhombresinnombre]

Actually the discussion by the OP who started the thread was over concern that Argentina is becoming more like Venezuela. Then another poster said hey look at this survey it not that bad there. My response look at another index by the UN measuring the same things and they are at the bottom of the heap and getting worse at a rapid rate. You asked what did you miss, I guess the point of the whole discussion. I don't care if the Gallop poll is valid or not I just know the nature of the regime there and that anybody that tries to defend it is probably an admirer of Hugo. I never called anybody a commie, I do believe the naive people who admire these types of regimes should actually go there and spend some time. I think their delusions about these regimes would be quickly dashed by the oppressive reality.

I have been and spent some time there, in 2007 under Hugo, and I think it's a hateful place though in my opinion the further you get from the capital the less overbearing the Chavistas become. I wouldn't be happy there. But the thoughts of us two little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world and if people in Venezuela are happy, let them be happy. There's a kind of arrogance in the view that people can only be happy in the way I'm happy or you're happy or that one type of democracy is better than another. It's the kind of arrogance displayed in the EU by getting the Irish to keep voting over the Lisbon Agreement until they came up with the right answer or the US and Israel telling Palestine they can vote for anyone they like so long as it's not Hamas. It's a plural world, full of contradictions: get used to it.

 

[gouchobob]

I have been and spent some time there, in 2007 under Hugo, and I think it's a hateful place though in my opinion the further you get from the capital the less overbearing the Chavistas become. I wouldn't be happy there. But the thoughts of us two little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world and if people in Venezuela are happy, let them be happy. There's a kind of arrogance in the view that people can only be happy in the way I'm happy or you're happy or that one type of democracy is better than another. It's the kind of arrogance displayed in the EU by getting the Irish to keep voting over the Lisbon Agreement until they came up with the right answer or the US and Israel telling Palestine they can vote for anyone they like so long as it's not Hamas. It's a plural world, full of contradictions: get used to it.

There aren't contradictions or room for doubt with somebody like Hugo. He is a authoritarian thug who is leading his country into the abyss. He is trying to export this disease to other countries in the region. Evil like this should be called what it is. To do otherwise is both naive and dangerous.