
How to Survive When Money Is Worthless [video] - wallflower
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/06/27/world/americas/venezuela-money-how-to-survive.html
======
jefe_
For more of a guide to surviving collapses, this essay about the 2001
Argentine Financial crisis is pure gold. I have printed several copies and
read it about once a year:

[http://ferfal.blogspot.com/2008/10/thoughts-on-urban-
surviva...](http://ferfal.blogspot.com/2008/10/thoughts-on-urban-
survival-2005.html)

~~~
probably_wrong
Sorry to be the negative one but, as someone who lived through the 2001
economic crisis, I have no idea what this guy is talking about.

He seems to write a lot of survivalist tips, so I would keep that in mind -
from a survivalist perspective, all society is at the point of collapse.

~~~
harias
Do you mean to say it was better than he depicts it to be? or is it something
else?

~~~
probably_wrong
Yes, I think he's cherry-picking some specific situations to make it seem much
more tragic that it was.

For instance,

> Some ate whatever they could; they hunted birds or ate street dogs and cats,
> others starved. When it comes to food, cities suck in a crisis.

Sure, _some_ did. They even showed up on the news due to how weird even the
idea of eating birds was. But that's the 0.001% - the average citizen reduced
their expenses, moved back with their parents, asked their relatives for help,
and/or started using the food banks.

> in 2001 half the country went without power for 3 days. Buenos Aires was one
> big dark grave.

That's straight up BS - there were widespread power outages, but they lasted
typically hours, not days. And even though specific neighborhoods had days
without power, to call it "a big dark grave" is too much.

> There are absolutely NO kids playing on the sidewalks at all, at any time of
> the day

There are no kids playing nowadays either, but that's because they are at
school (the average school day is longer than it used to be), playing with
their cellphones, or (at the time) playing Counter Strike in cyber-cafes with
dedicated LANs.

And so on. It also doesn't help that he paints the entire country based on
Buenos Aires, a city that has a _very_ strong cultural division to the rest of
the country.

------
andyidsinga
I found this maddening to watch from a technical perspective - it was
beautifully produced, subtitles, video and audio - but it didn't work right in
my browser! (latest chrome on win10)

\- the audio and subtitles didn't sync

\- if I touched the scroll wheel on my mouse it would rapidly generate events
that caused the 'next' action

\- if I click on next after the audio was complete on one page there was no
audio on the next page - just the subtitles.

..so I struggled through it and wondered how this was tested before they
pushed it out.

finally, getting to the end - I didn't see anything that actually discussed
how people are actually surviving!?

I lived in the USSR in the early 90s while crazy inflation was starting to
happen; here are a few strategies people used in those days (in fact I and my
family used too). Note that inflation got even crazier after I left - and I'm
not sure what other things people did to handle that; but I suspect
friends/family/connections continue to be extremely important.

\- they kept dollars or other western currency and traded for rubles as close
to purchases as possible

\- everyone would use private connections with others get access to goods that
we're not readily available. didn't seem to be at lot of bartering here - but
taking very good care of those connections and reciprocating whenever
possible.

\- people would grow food at their datcha - and share with their friends and
sometimes sell it at local open market / bazaar.

\- finally, you take on any work - and I mean _any_ work - to get a bit of
extra cash - especially in foreign currency. You're not like "I'm a doctor,
I've above doing ______" if someone will pay you to do ______; and you can do
it - you probably will.

~~~
amenod
For what is worth, it worked flawlessly for me (FF on Linux).

~~~
andyidsinga
yeah - I'm sure it must work for most - but it was goofey for me and I didn't
have the patience to open up inspector and start digging.

------
QasimK
For all the negative comments about the presentation, which I might normally
agree with, I liked this format this time. It took a while to load (thank you
multi-threading).

I got through it because I treated it like an interactive video with
subtitles, which is better than a video. I liked the sound - which, in my
iPhone, was muted at the started as my phone was muted, so I didn't even
realise there was audio. I liked that I could go forwards and backwards. I
liked that I could just read. It fit well on my phone, I don’t know what it
looks like on desktop.

Now, getting to the content itself, I found it to be very sad, especially at
how the spirit to protest was killed.

