Dream big!
Imagine what you could do with a gorgeous Caribbean island of 42,000 square miles!
That's the size of Tennessee.
Picture 3,500 miles of coastline — Florida boasts a mere 1,300.
Sandy beaches, hidden coves, lovely lush hills and deep forests, and fabulous weather. And over 4,000 satellite islands in a tight, tropical archipelago! It has some of the most desired and finest consumer products imaginable — sugar, citrus, coffee, and (apologies to certain Baptists) tobacco and rum.
There's also a vibrant and friendly Caribbean Latin culture, phenomenal food, and what ought to be the kind of place you'd dream of visiting.
Certainly not a place you'd want to float across 90 miles of shark-infested open ocean to escape.
Right?
72% Cubans are living below the poverty line. Their daily income is under $1.90 (yes, you read that correctly). Some figures put Cubans living in extreme poverty at 88% of the population!
The average wage is $33 — not per hour, or per day… per month.
But don't worry! The government gives you coupon booklets for food staples.
Except ... many of these run short, or are rationed heavily. Many Cubans are seriously malnourished as a result.
They can't go out and find a side hustle to get money for food, either. It has long been illegal in Cuba to buy or sell property privately.
About three-quarters of population works for the government — only a quarter in private capacity. In other words, 75% of the citizens produce nothing of value, and are supported by the minority.
There are no political parties — just the communist regime. There are no campaigns and no free elections (there's just one candidate for each position — the official communist party candidate).
Yay, democracy!
Since the communists took over in 1959, sixty-four years ago, Cuba has had one of the very few entirely centrally planned economies in the world. Its government is now running out of cash.
The example of Cuba - a paradise lost to madness and corruption - serves to prove a few of the timeless truths about human nature and God's design that we so readily forget.
In a fallen world, economics is based on these principles:
- Humans must work to live. Work is hard, but honorable. There is no surviving this world without effort. See Genesis 3:17.
- Humans have a right to what we call "private property" - that is, the right to the fruits of their labor. This is crucial for the growth and structure of the family, the basic building block of society. Owning what you produce provides motivation to be productive. That is the inference behind the commandment "thou shalt not steal." See Exodus 20:17.
- Humans cooperate socioeconomically through "exchange value" - we can trade labor, products, services, or other materials for other things. We just need to agree on relative values to do so. This enables efficiency in each of us getting what we need and want. That is why complex societies always develop monetary systems; we then have a "medium" of exchange so we can trade labor for money, and then buy what we wish with that money. It is better and more efficient than bartering. Money systems of exchange just lubricate and free systems up to maximize benefits for all participants.
- We live in a world characterized by "scarcity of resources which have alternative uses." This is the most basic economic result of the Fall. Instead of plenitude, abundance, and overflowing blessing, we have limitations, alternative uses, and scarcity. All resources are, to some degree, hard to get. Wood, metal, chemicals - they all take time and effort to produce in usable form, and they may be used in a variety of ways. If you had one ton of lumber you cut down, would you sell it to someone who wants to build a fire and is willing to pay $100, or to a homebuilder who will pay you $1,000, because they can sell the structure for $5,000?
This leads us back to work, the beginning of everything.
Economics is really just the study of material reality, and how we negotiate life in that reality.
Cuba, at 42,000 square miles, is ten times the size of Jamaica, which is just one of many hundreds of popular tourist islands in the Caribbean.
Yet Cuba generates only 2% of the tourist dollars in the region!
Cuba should be paradise. But it is not. In America, states like California are much the same, which should serve as a dire warning to those that live there.
When your economic system is based on what is centralized control as opposed to freedom, and what is really theft as opposed to productive work, it will necessarily collapse.
The Cuban communists just keep pulling rabbits out of hats. But they're running out of magic tricks. The hat-makers and rabbit farmers are all "working" for the government now.
