[senor boogie woogie]

I have just read recently about yet another Argentine economic crisis. Now an economic crisis is as common there as the common cold. That country has been in a mess for decades on end, mostly with rampant inflation.

Pardon my ignorance, but why is this? To me the country is really in a golden place geographically on Earth. It is a huge nation with much resources, mining, agriculture, a long sea coast. It seemingly does not have any enemies to have a massive military for, beyond basic defense. Brazil is a rival, but Brazil isn’t going to invade Argentina, unless some really crazy Hitler like guy comes along. Chile and Paraguay are small countries next to Argentina and pose no threat to them militarily or economically. Just it’s relative isolated geographic position. It has a huge territory with a very manageable population. Seems to me that the country could almost close itself off and be able to feed its people and trade their natural resources. Argentina should be in one of the most desirable neighborhoods on Earth.

Is it because the government has been criminally corrupt for ages? Argentina has seemed, at least from independence to the 1970’s to have an unstable government with lots of military like dictators.

But the country has been ruled by a lot of stupid military dictators in the past. The Falklands is an example of this. This is sort of like China and Taiwan in miniature. “The Falkland (or Isle Malvinas) is ours!! Why? Because they are close to us! I can kind of, sort of see this view, saying that Britain is a colonial power and why should they own two islands thousands of miles (or kilometers for our non-Americans) away? But the islands themselves only have a few thousand English folks, who live there for some reason, people probably wanting to just get away from it all and that place is as good as any. Supposedly and probably the islands have lots of oil under it. One can see the propaganda of “The British stole the treasure which os ours!” But it took balls for Argentina and its dictator to invade and expect no response. Didn’t the dictator realize that the Brits will come and come hard? A lot of their men will be killed, they will be kicked out and they will look foolish and bad in the end?

But that was forty years ago and Argentina hasn’t seem to get their “bleep” together since then. Makes no sense to me.

[Puffer Fish]

It's not just Chile, Argentina too, and many other Latin American countries.

Part of the problem stems from underlying racial issues. There's a racial divide (almost more like a caste system because the majority of the population is mixed to some extent or another) in most Latin American countries. This leads to very divisive politics (with the more "white" class who has wealth versus the poorer "mestizo" or native groups). And in divisive politics, in some way it's almost like a war and they are too focused on the short-term political balance of power to be concerned about the long-term. Government is under pressure to print money due to the existence of large amounts of poverty.

There may be racial genetic differences, but also physical geographic differences with the more tropical warmer climate may play some role too. These have a very complex interplay with economic conditions of a nation. I doubt anyone truly fully understands how all the pieces fit together. But there are definitely some patterns that can be noticed.

Chile is actually one of the most prosperous countries in Latin America.
(only the small country of Uruguay has a higher per capita GDP, and they are 88% white and only have a population of 3.4 million people, which is smaller than Chile's capital city)

GDP per capita Chile 16,265
GDP per capita Brazil 7,507
GDP per capita Mexico 10,045
GDP per capita Argentina 10,636
population of Santiago metropolitan region, Chile's capital city 6.8 million​

But yes, Chile is in a financial mess compared to White English-speaking countries like Canada or Australia.

related thread:
"American man goes to Chile, gets shot and killed" (posted in Conservatism section, Apr 19, 2023 )
viewtopic.php?f=7&t=183530

[Potemkin]

Wow. So much opinion in this thread, and so little knowledge of anything.

[AFAIK]

There are 4 types of economies in our world;

Developed
Developing
Argentina and
Japan

[Puffer Fish]

There are 4 types of economies in our world;

Developed
Developing
Argentina and
Japan

So true.