Oil and Gas.

I am sure that many of you have heard that Venezuela is an oil producer and exporter. It is member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporter Countries (OPEC). My country is one of the most important oil exporters in the world and it has the largest oil reserves, but the irony is that we have a big poor population. Many people wonders how come Venezuela is so rich and the Venezuelans are so poor? At the same time you see a lot of people expending a lot every day, the shopping malls are full every weekend. You might see poor people with better cell phones than you. Venezuela is a country of contrasts.

A popular tale says that when God was creating Venezuela he puts gold, petroleum, diamonds, pearls, iron, and so on; but The Lord realized that was too perfect for a country and so he decided to put the Venezuelans. I don't believe that tale is completely truth because most of the Venezuelans are really good and working people but the point is that we have all the opportunities to be a great nation and we are not.

I am pretty sure that a sociologist would love to work in Venezuela and study the Venezuelans but what I want to point in this post is that because we are a oil producer, the government subsidies most of the cost of gas for the national consumers. That means that gasoline is cheap. VERY cheap. Cheaper than water, literately. You can fuel a tank with only a few cents of dollar.

Maybe you are thinking "that's so good, I wish gas were that cheap in my country". But reality is different, it has two sides.

I will list what I consider to be the pros and cons of having cheap gasoline.

Pros: 

-We save a lot of money.

-We can hang out more and not worry about the price of fulling a tank.

-We can give or ask someone a ride easily. 

-A business depending in vehicles saves a lot, like taxi and bus lines.

Cons: 

-Nobody uses bikes.

-The air is polluted.

-A big and efficient railroad system hasn't been developed.

-Everybody wants to have a car and sometimes more than one car or motorbike so traffic is terrible.

-Car pooling is something really rare to see.

(Rush hour in Caracas).

Personalty I think that having cheap gasoline is fine but it shouldn't be so cheap. Many governments have tried to increase the gas price a bit with no success. People gets really mad every time someone in the government mention the possibility of having the gas price increased. Prices of alcohol, water, food, or everything else can increase and people will be fine, but don't mess with the gasoline price. That's another topic to be discussed between sociologists.

What do you think about this situation? What products does your country produce cheap?