jueves, 28 de septiembre de 2017
miércoles, 27 de septiembre de 2017
La ”Revolución Bolivariana” o la estupidez...
VENEZUELA: UN COLAPSO SIN PRECEDENTES
El 16 de julio se celebró un
plebiscito en Venezuela, organizado apresuradamente por la Asamblea
Nacional, en la cual la oposición tiene mayoría. Su objetivo era
rechazar el llamado del presidente Nicolás Maduro a formar una Asamblea
Nacional Constituyente. En este evento, más de 720.000 venezolanos
votaron en el exterior. En la elección presidencial de 2013, solamente
lo hicieron 62.311.
Cuatro días antes del referendo,
2.117 postulantes rindieron el examen para obtener su licencia médica
en Chile. De estos, casi 800 eran venezolanos. Y el sábado 22 de julio,
se reabrió la frontera con Colombia. En un solo día, 35.000 venezolanos
cruzaron el estrecho puente entre los dos países para adquirir alimentos
y medicamentos.
Es evidente que los venezolanos quieren
escapar, y no es difícil entender por qué. En todo el mundo los medios
de comunicación han estado informando acerca de Venezuela, documentando
situaciones verdaderamente terribles, con imágenes de hambre,
desesperación e ira. La cubierta de la revista The Economist del 29 de
julio lo resume así: “Venezuela en caos”.
Pero, ¿se trata simplemente de otra aguda recesión cualquiera o de algo más grave?
El indicador que más se usa para
comparar recesiones es el PIB. De acuerdo al Fondo Monetario
Internacional, en 2017 el PIB de Venezuela se encuentra el 35% por
debajo de los niveles de 2013, o en un 40% en términos per cápita. Esta
contracción es significativamente más aguda que la de la Gran Depresión
de 1929-1933 en Estados Unidos, cuando se calcula que su PIB per cápita
cayó el 28%. Es levemente más alta que el declive de Rusia (1990-1994),
Cuba (1989-1993) y Albania (1989-1993), pero menor que la sufrida en ese
mismo período en otros antiguos estados soviéticos, como Georgia,
Tayikistán, Azerbaiyán, Armenia y Ucrania, o en países devastados por
guerras como Liberia (1993), Libia (2011), Ruanda (1994), Irán (1981) y,
más recientemente, el Sudán del Sur.
Dicho de otro modo, la catástrofe
económica de Venezuela eclipsa cualquier otra de la historia de Estados
Unidos, Europa Occidental, o el resto de América Latina. No obstante,
las cifras mencionadas subestiman en extremo la magnitud del colapso,
según lo revela una investigación que hemos venido realizando con Miguel
Ángel Santos, Ricardo Villasmil, Douglas Barrios, Frank Muci y José
Ramón Morales en el Center for International Development de la Universidad de Harvard.
Claramente, una disminución del 40% en
el PIB per cápita es un hecho muy poco frecuente. Pero en Venezuela hay
varios factores que hacen que la situación sea aún peor. Para empezar,
si bien la contracción del PIB venezolano (en precios constantes) entre
2013 y 2017 incluye una reducción del 17% en la producción de petróleo,
excluye la caída del 55% en el precio del crudo durante ese mismo
periodo. Entre 2012 y 2016, las exportaciones de petróleo se desplomaron
US$2.200 per cápita, de los cuales US$1.500 obedecieron al declive del
precio del crudo.
Estas cifras son exorbitantes
dado que el ingreso per cápita en Venezuela en 2017 es menos de
US$4.000. Es decir, si bien el PIB per cápita cayó el 40%, el declive
del ingreso nacional, incluyendo el efecto precio, es del 51%
Típicamente, los países mitigan estas
caídas de precios de exportación ahorrando dinero en tiempos de vacas
gordas, para luego utilizar esos ahorros o pedirlos prestados en tiempos
de vacas flacas, de modo que el declive de las importaciones no sea tan
grande como el del las exportaciones. Pero Venezuela no pudo hacer esto
debido a que había aprovechado el auge del petróleo para sextuplicar su
deuda externa. El despilfarro en la época de las vacas gordas dejó
pocos activos que se pudieran liquidar en el periodo de las vacas
flacas, y los mercados no estuvieron dispuestos a otorgar créditos a un
prestatario con tal exceso de deuda.
Tenían razón: en la actualidad Venezuela es el país más endeudado del mundo.
No hay otra nación con una deuda pública
externa tan alta como proporción de su PIB o de sus exportaciones, o
que enfrente un servicio de la deuda más alto como proporción de sus
exportaciones.
Sin embargo, de modo similar a Rumania
bajo Nicolae Ceauşescu en la década de1980, el gobierno decidió recortar
las importaciones para poder permanecer al día en el servicio de su
deuda externa, lo que repetidamente sorprendió un mercado que esperaba
una reestructuración. Como consecuencia, las importaciones de bienes y
servicios per cápita cayeron en un 75% en términos reales entre 2012 y
2016, con un declive aún mayor en 2017.
