Trump’s promise of prosperity clashes with harsh reality in Caracas
CARACAS, Venezuela — Oswaldo Pinto is used to disappointments during shopping trips to buy food for his family. But he was particularly demoralized the other day after looking for bargains at the sprawling Coche market, which serves a largely working-class clientele on the southern outskirts of this chaotic capital.
“This month I was only able to buy half of what I needed,” said Pinto, 41, a taxi driver and father of two, including a new baby at home. “Everything has become too expensive. Prices are rising very quickly. Only meat is a little cheaper now, but I can’t afford that either.”
With his meager purchases in hand, Pinto left the market. Opposite the exit, a mural echoes a message of defiance:
A military boot with a red star stomps on the head of a caricatured Donald Trump, who wears a Hitler mustache and whose golden crown lies on the ground. “No more Kings” is written in English, next to a barrel of oil with a demand in Spanish: “No More War for Petroleum”.
A mural in Caracas depicting President Trump with a Hitler mustache declares “No more war for oil” in Spanish.
The scene illustrates some of the contradictions in Caracas, nearly a month after Trump sent troops to arrest President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, and bring them to New York to face drug and arms trafficking charges — which the couple denounce as a frame-up.
In Caracas, most people seem too preoccupied with their daily survival to pay attention to political posters or the latest statements from the ruling United Socialist Party, which, in an unlikely turnaround, now appears to be bowing to the US president’s demands.
Widespread hopes for a radical renaissance after Maduro’s ouster have foundered in the face of a grim reality: Removing a strongman can be much easier than transforming a nation.
A man carries fruits and vegetables to a car near a market in an affluent neighborhood of Caracas.
Most of Venezuela’s 28 million people face the same challenges and sense of foreboding they have endured for a dozen years. Falling oil prices, bungling government and harsh U.S. sanctions have combined to collapse the economy of what was once Latin America’s richest country, leading to hyperinflation, food and medicine shortages and mass emigration.
Despite Trump’s wishes for prosperity, many say the situation has gotten worse since Maduro’s impeachment. Uncertainty reigns, fueling inflation that the International Monetary Fund estimates could reach nearly 700% this year.
“We don’t really know where all this is going to take us,” said Nelida Castellanos, 40, a mother of two, who was shopping in a middle-class neighborhood in eastern Caracas. “There is a little less anxiety now,” she added, recalling the agonizing days following Maduro’s forced departure. “Prices have fallen a little. But everything is still very expensive.”
She and her husband recently finished a grocery run. The bill: About $180 for beef, pork, chicken, sugar, rice, vegetables, coffee and “a little bit of everything,” Castellanos said. “It barely lasts 15 days.”
A man shops with his pet at a market in Caracas.
Economists say despite more than a quarter century of socialist rule, Venezuela remains a deeply unequal nation. An elite 1% resides in mansions, works in luxury vehicles, and jets off on luxurious vacations abroad. But the country’s once-robust middle class has been decimated, barely getting by on salaries equivalent to about $50 to $120 a month. Then there is the omnipresent underclass.
According to various surveys, up to 8 in 10 people are mired in poverty, in a country that sits atop the world’s largest proven oil reserves.
Even if Trump achieves his stated goal of revitalizing the flagging oil industry — a project that will likely take years — Venezuelans desperate for immediate change will likely be disappointed, experts say.
“Things should improve, but it will take time,” said Luis Oliveros, an economist at Metropolitan University of New York. “The key is the opening of the oil sector.”
Due to the erosion of Venezuelans’ purchasing power, markets are less busy than a few months ago, according to traders and customers.
María González, a fish seller for 43 years, breaks the ice on the offerings at her stall at a popular Caracas market.
“The price of fish is lower than meat, so people come to buy here,” said María González, 57, who runs a fish stand inside the Coche market, a maze of wholesale and retail outlets that covers the space of about 20 American football fields.
