Venezuelan President To Expand Price Controls

What could possibly go wrong?

Reason

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro wants to put price controls on all consumer goods.

From the BBC:

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro says he plans to extend price controls to all consumer goods, if he is given powers to govern by decree.

In a televised address, Mr Maduro said that he wanted to set legal limits on businesses' profit margins.

The news comes after electronic stores accused of selling products at inflated prices were seized in Venezuela. 

From the Los Angeles Times:

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro ordered the "occupation" of a chain of electronics stores after the socialist government accused the company of overcharging its consumers.

Troops went to the Daka chain's five stores and ordered the company to start selling its products at lower prices, Reuters reported. Several managers of the company were arrested.

What could possibly go wrong?

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Comments

[SugarFree]

It's sure to work this time!

I wonder if rana ever got out of that place.

[Hugh Akston]

She did escape, but to an even shittier socialist dystopia: Canada.

[SugarFree]

Poor rana.

[JW]

But, plasma screen TVs will be so cheap!

[albo]

Here's the new pricing equation:

Cost of materials + labor + distribution + advertising - government-mandated goodwill to others on pain of death subtraction = proper retail price.

[some guy]

But, plasma screen TVs will be so cheap!

Only for a moment.

[playa manhattan]

Currently, the most popular airline route in the country is Caracas-Caracas:
http://www.reuters.com/article.....TW20130924

[UnCivilServant]

I've been hoping for short hop flights from airport to airport so I can avoid having to go through the TSA again (and dragging my luggage through the streets) to make the next legs of my trips. so I'd mistakenly thought it was connecting two (ore more) airports in one city.

[Sevo]

From the link:
"The currency controls that Chavez implemented have exacerbated some of the very problems they were meant to address: inflation and capital flight from the country."
Naah, ya think?

[waffles]

I think it will work this time. And by work I mean it will fail. However, Venezuela will succeed in exposing the kkkapitalist countries for the pig dogs they are. That is totally worth all the violence and starvation.

[wingnutx]

Why do you heartless bastards hate social justice?

[UnCivilServant]

Because I'm usually expected to pay for it (or have it imposed on me)

I worked hard to reach my unjust position.

[playa manhattan]

Is anybody interested in starting some sort of non-profit with me? My goal is to get as may Occupiers to Venezuela as possible so that they can live the dream.

[Hugh Akston]

As with any ill-conceived government diktat, if price controls aren't working, it's only because you're not doing them hard enough.

[sarcasmic]

Market failure.

[wingnutx]

It's because of the kulaks and wreckers.

[Dr. Frankenstien]

From the Reuters article.

"The ones who have looted Venezuela are you, bourgeois parasites," Maduro said, accusing Daka of raising some prices of products beyond 1,000 percent of cost.

So yes you're right.

[albo]

Doubling down on idiocy is the only choice if doing something else goes against your deeply-held philosophy.

[Sevo]

If you think TP shortages are bad, you just wait! We can watch Venezuela circle right down the drain and listen for the Hollywood commies to make excuses.

[Loki]

listen for the Hollywood commies to make excuses

Retarded Hollywood commie: "Wreckers and Kulaks... Bourgeoisie... still too many people suffering from false consiousness in rest of world for Socialism to work *leers towards 'flyover country'*..."

[albo]

I don't think there are any basic economics books in spanish. That must be the problem.

[OldMexican]

Oh, there are plenty of them, except most were written by Keynesian or Neoclassical charlatans. Some of them still include (very quaintly) the Phillips Curve.

[wingnutx]

Chile has some to sell, but they'd better get cash up front.

[OldMexican]

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro says he plans to extend price controls to all consumer goods, if he is given powers to govern by decree.

God knows that price controls can only work if given a great man plenipotentiary powers.

In a televised address, Mr Maduro said that he wanted to set legal limits on businesses' profit margins.

Fortunately for us, most self-absorbed petty tyrants like to immortalize their own folly for future generations. Imagine if they kept their stupid thought to themselves!

[JW]

Now that the shelves of Daka have been cleared by the non-looters, they can restock them with the now less-expensive merchandise, right? RIGHT?

[robc]

Where is joe to tell us that Venezuela is a democracy because they had elections?

[JW]

DEMOCRATIC PROCESS MULTIPASS

[robc]

Dont denigrate the hottest sci-fi women in history by comparing her to Venezuela.

[Raston Bot]

Alien accents suit her. She was terrible in The Messenger.

[robc]

Ive made no claims about her acting ability, merely her hotness.

[wingnutx]

That alien gibberish made her extra hot, for some reason.

[some guy]

I think the ace bandage outfit did a lot more than the alien gibberish.

[TANSTaaFL]

True, but unlike Resident Evil 1...2...3...and oh yeah, 4 there were no cooter shots.

[OldMexican]

Better questionL Where's Tony to explain to us how price controls are meant to help the poor?

[albo]

I think in a few months the remaining private businesses in Venezuela will be citizens flying abroad to arbitrage the difference in the official exchange rate of their country's butt wipe (6.3 to the dollar) and the street rate (58).

Plus the international beauty queen industry. Those Venezuelan girls are smokin'.

[ChrisO]

I've gotten to the age where you start seeing the same shit like this happen over and over. It does make you question the human condition.

[Raston Bot]

What a half-assed socialist revolutionary leader! First Maduro came for the Radioshack store managers but I did nothing b/c what dumbass goes for Radioshack store managers first?

[Dr. Frankenstien]

Beat you to it by a day. What do you have to do to get a hat tip around here.

http://www.reuters.com/article.....edType=RSS

A quote from a Venezuelan voter from the article from Charles Rangel. I mean Carlos Rangel.

Inflation's killing us. I'm not sure if this was the right way, but something had to be done. I think it's right to make people sell things at fair prices," said Carlos Rangel

[Raston Bot]

Do something!!

He'll forget all about inflation when there are food shortages.

[Loki]

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro wants to put price controls on all consumer goods go full retard.

You never go full retard.

[califernian]

The price-controller is as ignorant, backwards and superstitious as say, a fundamentalist religious leader. But for some reason the price-controller gets none of the vitriol from the media that you see for the Taliban etc.

[Redmanfms]

But for some reason the price-controller gets none of the vitriol from the media that you see for the Taliban etc.

I haven't seen too much vitriol directed at the Taliban either.

Socons and evangelical Christians OTOH....

[JidaKida]

This makes a LOT of sense dude.

http://www.Privacy-Road.tk

[some guy]

So now we can all make a killing by selling electronics on the Venezualan black market. Just make sure you bribe the right people along the way.

[#]

Where's Tony to tell us that price controls don't create shortages?

[some guy]

Even Tony isn't that economically ignorant. He would however push for Venezuala to institute modest, recurring increases to its minimum wage and to unpeg their currency from the dollar so they can inflate their way out of all their problems.

[#]

Well he was just arguing earlier today that the minimum wage (a price control) doesn't create a shortage of low skilled jobs.

[Gilbert Martin]

Doubling down on stupid.

The go to option of socialists everywhere.