Este colapso es comparable solamente con
los ocurridos en Mongolia (1988-1992) y en Nigeria (1982-1986), y mayor
que todos los otros colapsos de las importaciones ocurridos en cuatro
años en el mundo desde 1960. De hecho, las cifras venezolanas no
muestran mitigación alguna: el declive de las importaciones fue casi
igual al de las exportaciones.
Más aún, debido a que esta disminución
de las importaciones que impuso el gobierno creó una escasez de materias
primas y de insumos intermedios, el colapso de la agricultura y de la
manufactura fue todavía peor que el del PIB total, con lo que los bienes
de consumo de producción local cayeron en casi US$1.000 per cápita en
los últimos 4 años.
Otras estadísticas confirman el funesto panorama.
Entre 2012 y 2016, los ingresos fiscales no petroleros se desplomaron
un 70% en términos reales. Y, durante el mismo periodo, la aceleración
de la inflación hizo que los pasivos monetarios del sistema bancario
cayeran un 79% medidos a precios constantes. Medido en dólares al tipo
de cambio del mercado negro, el declive fue del 92%, de US$41 mil
millones a solo US$3.300 millones.
Dado esto, inevitablemente el nivel de
vida también ha colapsado. El sueldo mínimo –el que en Venezuela también
es el ingreso del trabajador medio debido al alto número de personas
que lo recibe– bajó el 75% (en precios constantes) entre mayo de 2012 y
mayo de 2017. Medida en dólares del mercado negro, la reducción fue del
88%, de US$295 a solo US$36 al mes.
Medido en términos de la caloría más
barata disponible, el sueldo mínimo cayó de 52.854 calorías diarias a
solo 7.005 durante el mismo periodo, una disminución del 86,7% e
insuficiente para alimentar a una familia de cinco personas, suponiendo
que todo el ingreso se destine a comprar la caloría más barata. Con su
sueldo mínimo, los venezolanos pueden adquirir menos de un quinto de los
alimentos que los colombianos, tradicionalmente más pobres, pueden
comprar con el suyo.
La pobreza aumentó del 48% en 2014 al
82% en 2016, según un estudio realizado por las tres universidades
venezolanas de mayor prestigio. En este mismo estudio se descubrió que
el 74% de los venezolanos había bajado un promedio de 8,6 kilos de peso
de manera involuntaria. El Observatorio Venezolano de la Salud informa
que en 2016 la mortalidad de los pacientes internados se multiplicó por
diez, y que la muerte de recién nacidos en hospitales se multiplicó por
cien. No obstante, el gobierno de Nicolás Maduro repetidamente ha
rechazado ofertas de asistencia humanitaria.
El abierto ataque del gobierno de Maduro
contra la libertad y la democracia está atrayendo merecidamente una
mayor atención internacional. La Organización de Estados Americanos y la
Unión Europea han emitido informes muy duros, y Estados Unidos hace
poco anunció nuevas sanciones.
Pero los problemas de Venezuela no son
solo de índole política. Abordar la extraordinaria catástrofe que ha
causado el gobierno también va a requerir el apoyo concertado de la
comunidad internacional.
domingo, 17 de septiembre de 2017
BACK TO STALIN´S SHOWS.....
A Show Trial in Moscow
As
the sensational trial of former Minister of Economic Development Alexei
Ulyukaev continued this week in Moscow’s Zamoskvoretsky District Court,
it seemed more and more like a replay of the infamous show trials of
the Stalin period—the charges bogus, the outcome predetermined. Ulyukaev
is the first Kremlin minister to be charged with a crime while in
office since Lavrenty Beria was arrested in 1953. He is accused of
taking a $2 million bribe from Igor Sechin, the CEO of the Rosneft oil
company, in exchange for facilitating Rosneft’s purchase of controlling
shares in the state oil company Bashneft. Ulyukaev was detained by the
Federal Security Service (FSB) on November 14 last year after he walked
out of Rosneft’s Moscow headquarters with the cash, and has been under
house arrest since.
Ulyukaev appears to be a pawn in a larger political game. In the words of
veteran Russian political analyst Anton Orekh: “He was nothing more
than a worm on a hook; he was not the real target.” Orekh says that
Sechin, widely viewed as the most powerful of Putin’s subordinates and
the de-facto leader of the hardline “siloviki” faction in the Kremlin,
was using Ulyukaev to attack the so-called “liberals” in the government,
represented by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and his group of economic
reformers. But the case has another purpose as well. In true Stalinist
fashion, President Putin, who would have given his approval for
Ulyukaev’s arrest and trial, is sending a message to all members of his
entourage: Watch out, you could be next. While Ulyukaev’s case points to
a conflict over power and resources within Putin’s elite, it is also a
manifestation of a broader crackdown by Putin—a crackdown that includes
the recent shocking arrest of famed theater and film director Kirill
Serebrennikov on fraud charges and the arrest last summer of Kirov
governor Nikita Belykh, whose trial is now taking place in Moscow as
well. With presidential elections looming in the spring of 2018, and the
Russian economy still fragile, Putin may be feeling vulnerable and be
concerned both about popular discontent and the loyalty of his elite.
Now, more than ever, he needs to show that he is in charge.