The abundance of food, at least for the moment, is a positive thing. The market stalls are full of products. The problem: people don’t have the money to buy.
Fresh fish sells for between $1 and $2.30 per pound, making it a popular alternative to beef, the cost of which rose to more than $11 per pound by the time Maduro left office. Since then, beef has fallen to around $6 per pound.
It’s still too expensive for most in a country where millions survive on sporadic income from street vending, domestic work, construction and other iterations of the informal economy. A mix of government pensions, food handouts and subsidized housing provides an increasingly tattered safety net. Remittances from relatives abroad, part of the vast Venezuelan diaspora, have become a lifeline for many families.
A mural at a popular Caracas market pays tribute to the late President Hugo Chávez, predecessor and mentor of the ousted Nicolas Maduro.
“We adapt,” explains González, the fishmonger, cracking the ice on the catch. “We live day by day. »
One measure of resilience is residents’ ability to adapt to ever-changing payment methods. Venezuela ceased to be a largely cash-based economy during the era of hyperinflation, in 2018-2019, when people carried around bags of bolivares – the national currency, named for Simón Bolívar, the 19th-century independence leader known as El Libertador.
These days, most purchases are made by credit card or via phone apps linked to personal accounts.
Although the bolivar remains the official currency, the dollar serves as an alternative and reference, with both an official exchange rate and a “parallel” free market value. Even street vendors selling candy and trinkets follow the rise and fall of the dollar.
As of Thursday morning, the Central Bank of Venezuela’s exchange rate was 364 bolivares per dollar. The parallel rate was 527 bolivares to the dollar, about 45 percent higher.
1. Prices of all kinds of goods are rising in Venezuela and economists predict that inflation could rise by 700% this year. 2. With beef prices rising, many consumers in Caracas are buying fish, like that sold in
Juan Carlos Hernández stands in Caracas. 3. Fish seller María González counts bolívares, the Venezuelan currency named in honor of Simón Bolívar.
Unfortunately, greenbacks are difficult to access for people like Tamara Mendoza, 65, who lives in the working-class neighborhood of Valle. She spends weekends as a saleswoman at the Coche market, offering her services at different food stalls. On a good weekend, she says, she could earn the equivalent of $50, paid in bolivares.
During the week, she takes care of her disabled nephew, Franco, 40 years old. He contracted meningitis in his youth and still suffers from seizures.
A woman organizes bags of tomatoes at a municipal market in Caracas.
“Really, everything has been difficult for us,” Mendoza said. “But we continue to try to survive.”
Not far away was the vegetable stand of Jorge Gudiño, 64 years old. He has four children: two sons in Venezuela and two daughters who emigrated to Chile. His scattered family, like so many others, reflects the extraordinary exodus of nearly 8 million Venezuelans – considered the largest displacement of people ever seen in the Americas.
Like others interviewed, Gudiño declined to offer his political opinion, particularly “after what happened” – the common euphemism for the U.S. attack.
He is worried about the fall in sales, but remains hopeful of a rebound. Venezuelans are accustomed to wild fluctuations in almost everything: the cost of food, the value of the bolivar, the availability of gasoline and electricity, Internet access and much more.
“People seem to have changed their habits,” said Gudiño, who was stacking onions, tomatoes, greens and other produce atop his stand. “Previously, this market was crowded at 6 a.m. Today, customers come later and buy less. Prices continue to rise and wages remain the same.”
Jorge Gudiño sells produce at the Coche market in Caracas.
It would be better if change came soon, warns Maritza Colombo, lawyer and mother of two, “because what is happening now is pure mockery.”
“I understand that everyone was nervous after what happened to Maduro,” added Colombo, 35, who was shopping Wednesday in supermarkets in eastern Caracas. “But even today, it’s really impossible to buy what you need.”
She had made a shopping list and hoped to spend around $250. She spent almost $400. “And I didn’t buy any meat or chicken.”
Special correspondent Mogollón reported from Caracas and Times editor McDonnell from Mexico City.
