I wouldn't go so far as to say it would be a drag but perhaps our relatively short lifespan prohibits us from appreciating the benefits of nothing ever going wrong as being the best way to experience a 'normal day'.
That being said, perhaps a quick look at their history would show why they went from having a lot of money to being in the poor house.
Venezuela Foreign Trade - Flags, Maps, Economy, History, Climate, Natural Resources, Current Issues, International Agreements, Population, Social Statistics, Political System
In 1988 official imports totaled US$10.9 billion; the country also ran a trade deficit in that year of US$758 million, the first since 1978 (see
table 11, Appendix). The country's imports peaked in 1982 at US$11.7 billion, before the 1983 economic crisis and the subsequent imposition of multiple exchange rates, higher tariffs, and greater nontariff barriers, all of which stifled new imports. These protective import measures caused imports to drop by 43 percent from 1983 to 1986, before imports surged again to the 1988 level. In 1988 raw materials represented 44 percent of all imports, followed by machinery (26 percent), transportation goods (16 percent), and consumer goods (15 percent). The United States, traditionally Venezuela's leading source of imports, supplied 44 percent of all foreign goods in 1988. Overall, Venezuela ranked as the sixteenth largest trading partner of the United States and was the largest export market for the state of Florida. In 1988 the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) trailed the United States with 8 percent of all imports, followed by Italy with 6 percent, and Japan with 5 percent. Brazil, France, Britain, and Canada were other notable suppliers. Imports from members of the Andean Common Market (
Ancom--see Glossary)--Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, and Bolivia--accounted for only a small fraction of total imports.
Import policy traditionally sought to protect local industry and agriculture from foreign competition and to substitute local production for imports. The government accomplished these goals through exchange rate manipulation, the imposition of tariffs, and through import licensing restrictions. In 1988 there were forty-one different tariff rates on more than 6,000 goods. Although tariffs sometimes exceeded 100 percent, the average was 37 percent. Fiscal policies, however, reimbursed as much as twothirds of these tariff payments through a complex system that favored priority development activities. Nevertheless, as part of the 1989 structural adjustment policies, the Pérez administration chose to liberalize the import regime to force local industries and farms to be more competitive with international counterparts, much to the displeasure of most local businessmen. In 1989 the government reduced the maximum tariff to 80 percent to simplify tariffs into a uniform structure, expected to include a maximum of 20 percent and a minimum of 10 percent tariffs by 1993. Import liberalization also addressed nontariff barriers, such as import licensing agreements, which further hampered the free flow of imports and often bred corruption. The government abolished most import licenses in 1989, including those of several state-owned enterprises. Economists expected that liberalization policies would hurt the country's balance of payments in the short run, but make the economy more competitive in the long run. Improved access for imports was also expected to increase trade flows from within the Andean region.
Exports declined in the early 1980s, then rose unevenly in the late 1980s, but still did not came close to the peak level of US$20.1 billion in 1981. Both export and import figures excluded substantial contraband trade along the Colombian border. Declining exports in the 1980s resulted almost entirely from lower oil prices. Traditional exports--oil, iron, coffee, and cocoa--averaged about 95 percent of total exports from 1980 to 1985, but fell as a percentage of total exports after the drop in oil prices in 1986. The role of nontraditional exports jumped from 4 percent of total exports in 1980 to 18 percent by 1988. Increased overseas sales of aluminum, steel, and petrochemicals also diversified the country's export base. The public sector produced nearly all the country's exports. The state also exported as much as two-thirds of all nontraditional goods in 1988, but the increasing role of private investment in basic metals and petrochemicals was expected to lower that percentage during the 1990s.