Ulyukaev,
who faces up to fifteen years behind bars if convicted, looked visibly
wan and older than his sixty-one years when he appeared in court on the
first day of his trial, August 16; he told journalists that he lost more
than thirty pounds since his arrest. But he was defiant, claiming that
he was innocent and had been “set up” by Sechin and Oleg Feoktistov,
the FSB general in charge of Rosneft security at the time: “Sechin
called me [to Rosneft headquarters] on the pretext of discussing
important matters and proposed we meet. That’s when the bag [of cash]
was given to me.” Ulyukaev says he did not know the bag contained money,
but Russian prosecutors have a different story. In their version, when
Ulyukaev and Sechin were both at a BRICS summit in Goa, India in
mid-October 2016, Ulyukaev complained that, while everyone got payoffs
for doing deals on the Kremlin’s behalf, he was working around the clock
on the Bashneft transaction and getting nothing in return. Sechin,
taking Ulyukaev’s statement as a request for a bribe, reported it to the
FSB, which then laid a trap for him.
The
problem with the prosecution’s narrative is that the Bashneft purchase
was completed in early October, before the summit in Goa happened.
Furthermore, it strains credulity that Ulyukaev, with his long years of
experience in the government, would have allowed himself to be duped
into taking a bribe so blatantly—especially since, by all accounts, the
deal was not contingent on his approval in the first place. How could
Ulyukaev exhort a bribe from Sechin for something Sechin, who manages to
win out in all Kremlin internecine struggles, would get anyway? In the words of
one government official: “If Alexei Ulyukaev had been accused of
running over an old lady while driving a Gelandewagen at high speed
through Moscow late at night, even that would look more probable.”
In
addition to lack of motive, the prosecution’s case thus far seems
flimsy on evidence, although in the Russian system of justice evidence
often does not matter much. On
Tuesday, the third day of the trial, the prosecutor read from a
transcript of a taped conversation that took place between Sechin, who
was wearing a wire, and Ulyukaev just before the latter was arrested as
he and his driver were leaving Rosneft headquarters in a BMW.
There was no discussion of money or a bribe, and it was not at all clear
from the conversation that Ulyukaev knew that there was $2 million
stashed inside a briefcase Sechin gave him that also contained a bottle
of expensive wine. Sechin, who reportedly has a habit of giving gifts to
business associates, presented Ulyukaev with a basket containing
sausages as well. (Sechin is an avid hunter and often has the Rosneft
chef make sausage from the wild game he catches.) According to
Ulyukaev’s driver, who was questioned in court today, Sechin was with
Ulyukaev when he put the parcels in the trunk, thus making sure that his
plan came off.
Ulyukaev’s
fall from grace was preceded by a highly successful career as an
economist and central banker. (He also has published three volumes of
poetry.) As he pursued a doctorate in economics, Ulyukaev became
associated in the late 1980s with Yegor Gaidar and other prominent
economic reformers during the years of perestroika, and eventually
served as deputy head of the Gaidar Institute for Economic Policy.
From
2000 to 2004, he was first deputy minister of finance under Alexei
Kudrin, and then moved to the Central Bank of Russia, where he served as
first deputy chairman from 2004 to 2013, overseeing assets management
and making his name as a frequent speaker on financial and economic
affairs. Ulyukaev was the favored candidate to become governor of the
Central Bank when Sergei Ignatiev retired in 2013, but in the end Putin
gave the job to Ulyukaev’s colleague Elvira Nabiullina, and Ulyukaev
became minister of economic development in the cabinet of Prime Minister
Dmitry Medvedev.
Ulyukaev’s
influence in the financial world grew after he became chairman of the
supervisory board of VTB Bank in mid-2015, and the next year was
appointed to the board of Gazprom. But his reputation started to be
tainted with scandal. The state-controlled VTB Bank, which was placed on
the Western sanctions list in 2014, had become notorious for its
illicit financial practices and its lack of transparency, problems that
Ulyukaev apparently made no effort to address. The anti-corruption
blogger and now presidential candidate Alexei Navalny once said:
“VTB is a group of money-laundering thieves endlessly devouring money
allocated as ‘financial assistance.’” (Coincidentally, it was VTB Bank
that President Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen was supposedly lining up to
finance the planned Trump Tower in Moscow.)
In
2015, Ulyukaev was featured ignominiously in the Panama Papers, which
disclosed his secret offshore family company, operating in the British
Virgin Islands from 2004 to 2009. It is illegal for Russian government
officials to own companies abroad, so Ulyukaev got around the problem by
listing family members as directors: Ulyukaev’s twenty-one-year-old son
Dmitry was initially listed as director of the company, followed by
Ulyukaev’s second wife, Yulia. Navalny later revealed another offshore
company, listed in Cyprus in the name of Ulyukaev’s father, who is in
his eighties. All this was technically legal, but certainly looked bad.
As for Ulyukaev’s reported income, according to documents unearthed by
Navalny it was around a million dollars in 2015. At that time Ulyukaev owned twelve
parcels of land, a residential house, an apartment, and a dacha, while
his wife owned five parcels of land, two houses, and two apartments.
This was a substantial holding for a Russian civil servant and his
spouse.