~~~
WrathOfJay
I actually found this to be worth the time. I haven't paid much attention to
the situation down there, and seeing it was enlightening.

Onto the content...

I wonder, can someone tell me why there are so many obese people in these
video clips, if food is so hard to come by?

Why does there seem to be so many people sitting around? Surely with so much
manpower available, there are way to make them productive on a large scale?

~~~
a3n
> I wonder, can someone tell me why there are so many obese people in these
> video clips, if food is so hard to come by?

If those people are alive (as they observably are), then logically they are
getting food.

When you're poor, you generally can only afford low quality food. Low quality
food is bad for your health, resulting in many problems including obesity and
diabetes.

Low quality food is generally processed grain. It's cheap to make and cheap to
keep "fresh," which is why we have so much of it in the US. Think high
fructose corn syrup, and almost anything that comes in a box, and do the
thought experiment across the food chain from the farm, through manufacturing
and distribution, to consumption and the doctor's office.

When you see a population of obese people, don't think that their food problem
is solved; realize that the food they have practical access to is a problem.
(And yes, many rich people in rich countries are obese and have a choice, but
many of _those_ obese people are poor and do not, and we're not talking about
a rich country at the moment.)

~~~
cimmanom
Additionally, consuming mostly processed grain leads to micronutrient
deficiencies, which can in turn cause food cravings that are extremely
difficult to resist -- causing people to overeat the food that _is_ available.

------
tigershark
Inflation in Venezuela is over 25k%. People are jailed during demonstrations
when they are not shot in cold blood. Children are dying of malnutrition. But
for everyone on HN the biggest problem is the article format. Utterly and
completely unbelievable...

~~~
ademup
A large number of people (most?) in the HN community are
contributors/authors/creators to web sites such as that linked. I love HN
people for their ability to respect content while simultaneously addressing
how it is delivered. I believe that ~how~ the message is conveyed is extremely
important. If the UI is such that people click 'next' and never get to the
content, then all of the breathless exasperation in the world will be directed
at the uniformed.

~~~
candiodari
Exactly. The point is to attract attention, and to keep it as long as
possible. The starving and exploited Venezuelans are just a tool for that, and
in a way just being exploited just that little bit more by these sites, for
their own gain.

The discussion here is about the exploitation, not so much about the source of
the initial spec of attention to be exploited.

Besides just wait until someone points out which type of politics were at the
source of this change.

The same is true of this comment.

------
jdpigeon
I love these multi-media style articles. Didn't anyone else feel completely
transported when they watched the yuca getting cooked and saw that woman's
tears?

Certainly it's not the right choice for every story, but I think it's often
better than a typical narrated video piece. Here's another one that I think
takes advantage of the format beautifully:
[https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/british-
columbia/kinder...](https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/british-
columbia/kinder-morgan-trans-mountain-pipeline-bc-coast/article35043172/)

~~~
jdietrich
_> Didn't anyone else feel completely transported when they watched the yuca
getting cooked and saw that woman's tears?_

I felt an intense pang of shame as my mouse hovered over the "next" button.

------
jbb67
Got about 15 seconds into this before deciding life was too short

~~~
catchmeifyoucan
Agreed. Closed it two seconds into the second loading screen

------
tw1010
I loved this format so much. It feels like some of the people who are
complaining are acting as if this is going to replace text somehow, which I
hardly think will be the case. There is plenty of room for both formats. I
thought this was the perfect middleground between a documentary and an
article. Documentaries often feel biased or like they're trying to manipulate
the audience or something. Articles, at least to me (though it's a function of
how good your imagination is), can sometimes feel a bit too distant from
reality. Language is too abstract, too manipulable, and some phrases are too
loaded to not be distracting. Short videos with scenes from everyday life,
coupled with a slight bit of interactivity (the "next" button) makes it much
harder to zone out of (unlike a long-form movie), and to me at least made it
much more somehow connected to reality. I definitely feel like I have a much
closer and personal understanding of the situation, much more so than I would
have gotten with a documentary or an article.

