Brain Drain

After a decade of 21st-century socialism, the chief export of Venezuela and its allies seems to be the intelligentsia.

By Mac Margolis | NEWSWEEK
Published Jul 18, 2009
From the magazine issue dated Jul 27, 2009

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  • Posted By: EFerrari @ 07/18/2009 8:00:54 PM

    What a silly article. Under Chavez, the literacy rate has tripled, there is free ed for everyone, and the government is engaged in tech exchanges all over the world. This whole article is a dog whistle for white flight. Good luck and good riddance.

    • Posted By: zz333 @ 07/19/2009 7:41:13 AM

      why don't you go there and assist him. good riddence. You, like the rest of the Marxists, are failures, and want to take rest of us down with you.
      Note:Newsweek is a liberal rag, and if they are writing this, thing are even worse in these countries.

      • Posted By: bacile @ 08/21/2009 11:59:26 AM


        This is absurd. You can be a marxist and be against Chavez. I don't agree with Chavez, but there is a reason
        he is in power: poor people are not stupid, and they could tell that those in power were not treating them fairly.
        Of course, a remedy better than Chavez would have been great....in a perfect world.
        Just as absurd it is to pretend that Fidel came into Cuba just because he was power-hungry, and not because
        the island had become a playground for gangsters.

  • Posted By: Holly Garfield @ 07/19/2009 4:39:34 AM

    Nothing surprising here. Socialism takes away the ability to benefit from your work. Governments which try to run businesses inevitably fail because they are two very different sets of skills and objectives. Governments need to regulate businesses to keep competition open and fair and to provide standards for industry. But once government tries to run businesses the benefits of having superior abilities, skills and work ethics disappear. The money that once went to the business managers??? pockets now goes into government???s (translation Chavez) pockets. Russian society has crumbled and China???s society is openly turning capitalistic in order to survive. Why? Because socialism in any form cuts into the individual???s, and thus society???s, ability to advance. And even if the literacy level and education increase the benefits to the individual from that education decrease.

    • Posted By: Hagbard Celine @ 07/20/2009 3:15:43 PM

      "Socialism takes away the ability to benefit from your work."

      Has anyone told the Canadians?

      • Posted By: bacile @ 08/21/2009 11:56:17 AM


        No. And neither have they told the Swedes. It is just scare tactics from extremists.

  • Posted By: Braindrain @ 07/29/2009 1:22:29 AM

    Very good article. i think is even soft, because i'm venezuelan.
    For those who believe that Chavez is a very kind person, please go to Caracas and see the streets. Do you know that every weekend there are about 100 - 300 deaths just for violence!! not natural causes, just homicides. In Caracas die more people every weekend that in the war.
    Do you know that most of the budget is used in publicity, while the hospitals works without WATER!!! (just one thing of the list). Do you know that if a common family (2 adults, 2 childrens) wants to travel to any destiny in the world they have only 6000$ to spend PER YEAR, because each person 18 or older with a GOLD credit card has the right to spend just 3000$ per year? Do you know that 80% of the population is poor.

    Thanks to Mac Margolis, maybe this going to help to change the american mentality about Chavez.

  • Posted By: Joshua Lipana @ 07/27/2009 2:57:08 AM

    Mac Margolis has brilliantly captured what is currently wrong with Venezuela. The Brain drain is happening precisely because of Chavez and his leftist policies. His so called "21st-Century Socialism" is nothing more then plain old Dictatorship. In the name of helping the poor and downtrodden Mr. Chavez has completely removed any hope for upward mobility for the poorest of Venezuela. It has been proven time and time again that Capitalism is the greatest creator of wealth in the history of the world yet time and time again these demagogues keep popping up destroying economies along with people???s lives. We can only hope that another coup takes place and succeeds in taking out Mr. Chavez.

    Joshua Lipana

    Manila, Philippines

  • Posted By: motorherz @ 07/18/2009 6:07:09 PM

    This is BS. Suddenly everything that has even a remote alighnemnt with Chavez is corrupt. Do you expext us to believe it?

    • Posted By: Hagbard Celine @ 07/20/2009 3:15:07 PM

      Yes.

    • Posted By: Holly Garfield @ 07/19/2009 3:24:16 PM

      motorherz said: 'This is BS. Suddenly everything that has even a remote alighnemnt with Chavez is corrupt. Do you expext us to believe it?'

      Yes.

  • Posted By: Hagbard Celine @ 07/20/2009 3:14:53 PM

    Who can blame them for leaving? Anyone who doesn't kiss ass is an enemy of the state...and when you're an enemy of the state, Bubba, you better run.

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