It
should come as no surprise that Ulyukaev took advantage of his
privileged Kremlin position to enrich himself and his family. As the
Russian journalist Evgenia Albats said to me this week: “Of course
Ulyukaev is corrupt, who isn’t in the government? That is the rule of
the game in Russia, otherwise you are lacking weight on the bureaucratic
market.” Indeed, Ulyukaev’s accuser, Sechin, is a notorious crook. In
September 2016, Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Fund documented the
rewards Igor Sechin has earned as the chairman of Rosneft, including a
$150 million yacht and a mansion in the exclusive Rublevka suburb of
Moscow that, together with its land, is valued at close to $60 million.
According
to Navalny, Sechin is a “witless, mediocre manager” who got his
powerful position as Rosneft CEO because he was for several years
Putin’s secretary and “carried his briefcases.” Rosneft’s acquisition of
Bashneft, which led to Ulyukaev’s arrest, may in fact be an example of
Sechin’s poor management skills. Supposedly the private company Lukoil,
Russia’s second largest oil producer, had been engaging in joint
ventures with Bashneft for several years and wanted to acquire the
controlling shares in Bashneft.
Two senior ministers in Medvedev’s
cabinet, Igor Shuvalov and Arkady Dvorkovich, were reportedly lobbying
on behalf of Lukoil and had opposed the Rosneft purchase, as did
Ulyukaev before he was persuaded otherwise late in the summer of 2016.
They argued, with justification, that Rosneft is not a private company
because more than two thirds of its stock is owned by Rosneftgas, which
is state-owned, so the purchase would just be assets shifting from one
state corporation to another. In their view, the transaction undermined
Russia’s privatization efforts.
Sechin, who is not a fan of privatization, won out, but the deal has
not been beneficial for Rosneft, which was already in debt and had to sell 19.5 percent of its assets to cover the purchase of Bashneft stock for $5.3 billion—higher than the market price.
Although
at this point the case against Ulyukaev boils down to his word against
Sechin’s, it is not clear that either Sechin or FSB General Feoktistov,
who facilitated the covert operation against Ulyukaev, will appear at
the trial as witnesses. Feoktistov, who has gained notoriety as the
investigator in several high-profile corruption cases, including that of
Nikita Belykh, was seconded from the FSB to Rosneft by Sechin in August
2016, presumably to work on the Ulyukaev case. He reportedly fell out
of favor for going too far in investigating members of the elite after
he returned to the FSB, and was sent into retirement.
As for Sechin, who
just yesterday repeated to journalists his claim that
Ulyukaev took a bribe from him, he has good reason to avoid facing the
former minister in court. The transcript of his conversation with
Ulyukaev on the fateful evening of the arrest reveals treachery on his
part that rivals that of Shakespeare’s worst villains. Using the
familiar “you” (ty) with Ulyukaev and addressing him by his
diminutive, “Losha,” Sechin fusses over him and feigns concern that
Ulyukaev is not wearing a jacket and will get cold. (He knows, of
course, that Ulyukaev will be spending the night in a dank prison cell.)
He talks cryptically about “completing a task,” presumably to imply
that he is referring to a bribe, but without arousing Ulyukaev’s
suspicions.
The
basket of sausage was an added touch, and its irony has not been lost
on Ulyukaev. He blurted out to journalists in court yesterday: “Beware
of Danaans [Greeks] bringing gifts of sausages.” This might be amusing
if it were not for the chilling parallel between Sechin’s actions and
those of Stalin and his henchmen. Alexei Navalny, himself a victim of
false corruption charges, has said that the prosecution of Ulyukaev is
part of Putin’s plan to create a “nightmare” for the Kremlin elite: “The
elite hates Putin and is scared of him. He is afraid that the elite
will betray him, so he is doing what all authoritarian leaders—from
Stalin to the chief of an African tribe—do: periodically repress some
unsuspecting person, so that the others will grumble less and actively
fight each other.”
Perhaps
Ulyukaev will avoid prison and receive only probation or a suspended
sentence. Whatever happens, he can at least be thankful that he is still
alive. Eleven years ago this month, Ulyukaev’s colleague, Central Bank
First Deputy Chairman Andrei Kozlov, an advocate of reforms that were
resented by the banking community, was brutally gunned down on a Moscow
street.
September 8, 2017, 4:10 pm
TRYING TO UNDERTAND THE CHINESE MESS
September 14, 2017
What the West Gets Wrong About China's Economy
Debt, Trade, and Corruption
By Yukon Huang
Few countries command as much attention as China.
That is not surprising. Its remarkable economic rise is shaking the
world’s geopolitical balance even as it raises questions about the
universality of market-led capitalism and democratic norms.
In turn, China has become a lightning rod for all manner of anxiety.
The White House has blamed China for the United States’ huge trade
deficits, for example, even though there is no direct causal
relationship between such deficits and China’s surpluses. In fact, there
are several things about China that U.S. analysts get wrong.
It
isn’t hard to understand why. For the general public, there are
difficulties in drawing appropriate conclusions about a country that is
so big and regionally diverse in the distribution of its natural
resources and commercial activities. And sentiments are almost always
clouded by differences in ideology, values, and culture.
