Maduro says govt in Venezuela will set car prices

[Zorro]

Source: AFP

President Nicolas Maduro said his leftist government will set car prices in a bid to lower their cost.

Maduro, using a newly-acquired power to rule by decree, ordered in an address on state television that "car production be regulated and strengthened in Venezuela, ... to lower the prices of new cars made in Venezuela, and of imports and of used cars."

Maduro had promised Sunday that he would decree new regulations on car prices, as part of the special powers conferred on him to combat corruption and so-called economic war.

He maintains a "parasitic bourgeoisie" and US interests are out to derail his socialist revolution's economic goals.

Read more: http://en-maktoob.news.yahoo.com/maduro-says-govt-venezuela-set-car-prices-032713450.html

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Oh yeah this will really work out well...

[Archae]

1. So he's going to dictate the price of cars?

Well, it worked so well in old East Germany...

[MyNameGoesHere]

9. Exactly

the new Trabant is expected to go for about 29000.00 US dollars. It works pretty well in capitalist Germany right?

[Archae]

10. VW now owns Trabant.

[Agnosticsherbet]

2. Rule by decree is tyrany....

Just sayin....

[hrmjustin]

3. I thought he was going after corruption.

If poor people get a very good price on a car because of this I won't be upset, but this new president seems hardline to me.

[Blanket Statements]

7. What they'll get is no car at all

[hrmjustin]

8. Probably not.

[Nye Bevan]

4. Given that most countries these days follow free-market capitalism,

it will be interesting to see how Venezuela's experiment with turning away from this economic model pans out.

[freshwest]

5. They should nationalize and make all their own cars, if he's following ideology.

That would be rather harsh, though. As an American, the problem would be wages are too low, not prices too high. This is really micromanaging, when they say they have hungry people. It's impossible to tell what is really going on down there.

[Archae]

6. To meet Maduro's demand, they will need to cut corners.

Just ask Detroit how that went.

[Recursion]

11. OFFS... even Cuba uses the price signal now

sigh

[daleo]

12. Oh no

Please god, anything but this.

[Laelth]

13. k&r for exposure. n/t

-Laelth

[Dreamer Tatum]

14. Is there such a class as World History taught in Venezuela?

What a moron.

[Igel]

18. Of course.

But while the outcome of this decree can be known and taught safely, what happened in the past is a field fraught with danger.

Easier to be confident about the future than it is to predict the past. That's the way it winds up in such societies.

[bemildred]

15. Oh the Horror of it all. nt

[Freddie Stubbs]

16. Apparently they don't teach economics at bus driver school

[Comrade Grumpy]

17. I don't understand this obsession with Venezuela.

There are disputed elections in Honduras.

There are historic peace negotiations between the FARC and the government in Colombia.

Mexico's cartel wars continue apace.

Uruguay is about to legalize weed.

And our very own crew of Chicago School economists is focused like a laser on Maduro.

I think it is the reflexive, remnant anti-communism that still lingers in some segments of the Democratic Party. Otherwise, why are they so invested in seeing Venezuela's socialist experiment fail?

[Igel]

19. Perhaps because fail it will.

Everything's looking to be following the model of eating one's future to get through the present, of have a command-and-control economy in a complex, ever-changing environment.

It will be lauded as a great socialist experiment by some. When it fails, it will be as it was the last time: True Socialism was tried, and it will be necessary to come up with 101 arguments why it wasn't really True Socialism, or socialism at all so that it can again be claimed that socialism hasn't "really been tried."

[hrmjustin]

20. People have criticisms of this new president. Especially when he can now decree new laws.

[bemildred]

21. It's where the oil is.

I mean there are other factors, but that's why it gets the attention in the press that it does. There are plenty of other stories, as you mention.

[bitchkitty]

22. OR

maybe it's not a segment of the Democratic Party at all. At least on these threads. I too have wondered about the obsession with smearing the leaders of Venezuela.

Or maybe it's not a party issue, but a corporate one?

[Theyletmeeatcake2]

23. The usual suspects .......

Didn't the USA cause the GFC a few years ago.....same old arguments that sound like the sky's falling in...maybe it will but at least they have some benefit from all 'their' assets...it's always the same old crap ....I think these people have vested interests in seeing the parasite class getting back in ...but that damn democracy stops them....sweet irony !!!!

[Pterodactyl]

24. Fixing prices is a bad idea. Once the prices are "fixed, guess what? You thing you buy will be...

...not as good as the one before the fix. It'll be lower quality, or have fewer features.

Imagine if the chief decreed that admission for a hit movie will cost five dollars. Pretty soon, a hit movie will be shorter, will skimp on production and so on.