jacqueslaub @jacques00 - Twitter Profile

Pinned Tweet

jacqueslaub @jacques00

over 4 years ago

Finally updated my portfolio :) https://t.co/p2aoeCfpA8

0

1

0

jacques00 retweeted

Handre

@Handre

29 days ago

France-Albert René seized power in Seychelles through a coup in 1977, promising his people the revolutionary paradise that socialism would deliver. He nationalized industries, imposed price controls, and centralized economic planning across the island nation of just 60,000 people. The results arrived swiftly and predictably. By the mid-1980s, Seychelles faced economic collapse. State-controlled agriculture produced chronic food shortages despite the islands' fertile soil and favorable climate. Tourism, the natural economic lifeline for a tropical paradise, withered under bureaucratic mismanagement and foreign exchange restrictions. The government treasury emptied as subsidized state enterprises consumed resources without producing value. Black markets flourished while official commerce stagnated. Rene confronted an unavoidable choice: watch his country sink into poverty or abandon the socialist experiment. In 1991, he chose pragmatism over ideology. The man who had imposed single-party rule and Marxist economics suddenly embraced multiparty democracy and free markets. He privatized state enterprises, eliminated price controls, opened the economy to foreign investment, and established the Seychelles as an international financial center. The transformation was immediate and dramatic. GDP per capita surged from roughly $4,000 in 1990 to over $15,000 by 2010. Tourism exploded as private operators could finally respond to market signals and customer demands. The Seychelles developed a thriving offshore banking sector, attracting international capital with competitive tax rates and regulatory efficiency. Agricultural productivity increased as farmers could sell their crops at market prices rather than government-mandated rates below cost. Private property rights, enforced contracts, and competitive markets accomplished what central planning never could. Entrepreneurs opened luxury resorts, developed fishing operations, and created service businesses that employed thousands of Seychellois. Foreign investment flowed into telecommunications, transportation, and financial services. The islands became one of Africa's wealthiest nations measured by per capita income. Rene's conversion represents more than one dictator's pragmatic pivot. His experience validates every prediction free market economists make about socialist central planning. Price controls create shortages. State ownership destroys incentives. Central planners lack the information that market prices provide. Bureaucrats cannot allocate resources efficiently across millions of individual decisions. The Seychelles experiment also exposes the intellectual poverty of those who claim mixed economies or "democratic socialism" avoid these problems. Rene tried gradual reforms first. He attempted to maintain state control while improving performance through better management and more resources. These half-measures failed because the fundamental issue was not incompetent administration but the absence of market mechanisms. When Rene finally embraced capitalism, prosperity followed not because he was particularly wise or skilled but because free markets work regardless of who implements them. Private ownership creates incentives for productive behavior. Competitive pricing allocates resources to their most valued uses. Profit and loss guide entrepreneurs toward satisfying consumer preferences. The most remarkable aspect of the Seychelles transformation was Rene himself remaining in power through 2004. Voters rewarded him for delivering economic growth even though he had initially imposed the socialism that created their poverty. His political survival demonstrates that people care more about results than consistency. Today, the Seychelles ranks among the world's highest-income countries. Visitors enjoy world-class resorts, pristine beaches, and efficient services that market competition provides. The islands that once suffered under socialist mismanagement now prosper as a free market success story. Rene accidentally conducted the perfect economic experiment: identical geography, climate, and population under two radically different systems. Socialism produced poverty and stagnation. Capitalism delivered prosperity and growth. The results could not be clearer.