For scholars, meanwhile, conflicting views stem from the lack of an agreed framework for analyzing China’s economy.
Decades ago, in the heyday of the Soviet Union, universities taught
courses on centrally planned or “transitional” economies as an academic
discipline. With the demise of the former Soviet Union, this body of
analysis faded away. Today, China is studied as a developing economy,
yet it is not one. The close links between its financial, fiscal, trade,
and social welfare systems make it a different animal entirely.
Given
the lack of an appropriate framework for analyzing China, predictions
of its future have varied wildly. Among the many popular beliefs are
that China’s high debt levels will inevitably lead to financial crisis
(yet its debt as a share of GDP places it around the middle of major
economies); that corruption has negative consequences for
China’s growth (yet deepening corruption has facilitated rather than
impeded growth); that it is impossible for U.S. firms to compete with
China because its wages are so low (yet China’s wages have increased
fivefold since the mid-1990s); and that American companies invest a lot
in China, which is a drain on jobs in the United States (yet less than
two percent of America’s foreign investment over the past decade
actually went to China).
If the analysis is off, then it is likely that Western policy responses are as well.
JASON LEE / REUTERSRush hour in Beijing, November 2016.
WHY CHINA’S DEBT IS DIFFERENT
For
many years, annual Pew and Gallup polls have reported that most
Americans see China as the leading global economic power. Europeans, for
the most part, share this view. Those in the rest of the world,
however, correctly identify the United States as the world’s top
economic power. Perception is important; politicians are greatly
influenced by where they sit and the sentiments of their constituents.
Why
is there such a dichotomy between the views of developed and developing
countries? The answer comes from the preoccupation of the United States
and Europe with their huge trade deficits with China as a sign of
economic weakness. Overall, the rest of the world generates trade
surpluses with China, and many countries realize that economic power
comes more from the strength of a nation’s economic institutions and the
depth of its human capital than from trade alone.
For
the more ideologically inclined, China’s economic ascendancy threatens
the tenets of Western political liberalism—grounded in free markets,
democracy, and the sanctity of human rights. These concerns often
surface as a debate about the roles of the state versus the market, or
the priority to be accorded to individual liberties versus collective
action. The relative positions of the United States and China have
become caricatures, although they may have more in common than many
realize in terms of the problems that need to be addressed.
In
the West, the debate about the market versus the state took on more
urgency after the 2007-08 financial crisis, when major Western economies
stumbled badly as China continued steadily apace. Critics of the Chinese model found
China to blame for the West’s woes. They warned of its unbalanced
growth (as measured by its extremely low share of personal consumption
relative to the size of its economy and high outward investment), which
would make it harder for the United States and Europe to recover. In the
long run, the imbalance would even harm China itself. Thus, under U.S.
President Barack Obama and now President Donald Trump, Washington has
been urging Beijing to boost consumption if China wants to achieve
high-income status—to escape the so-called middle-income trap.
China’s financial situation is not in crisis the way some observers suggest.
Although
“balanced” sounds good and “unbalanced” bad, those perceptions are
misguided. Unbalanced growth is an inevitable but unintended consequence
of a largely successful long-term development process. A decline in
consumption as a share of GDP and a commensurate increase in investment
actually comes from the movement of migrant workers from labor-intensive
rural activities to more capital-intensive industrial jobs in cities.
In the process, the share of consumption to GDP automatically declines
even though consumption per person or household increases. In
labor-surplus countries like China, farmers consume most of what they
produce; thus, the share of consumption relative to agriculture output
is high. When the farmer moves to an urban-based industrial job, such as
assembling computers, he is paid a wage that is several multiples of
what he was previously earning in agriculture; thus, his personal
consumption increases considerably. But labor costs (and thus personal
consumption) as a share of the value of an industrial product is
relatively small compared with the costs of the components and the
factory. Thus, the steady transfer of labor from agriculture to industry
leads to a decline in the share of consumption to GDP but an increase
in consumption per worker. Unbalanced growth has thus led to a rise in
household living standards and China becoming a major manufacturing and
trading power—much as it once did for Japan and South Korea and, a
century before that, in the United States.
Beyond
so-called unbalanced growth, world financial markets have also been
fixated on China’s surging debt-to-GDP ratio and a property bubble.
Experts such as the former IMF chief economist Kenneth Rogoff and
agencies such as the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) and
Moody’s have warned that all economies that have incurred comparable
increases in debt have experienced a financial crisis and that there is
no reason why China should be any different.
Yet
China is, in fact, different—not because it is immune to financial
pressures, but because of the structure of its economic system. The more
optimistic observers point out that most of China’s debt is
public rather than private, sourced domestically rather than
externally, and that household balance sheets are typically strong. But
neither the optimists nor the pessimists recognize that, a decade ago,
China did not have a significant private property market. Once that
market was created, credit surged into establishing market-based values
for land—whose value was previously hidden in a socialist system. The
fivefold increase in property prices over the past decade is the
consequence.
