[FRex]

And somehow it's still a shit country, apparently. Look at how Saudi, Emirati, Bruneian and Qatari live off of their smaller oil reserves. Something is clearly up with Venezuela's governance if they can have that much oil and do that badly.

[protomyth]

Well, yes, the governance is horrible, but the oil is a bit deceptive.

It really isn't that good of oil and requires a higher price to refine. It is somewhat analogous to what the Canadians have to do to the oilsands production. Since it requires more work than say Saudi or North Dakota shale, it has a higher cost of production. Saudi's cost are very low, and the tech is making ND / TX fracking cheaper along with a new pipeline that cuts the cost of ND oil.

So, it requires a bit more competence and investment to get the value and compete in a global market. Sadly, Venezuela is incompetent.

[FRex]

It's still oil. At worst they can just not touch it at all or keep it on life support like coal is being treated in Poland due to miners' demands, it's a strain (and quite fucking unfair towards people who aren't miners at comfy labor union and politics infested governmental mines) but doesn't ruin the entire country on its own.

There are also plenty oil less countries that do well, what Venezuela is doing is just pure WTF, even considering their placement.

At the same time Maduro doesn't seem to give a shit and just presses on with his absolute devoted voter base, pure PR and attempts to meddle with the constitution.

[protomyth]

Oh yeah, they are totally broken. I was pointing out the price point of their oil is higher than others in this downward pressure environment. It actually would take some basic competence to make it work which they have none. The government clearly doesn't understand the basics of running a grocery much less a country.