Venezuela’s Maduro Orders 3,500 Percent Increase in Minimum Wage … 40 Percent of Businesses Close

We have previously discussed the meltdown in Venezuela and how the government of socialist President Nicolas Maduro has done everything possible to ruin the economy, including a one million inflation rate.  The latest moronic move was to increase the minimum salary by nearly 3,500 percent when businesses are struggling to exist. The result? Nearly 40 percent of all Venezuelan stores have closed so now there are no wages. In the meantime, the Maduro government (and its Cuban intelligence forces) are doing what they do best: arresting anyone critical of the government including a couple firefighters are joking about Maduro.

The national currency, the bolivar, has now lost two-thirds of its value in thirty-one days.  However, ordering massive increases in wages merely cut forty percent of the businesses still supplying dwindling job opportunities.  With four out ten stores closed, many are ominously selling off their merchandise.

Not only do these closed businesses represent a decline in the job market, but they can have ripple effect on the supply of goods and labor for the surviving businesses.

In the meantime, two Venezuelan firefighters were arrested by the military for merely  making of a viral video that mocked Maduro by likening him to a donkey touring a fire station. Venezuela’s military counterintelligence unit DGCIM arrested the firemen, Carlos Baron and Ricardo Prieto.

Maduro has succeeded in destroying democracy with the same determination of destroying the economy.