The
question now is whether current asset prices are sustainable. If they
are not, a debt crisis is plausible. On that score, housing inventory
has declined in recent years and affordability has improved. Many
analysts have compared China’s housing prices with other major cities to
get a sense of whether they are too high. But usually such comparisons
are with much richer cities such as Hong Kong, Singapore, and Tokyo. Few
realized that compared to India, prices in China’s megacities are
actually much lower.
China’s
financial situation does warrant serious attention, but it is not in
crisis the way some observers suggest. Although China’s largely
state-owned banking system has been too lax in its lending practices,
the excessive pressure for credit expansion comes from local
governments, which do not have the authority to raise revenue needed to
fund the social and infrastructure services to support a rapidly growing
economy. They have survived only because they have been able to borrow
from state-owned banks to finance these expenditures. Thus, China’s debt
problem is not so much a sign of typical banking problems but rather
the consequence of a weak fiscal system.
TRADING UP
For many China observers, worsening social tensions are the real risk to the country. Over the past several decades, income inequality has
increased more rapidly in China than in any other major economy,
environmental degradation has become a source of social protests, and
worsening corruption is perceived as hampering growth and destabilizing
the system.
Efforts
to aid the poorer interior regions and to revamp social programs are
beginning to moderate income disparities. The government is also
starting to address environmental concerns because the rise of a more
concerned middle class has
made doing so a political imperative. But addressing corruption has
revealed a potential conflict between political and economic objectives.
Chinese President Xi Jinping sees arresting corruption as critical to
preserving the legitimacy of the Communist Party, whereas economists, be
they Chinese or Western, see dealing with it as essential to
maintaining rapid growth. But these goals are not compatible.
Corruption
is said to impede growth in developing economies because it dampens
investment, both public and private. But China is different because the
state controls all the major resources such as land, finance, and the
right to operate commercial activities. Since privatization of those
resources is not politically realistic, corruption allows for the
transfer of use rights of these assets to private interests through
formal or informal contractual arrangements with party and local
officials. Such an arrangement encourages investment in infrastructure
and industrial expansion in support of growth, with both sides sharing
the gains. It is the major reason China has done so well economically
even though it has lacked strong institutions and the rule of law.
Yet
as China’s economy becomes more services-oriented and complex and
public dissatisfaction with the inequities of rent-seeking behavior
intensifies, sustaining growth may require getting the party out of its
dominant role in controlling access to resources and economic
opportunities.
Beyond
national and international investment, international trade is another
concern. Many Americans share the sentiments of Trump and his key
advisers that America’s huge trade deficits are closely linked with
China’s large trade surpluses. Yet the reality is that there is no
direct causal relationship between the two.
As
a former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors, the Harvard
professor Martin Feldstein, has written, “every student of economics
knows or should know that the current account balance of each country is
determined within its own borders and not by its trading partners.”
Basic accounting principles tell us that the United States’ overall
trade deficit is the result of a shortage in national savings relative
to spending due to excessive government budget deficits and households
consuming beyond their means. The countries that show up as being the
source of the offsetting trade surpluses are coincidental.
How
can this be explained intuitively to the non-economist? A close look at
historical trends provides an answer. America’s trade deficit became
significant around the late 1990s and only began to moderate around
2007. But China’s trade surpluses with the United States were not
significant until 2004-05. How could China be responsible for America’s
trade deficits when America’s huge deficits emerged long before China’s
huge surpluses?
More FDI in both directions would benefit both the United States and China.
The
confusion comes from having China as the final assembly point for parts
produced by other Asian countries. In the 1990s, America’s bilateral
trade deficits were concentrated among the more developed East Asian
economies. The share of U.S. manufacturing imports from Asia has not
changed over time, but the bulk of it shifted to China after the country
became the last stop in the regional production network in the early
2000s.
Conventional
wisdom also suggests that too much of America’s foreign direct
investment (FDI) is going to China, resulting in job loss and declining
competitiveness. Yet despite the United States and China being the
world’s two largest economies, only about one or two percent of U.S.
foreign direct investment has gone to China over the past decade. Going
the other way, only three or four percent of China’s outward investment
has been directed to America.
The existence of tax havens means
that the real numbers are likely higher, but consider the EU, which is
comparable to the U.S. in economic size. Over the past decade, annual
flows of European FDI to and from China have been roughly two to three
times those of the United States although they began at around the same
levels a decade ago. The difference is that the European Union’s
manufacturing strengths are more complementary to China’s needs than the
United States’. The EU’s top exports to China are dominated by
machinery and automobiles as well as high-end consumer goods. These
products require FDI flows to support market penetration and servicing.
In
comparison, the top categories of U.S. exports to China over the past
decade include oilseeds and grains and recyclable waste (scrap metal and
discarded paper), which do not lead to FDI. The third type is largely
Boeing aerospace products, but Boeing has refrained from opening
operations in China until recently, whereas its European competitor,
Airbus, has had manufacturing centers in China since 2008.
Regarding
outward investments, Europe is again more attractive because China and
Europe are more complementary in their respective industrial structures
than China and the United States. In addition, the EU is a much easier
market for China to penetrate because it offers a greater choice of
partners that are less preoccupied with security concerns. If one EU
country restricts access to its market, a Chinese company can still
enter through a different member country to gain access to the greater
EU market. Although partnerships with individual U.S. states are
possible, overarching federal policy is disadvantageous for Chinese
investors relative to the more open environment that the EU offers.