------
the_watcher
I wanted to read an article with this headline. Unfortunately, I only got to a
slow loading video of someone making a latte before giving up.

~~~
ManFromUranus
I can guarantee that's because the article is light on insight and heavy on
emotionality and will almost certainly seek to tug on the heartstrings as it
has no real commentary or insight into the situation. It just wants to show
you crying babies, women and sad people.

------
cgopalan
Who else felt the irony of people complaining about the presentation format
when there are human beings suffering from such a crisis? I was moved when I
saw the clip of the kids being fed in a soup kitchen.

Not saying you cannot criticize the format, but shouldn't the discussion be
more about what actually caused this situation and how it can be remedied or
prevented?

~~~
cellularmitosis
Well, you could say it is about overall impact. If you turn a bunch of people
off with your format, you just reduced your potential impact.

------
post_break
This was like all the negatives of a slide show mixed with video and some
text. I struggled to make it through.

------
detcader
"U.S. Papers Hail Venezuelan Coup as Pro-Democracy Move" \- June 2002 -
[https://fair.org/extra/u-s-papers-hail-venezuelan-coup-as-
pr...](https://fair.org/extra/u-s-papers-hail-venezuelan-coup-as-pro-
democracy-move/)

~~~
wazoox
My thought exactly. This really sounds like a propaganda piece; "it's all
Maduro's fault". really, I don't know. I'm not so sure.

~~~
throwaway37585
As a Venezuelan, I'm curious to know what about this article makes you think
it's a "propaganda piece".

~~~
wazoox
The fact that it's extremely one-sided, about a country well-known for
repeated US meddling. For instance see the example of the Kellogg's factory.
They present several questionable facts as given: why did Kellogg's leave the
country? it's unclear. May it be in part because of US government pressure?
not unlikely. Why do they present the takeover of the abandoned factory as
something wrong? The owners are gone. In fact, takeover of the factory to
provide work to its employees and products to its customers look like the
obvious right thing to do.

Maduro and his clique did many things wrong, no doubt. They failed badly at
reforming the economy and making it more sustainable. They're corrupt. They
probably mismanaged the country. However international sanctions are the
direct cause of most of the problems that make the news daily (lack of
medicine, food, etc).

~~~
throwaway37585
> The fact that it's extremely one-sided

There's a fucking crisis destroying this country and you're complaining about
this article being "extremely one-sided"? _Any_ accurate portrayal about
what's going in the country will appear one-sided _because the situation is
one-sided_. You'll be hard-pressed to find _anything_ the government is doing
right. That's the extent of their incompetence.

> about a country well-known for repeated US meddling

Ah yes, Maduro's universal scapegoat. Can you point to what "US meddling" you
think caused this crisis?

> why did Kellogg's leave the country? it's unclear.

Are you fucking serious? It pulled out of the country because the country is
in economic free-fall, and the government is notorious for expropriating
companies at a whim. How the government was able to ruin Venezuela's _oil
industry_ and is too incompetent to even operate existing infrastructure
should be a case study for the world.

> May it be in part because of US government pressure? not unlikely.

Based on what?

Using the abandoned factory isn't the problem. It's what _led_ to that
situation that's the problem.

> international sanctions are the direct cause of most of the problems that
> make the news daily (lack of medicine, food, etc).

Direct cause of most of the problems? What the hell? On what basis do you
claim this? Are you even familiar with the factors that led to the current
crisis at all?

------
arriu
I feel like the authors should have picked either narrated video or text, not
both. I couldn't get through this, too painful.

