This weekend Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro announced a 30 percent increase in the minimum wage. This marks the twelfth increase since he took over from Hugo Chavez in 2013, and comes on the heels of a 25 percent increase March 1. The minimum wage is now up to roughly $13.50 at the black market inflation rate. That’s not an hourly minimum, but $13.50 per month.
Due to disastrous economic policies and the recent fall in the price of oil, Venezuela’s economy, already teetering on the brink of a crisis, has plunged into full-fledged collapse in recent weeks. Venezuelans face dire shortages in everything from food to soap to toilet paper. Rampant inflation makes it hard to find the basic necessities they need to survive even when they spend hours in lines hoping to buy them.
Venezuela, once one of the richer countries in the Americas due to its oil, has had the ignominy of topping the Misery Index, a project from Cato’s Steve Hanke which scores countries on unemployment, inflation, lending rate and change in real GDP per capita.