Promoting
more FDI in both directions would benefit both the United States and
China. But the Trump administration may resist any agreement that would
encourage American firms to invest more abroad. Moving forward on the
bilateral investment treaty that has been under negotiation for years,
however, should be high on the agenda even if it is not politically
expedient.
VENUS WU / REUTERSWorkers at a factory in Zhuhai, China, December 2016.
NO ZERO-SUM GAME
In
assessing China’s economy, the puzzle is not whether one should be
positive or negative. Rather, it is coming up with a framework that
leads to a better understanding of China’s reality. For now, more often
than not, the China debate reflects a misreading of the role of the
state in influencing economic decision-making in China. The Western
concept of an economy is based on competition among firms in open and
free markets. Unique to China, local governments are also part of the
competitive economic environment. Beijing sets the broad parameters and
policies are calibrated in ways that defy traditional thinking.
Competition in China is not just the result of pressures generated by
markets and firms but can also come from local government entities. Not
incorporating these factors into the analysis leads to a
misunderstanding of what has been happening in China.
It
is good for the world if China is stable and progressing well
economically. Such progress is best supported if the country’s economic
and financial problems are accurately assessed and addressed.
Misunderstanding the nature of its debt problem, for example, by not
recognizing that it is as much a fiscal problem as a banking issue,
contributes to misguided efforts. China has one of the most restrictive
regimes regarding foreign investment in services. Liberalizing access
would cater to the United States’ strengths as well as spur the
competition and knowledge exchange needed for China to become more
innovative. Thus, the debate should be less about punitive tariffs and
more about negotiating a bilateral investment treaty. Moreover, rather
than worrying about China’s unbalanced growth model, the focus should be
on persuading China to grant its rural-to-urban migrant workers full
access to the social and economic services accorded to established urban
residents. Doing so is justified for reasons of equity, but it would
also spur growth in personal consumption and help moderate China’s trade
surpluses, thus easing global trade tensions. Finally, at the
geopolitical level, economic differences between nations can and do
raise concerns, but ultimately their resolution does not have to be a
zero-sum game.
UN BREVE MIRADA A LOS CRIMENES DE LA NARCO-DICTADURA DE MADURO
Los crímenes de lesa humanidad del gobierno de Nicolás Maduro
Tamara Suju
LA OPINIÓN DE
Tamara Suju
@TAMARA_SUJU
TAMARA SUJU
22 DE AGOSTO DE 2017 09:00 AM | ACTUALIZADO EL 22 DE AGOSTO DE 2017.
"Confieso que TRANSCRIBIR cientos de relatos de víctimas
de tortura en Venezuela y su sistematización me ha puesto el “cuero
duro”, pues no puedo dejarme embargar por la indignación y la rabia para
escribir lo más metódico y objetivo posible los informes.
El pasado jueves 17 de agosto entregué a la Corte Penal
Internacional 22 nuevas incidencias de torturas, que contienen un número
aproximado de 110 víctimas directas y un número no cuantificado de
víctimas silenciosas, esas que son torturadas junto a las que sí
denuncian, pero que el pánico, quizás la vergüenza y la gran
intimidación de sus victimarios, no le permiten hacerlo. Tengo año y
medio escribiendo los gritos del horror en mi país para mi expediente en
la Corte, y cuando pienso que ya nada puede alterarme, surgen
testimonios que me doblan de rabia, de estupor.
Uno de ellos es el de Wuilly Arteaga, el violinista de
las marchas, detenido y torturado por efectivos de la Guardia Nacional
Bolivariana, quien narró cómo el día de su arresto, mientras era
trasladado, le practicaban actos lascivos y violación por el ano a una
muchacha que también habían detenido y habían tirado encima de él para
atacarla y abusar de ella. Aunque ya he transcrito por lo menos dos
casos parecidos, escucharlo de la boca de este valiente joven, sometido a
torturas y herido de perdigón solo por tocar su violín en las
manifestaciones, me provocó un gran escalofrío en el alma.
Me niego a acostumbrarme al silencio que viene después
del breve escándalo que casos como este causan en nuestra sociedad. Me
niego a que esa “muchacha” no obtenga justicia, y sus violadores no sean
enjuiciados y apresados. Me niego a que cada gánster que mantiene
secuestrada a Venezuela a punta de armas, persecución y represión,
encarcelamiento, asesinatos, torturas, tratos crueles, desapariciones
forzosas, allanamientos ilegales, pillaje, ataques a la propiedad
privada de quienes manifiestan, entre otras violaciones de derechos
humanos y crímenes de lesa humanidad, no sea juzgado y pague por sus
crímenes.
A Carolina (nombre en reserva) la arrodillaron a mitad
de la carretera un día de julio y le pusieron en fusil en la cabeza. Su
ropa estaba hecha harapos, después de que varios guardias la golpearon y
la trataron de violar, manoseándola violentamente en todo su cuerpo.
