[wisty]

In 1973, when the US intervened, Chile's GDP per capita was slightly above average for Latin America. It crashed after the US intervention, and only caught up with the rest of Latin America in about 1990 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:GDP_per_capita_LA-Chile.pn...

OK, it did better under Hernán Büchi (one of the "Chicago Boys", who floated the Peso). But it's a big stretch to say that the 17 years of moribund GDP were worth it, just to catch up with where they were before the intervention.

All we've really learnt is "don't peg your currency to the US dollar if your economy is a shambles". I don't think Friedman should win another Nobel Prize for that, it's not exactly a radical idea.