------
erikb
I wonder, if you go there can you still buy stuff for USD? E.g. how does the
reporter survive there? I can't imagine a journalist would drop to that
quality of life he describes just for his job.

~~~
probably_wrong
If you have access to USD, you can usually exchange them quite easily - not
officially, of course, but you'll find buyers: importers that will get a nice
return on them, individuals who want to keep their remaining savings from
disappearing, and so on.

------
lentil_soup
Given the presentation doesn't actually provide how people survive, these are
some "insights" into it:

\- Paper money is useless (as seen in the video) so everything is done via
bank transfer. This has led to a very fast adoption of internet banking. You
want to pay someone, you make them a transfer and show them the transaction.

\- There are places where paper money is needed, parking lots. You have to pay
100.000 bolivares in bills of 500. ATMs don't give you enough money to cover
that, so you need to ... buy packets of money, for a premium.

\- Credit cards can't keep up their limits with the inflation. All the credit
cards in a middle class family amount to a few dollars.

\- Unusual for a country like Venezuela, some weird sense of trust is now
needed. You might go to get a haircut and then make a money transfer from your
PC when you get home. No one wants your paper currency.

\- Bitcoin has become a common way of sending money from abroad to family in
Venezuela. There's people that will buy it in exchange for Bolivares
(Venezuelan currency) at a premium. Again, you have to trust them to hold
their side of the bargain.

\- All of the issues above work while internet and electricity are working,
which very often, doesn't. Banking infrastructure is pushed to its limits .

\- There's start ups trying to work around these trust and centralized systems
using blockchain technology.
([https://www.citywallet.net/](https://www.citywallet.net/) \- in spanish)

------
djschnei
"Revolutionary Cornflakes"... these people are pure evil.

------
adreamingsoul
Ehh, I find this experience difficult to read and understand (as someone who
embraces Aspbergers). I had to give up trying to read it because I have no
idea where I am and if I missed something.

------
wdn
The title should replace "Money" with "Currency".

It's the Venezuelan Bolivar is worthless. If you use gold or silver, I am sure
they will be more than happy to accept it.

~~~
delecti
That would make for a less catchy title.

Though amusingly by the definition of "money", worthless currency doesn't
qualify.

------
epistasis
This presentation is a great experiment, but it's just that, an experiment in
presentation. It should never have been released to the general public, just
to UI or web dev forums in order for them to learn from.

I think that human computer interaction has taken massive steps back from the
90s. That, or I'm getting old. Could be both too.

Aside: some great content here though. so many beautiful shots of the country.
And some brief text that gave a tiny bit of color.

~~~
sandworm101
The biggest step back happened after we started describing the "human-computer
interaction". I don't want an interaction. I'm talking to a machine, not a
person. This isn't a two-way conversation. If I wanted to see transitions
between slides and text fed to me piecemeal, I'd watch a TV report on the
issue. This article is like watching that TV report but also having to click
an arrow every ten seconds to prove I'm still paying attention. I got through
maybe six slides before giving up.

~~~
danharaj
> I'm talking to a machine, not a person. This isn't a two-way conversation.

I guess you operate your computer with no output devices?

~~~
sandworm101
I do, but I am the master in the computer-human or website-human relationship.
If I want to read faster, I tell the machine to move faster and it does. When
I machine tells me that I am moving too quickly or two slowly and demands that
I alter my behavior ... the human does not take orders from the machine. They
work for us.

------
csomar
The format is not bad. I think what made the experience a bit bad for me is
the slow Internet connection. It would help if the presentation force you to
wait until everything is loaded.

Now back to complaining about the content: It is very light on details. I'm
very interested in the Venezuela crisis but this gives practically no numbers
and thus no idea about how bad the situation is.

------
baybal2
An excellent read on economics of "dead economies," and why would one give a
gold bar for a piece of bread is "Necroeconomics" by V. Papava

[https://www.emeraldinsight.com/doi/abs/10.1108/0306829021044...](https://www.emeraldinsight.com/doi/abs/10.1108/03068290210444421)

------
pascalxus
I think it's great that this is being publicized and getting attention. It
took many economic mis-steps to bring such a country to it knees (printing
money, restricting prices with price ceilings, import taxes, etc), I kinda
wish they would focus on all the economic errors they've made, so the rest of
the world can learn from those mistakes.