Pensó que la mataban, mientras permanecía de rodillas llorando y el
pánico le corría por las venas, y sentía el fusil en su cabeza, pero
terminaron aplicándole descargas eléctricas, en la nuca, en los senos,
en sus partes íntimas mientras le gritaban “guarimbera” por manifestar.
Marta (nombre en reserva) sentía que se desgarraba por
dentro, mientras recibía golpes con tubos y palos en sus costillas, en
su abdomen, en su espalda, en sus piernas, colgada por sus muñecas
esposadas de una columna en la sede del comando de la Guardia Nacional,
tocando el piso solo con las puntas de los pies, sintiendo cómo se le
hacía más dificultoso respirar y todo se le ponía negro, pero aun así
podía percibir el odio y la violencia con el que cada guardia le daba
golpes sin piedad.
Enmanuel Barrio se negó a manosear (practicar actos
lascivos) a sus compañeros detenidos, para espectáculo de los guardias
nacionales que los obligaban a tocarse entre sí, luego de que los
golpearan de forma salvaje. Por negarse, trataron de violarlo con un
tubo. Arrodillado junto a los demás, esposado y con las manos atrás, le
echaron polvo de las bombas lacrimógenas en los ojos y siguieron
golpeándolo, una y otra vez…Por manifestar y pedir libertad para su
país.
Carmen Ángel le pedía al guardia que no le pegara más,
mientras sangraba copiosamente por la herida abierta que el oficial le
había hecho en el cráneo con el casco y la culata del arma con que la
golpeaba, y mientras la sangre corría por su rostro se dio cuenta de que
no era uno, sino 4 o 5 los que la golpeaban y le daban puntapiés al
mismo tiempo. Le dieron cachetadas, le fracturaron dedos de la mano al
tratar de protegerse la cabeza, pero lo peor para Carmen fue ver el odio
con el que los torturadores la llamaban "guarimbera".
El capitán Jesús Alarcón está preso en una cárcel civil
hace ya más de tres meses. Antes fue torturado en “la Tumba” que tiene
la División de Contrainteligencia Militar en Boleíta, Caracas, y en la
cárcel militar de Ramo Verde. Recibió descargas eléctricas, asfixias con
bolsas plásticas, palizas en todo el cuerpo y torturas “blancas”. Hoy
está encerrado en una especie de jaula con barrotes, como las que se
usan para animales en los zoológicos, sin agua ni electricidad, sin
baño, solo con una letrina, por donde salen todo tipo de insectos, y lo
que es peor, sin alimentos. Agua de lentejas es la dieta impuesta desde
hace días para todos los presos, que han bajado entre 15 y 25 kilos de
su peso corporal. Cuando los alimentan con otra cosa, la porción es
miserable, a veces descompuesta, a veces con gusanos. Desde que llegó no
lo sacan al sol y en la jaula no puede realizar ningún tipo de
actividad física que lo ayude a mantenerse en forma. Jesús está muy
débil. Y lo que es peor, solo tiene permitido ver a sus pequeñas hijas
una vez al año, el Día del Padre, según le dijeron.
A Briggitte Herrera la golpearon salvajemente aquel día
en la UPEL. La apuntaron con el arma en la cabeza y luego le dieron
golpes con la culata, con tubos y palos, con los cascos de los
funcionarios y fuertes puntapiés en todo el cuerpo. Fue objeto de actos
lascivos e intentaron violarla con un tubo, y junto a las demás jóvenes,
recibió cachetadas en el rostro para causarle el mayor daño posible,
dejándola con fuertes hematomas, mientras la amenazaban de muerte. 29
jóvenes fueron torturados junto con Briggitte esa noche, por un número
no cuantificado de funcionarios. Los muchachos fueron trasladados a dos
cárceles, El Dorado y la 26 de Julio, y ahí ha continuado la tortura.
Sin atención médica para las graves heridas sufridas, con muy escasa
alimentación, con el paludismo y la malaria dándoles vuelta; ya hay
denuncias de contagiados. Hay quienes sufrieron heridas abiertas en la
cabeza que no han sido atendidas e incluso uno de ellos estuvo vomitando
sangre los primeros días.
Podría pasarme días escribiéndoles los horrores que
miles de venezolanos han sufrido los últimos meses y años. A mí no me
queda ninguna duda sobre los crímenes de lesa humanidad que comete el
régimen de Maduro. ¿Y a usted?
La narcodictadura está dispuesta a matar, encarcelar y
torturar de las formas más viles y sanguinarias a los venezolanos que
manifiestan en las calles y se oponen a ser sometidos al régimen que
pretenden imponer. Responsablemente le digo a la comunidad internacional
que los venezolanos no pueden luchar solos y con las herramientas de
una democracia, como es el voto, contra un régimen que está dispuesto a
matarlos, encarcelarlos, torturarlos y hasta desaparecerlos, tal como
sucede actualmente con algunos detenidos. Esto sin tomar en cuenta las
cifras de decesos por desnutrición, por falta de medicinas y condiciones
precarias de los centros de salud, que ni alcohol tienen para
desinfectar. El régimen lucha por mantenerse en el poder a costa de lo
que sea. Los venezolanos luchan por vivir en libertad y democracia. No
nos dejen solos."
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