May first random notes
For workers days Maduro has decided to double the minimum income. Nobody is happy. With the new total income and benefits you buy 4 pounds of chicken a month. What the story does not say is that such a brutal minimum wage increase will be propagated through pay scales and as such employer charges will reach levels unsustainable for those small business still alive. More shops closing at your friendly nearby mall.
By the way, business that can manage it pay their main managers a supplement in dollar on the side, for them to see how they can exchange that. The problem of course is that business draw that from their reserves, and are currently unable to replenish these. In other words, it is merely a prolongation to the final demise of the middle class.
Of course, payrolls are not a problem for the regime. They just print cash and spread it around. But even among that cynical management, printing is not enough. Public employees are being laid off in droves but no one talks about that. Least the fired crowds as their severance check speediness is linked tot heir silence.
Meanwhile my credit cards, all of them, have increased my limits this past two weeks. I think that my debt could reach 200 million which is respectable by Venezuelan standards. My guess is that I am definitely a top 10% credit card wise, but not based on income, not at all. The only problem is that when you sum it up, well, it is nothing. On the right the calculation of black market rate for today's. My maximum debt is at DOLARTODAY 321 USD. But if like some military I had access to the official DIPRO I could charge 20 millions on my credit cards.
Ain't that crazy?
But in fact I would not even get 321$, there is a "commission" to pay for black market exchange between 10 and 15%. So my combined credit cards would only give me around 300. Barely enough to escape to Colombia and then...
So that is that for workers day celebration: they will go from very starving to somewhat less severely starving. For about a month. Maybe. With luck. But by then Maduro will have been reelected so who cares?
By the way, business that can manage it pay their main managers a supplement in dollar on the side, for them to see how they can exchange that. The problem of course is that business draw that from their reserves, and are currently unable to replenish these. In other words, it is merely a prolongation to the final demise of the middle class.
Of course, payrolls are not a problem for the regime. They just print cash and spread it around. But even among that cynical management, printing is not enough. Public employees are being laid off in droves but no one talks about that. Least the fired crowds as their severance check speediness is linked tot heir silence.
Meanwhile my credit cards, all of them, have increased my limits this past two weeks. I think that my debt could reach 200 million which is respectable by Venezuelan standards. My guess is that I am definitely a top 10% credit card wise, but not based on income, not at all. The only problem is that when you sum it up, well, it is nothing. On the right the calculation of black market rate for today's. My maximum debt is at DOLARTODAY 321 USD. But if like some military I had access to the official DIPRO I could charge 20 millions on my credit cards.
Ain't that crazy?
But in fact I would not even get 321$, there is a "commission" to pay for black market exchange between 10 and 15%. So my combined credit cards would only give me around 300. Barely enough to escape to Colombia and then...
So that is that for workers day celebration: they will go from very starving to somewhat less severely starving. For about a month. Maybe. With luck. But by then Maduro will have been reelected so who cares?
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