~~~
digi_owl
The main error was to be the economy on heavily exporting oil, only for the
oil price to tank (Thanks, Saudis).

While being able to heavily export oil, they could heavily import stuff that
could help the poorest of the population.

But when the oil price dropped, they were loath to cut back on the support
systems. Thus a massive trade deficit developed, and the exchange rate tanked.

While the reasons are different, it is the same "death spiral" as one could
witness in Germany between the wars, or in Zimbabwe.

------
excalibur
> Last year millions took to the streets last year to protest the mismanaged
> economy and silencing of the opposition.

If you're going to have a multimedia presentation with polished production and
very small amounts of text, you should be aware that it makes proofreading
failures seem like a much bigger problem than they would be otherwise.

------
StavrosK
Are people there still using the Bolivar? Why haven't they switched to some
alternative currency? Wouldn't that solve many of the current problems?

~~~
icebraining
There are probably heavy controls on the import of foreign currencies.

~~~
StavrosK
That makes sense... Cryptocurrencies might have helped there, but with how
hard they are to use and with how impossible it would be to actually exchange
them to and from fiat, they'd practically be no help at all.

------
narvind
Both form and content are superb. Very moving story. The crisis is real. We
have to act now.

What are the best ideas proposed so far that might help them?

~~~
olivermarks
Should have been a video, not a slow to load click through light weight social
media snapshots format.

This is a very serious humanitarian and economic problem and the glossy
reportage format is too glib and simplistic IMO.

More importantly, what will help is an end to the western siege on their
economy because they are a socialist country
[https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/socialism-blame-
ve...](https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/socialism-blame-venezuelas-
crisis-180530095418091.html)

------
AnsisMalins
I fucking hate the modern web.

------
aspyct
So... the country needs help. How do we help?

~~~
AnimalMuppet
I don't think we can.

Any attempt to do so will be resisted by the government as the meddling of the
imperialists, to be opposed at all costs. We either have to invade to remove
the government by force (and kill a bunch of the army), or we can do very
little.

One thing that we might, in other circumstances, do, is to tell Columbia, for
example, that any refugees that come over the border we will take, so that
they don't need to try to keep them out. But under current political
circumstances in the US, even that seems out of reach...

------
lisper
This is not an article, it's a movie with subtitles. (It should have a [video]
tag.) And it doesn't address how to survive when money is worthless, it just
shows some vignettes from Venezuela that illustrate how hard it is to survive
when money is worthless.

~~~
TheCowboy
It's a hybrid article. Mixed media. Interactive web page. The categorization
of movie seems to imply some dismissiveness as well.

The article isn't so much an instructional video on how to survive, and could
be interpreted as ironic on some level. I don't think the title is beyond
critique, but the content addresses how people are surviving by showing people
who are surviving, even barely.

If people think conditions in Venezuela are not that bad, and there are people
who believe that, then this should give them pause.

~~~
loeg
In what sense is it hybrid or mixed media? It's ordinary video, with
subtitles.

~~~
TheCowboy
The usual video content I experience isn't presented this way. It's also not
all video and includes still images. Video loops with text overlays as a
webpage vs. Youtube embedded video vs. a movie on Netflix with no interaction.
Maybe multimedia presentation is a better description.

The presentation style is simply not the same as a movie. You can argue that
it's not unique or original, but trying to make that point by dismissing it as
a movie seems pedantic.

~~~
loeg
We'll have to agree to disagree. It's essentially a short film documentary
that happens to be presented via a webpage.

------
mattlondon
Is there a text version? The "multimedia" presentation is pretty annoying.

~~~
drb91
Haven’t you heard _everything_ needs picture stories now, if not video? Text
is so outmoded.

~~~
trimbo
"Print is dead"

\-- Egon Spengler

------
thomasfedb
As much as I love media-rich reporting, sometimes I just want to scroll and
read. Currently on crappy hotel WiFi and this article is to hard to read
(watch?) on this connection.

