Victor Olivo

PhD Economics University of Connecticut. Follower of Milton Friedman. A humble defender of free markets.

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

Macro textbooks that try to explain the New Keynesian model using the AD-AS apparatus in which the AD schedule is derived from the IS-MP model without money, and describe the same adjustment process to shocks as when the AD is derived from the IS-LM framework are dead wrong.

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

Statistics from communist countries are worthless

[Gaby Blanco @_gabyblanco]

- Cuba’s literacy rate was already 4th highest in the hemisphere before the revolution. Today it’s still comparable to many middle-income countries.

- Many countries offer free education without demanding loyalty and submission to the ruling party.

- Many countries subsidize university education without forcing students to do hard labor to pay for it.

- There is nothing worthy of praise about Cuba’s education system.

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

Interesting perspective

[Niall Ferguson @nfergus]

“Before I join in the swelling chorus of former Obama and Biden officials rushing to write op-eds denouncing the MOU, or the Middle East hawks decrying it as an instrument of U.S. surrender, it is important to remember that a piece of paper by itself is not a peace. For peace is made as much by actions as by words—and as much by the unforeseen consequences of diplomacy as by the intended ones.
“The Trump administration prides itself on its realism. That is why key figures seem to feel no compunction about pulling the plug on the Israelis, and deeply disappointing many of their Arab friends in the Persian Gulf, too. Yet Trump is as much at the mercy of unpredictable historical events as [Woodrow] Wilson before him.
“Right now, Trump’s 14 Points look as wretched as Wilson’s 14 Points looked splendid in 1918. But who can be sure what lies ahead? What if the most perilous time for Iran’s horrible regime is not when it is under intense bombardment, but when it makes peace and smells the approach of boatloads of money? What if, at the same time, it turns out that the IRGC’s equally blood-soaked confederate, Vladimir Putin, is in deeper trouble than we realize with his war in Ukraine? And what if the reason oil prices didn’t go even higher than they did in the past four months is that China’s domestic economy is in free fall, as some numbers indicate?
“What if, in short, President Trump’s luck holds—as it has held so often throughout his 80 years of often reckless risk-taking?
“In the end, the wording of this lousy memorandum of understanding may matter less than the second- and third-order consequences of Trump’s Iran war. The economic consequences to date have certainly been far less damaging than I foresaw earlier in the conflict. Maybe, just maybe, the same will turn out to be true of the geopolitical consequences.”

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

But you can bet he has helped to destroy many jobs.

[Alec Lace @AlecLace]

Bernie Sanders has never created a single private sector job in his life.

Career politician. Multimillionaire. Owns 3 homes.

Elon Musk’s companies have created over 150,000 direct jobs worldwide and counting.

Guess which one the media worships?

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

Olvidé mencionar que el PIB de Venezuela en 2025 está alrededor de $60.000 millones. Nota: la cifra de $100 mil millones del FMI es una sobrestimación.

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

Inversión necesaria en 10 años para recuperar el sector eléctrico $96.000 mill. y el sistema de saneamiento y distribución de agua $25.000 mill.
Deuda pública externa (2025) $183.000 millones.

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

Resentment is the limitless energy that moves Marxists everywhere.

[Bill Ackman @BillAckman]

.@BernieSanders , it is a time to celebrate. @elonmusk has created enormous value for society by building @SpaceX, driving down the cost of rocket launches and creating a global satellite communication network that has brought high speed, low-cost internet and communication access to hundreds of millions and eventually billions of people along with critical advantages for our military and our nation’s defense.

SpaceX and its technologies will cause an acceleration in the growth of wages and wealth creation globally, including in some of the poorest communities in the U.S. and around the world.

Access to low-cost, high speed communications everywhere will allow children around the world to be educated, families to build businesses, and life-saving medical knowledge and care to be available everywhere.

SpaceX will materially bring down the cost of compute, advancing AI and humanity.

Meanwhile, 4,000 SpaceX employees yesterday became millionaires, including hourly wage employees who you claim you are trying to help.

The Elon Musks of the world drive growth, global GDP, and provide access to goods and services at lower cost that would otherwise not exist.

Elon’s nominal trillionaire status is due to his ownership of SpaceX, Tesla, Neuralink, the Boring Company and his other initiatives that have brought new technologies that improve our everyday lives.

Elon is not sitting on a trillion dollar pile of cash, jewelry and gold. He is using his controlling stakes in his companies to advance mankind. Elon’s companies don’t pay dividends. They reinvest all of their capital to accelerate innovation and value creation.

Elon is working 24/7 for all of us. He deserves respect and appreciation, not smears.

Bernie, your socialism would never allow a SpaceX to be built. Socialism has only proven to impoverish mankind and lead to death and destruction.

We need to create the conditions for more SpaceXs to be built, not attack the great entrepreneurs who are helping to advance our country.

[Bill Ackman @BillAckman]

.@BernieSanders , it is a time to celebrate. @elonmusk has created enormous value for society by building @SpaceX, driving down the cost of rocket launches and creating a global satellite communication network that has brought high speed, low-cost internet and communication access to hundreds of millions and eventually billions of people along with critical advantages for our military and our nation’s defense.

SpaceX and its technologies will cause an acceleration in the growth of wages and wealth creation globally, including in some of the poorest communities in the U.S. and around the world.

Access to low-cost, high speed communications everywhere will allow children around the world to be educated, families to build businesses, and life-saving medical knowledge and care to be available everywhere.

SpaceX will materially bring down the cost of compute, advancing AI and humanity.

Meanwhile, 4,000 SpaceX employees yesterday became millionaires, including hourly wage employees who you claim you are trying to help.

The Elon Musks of the world drive growth, global GDP, and provide access to goods and services at lower cost that would otherwise not exist.

Elon’s nominal trillionaire status is due to his ownership of SpaceX, Tesla, Neuralink, the Boring Company and his other initiatives that have brought new technologies that improve our everyday lives.

Elon is not sitting on a trillion dollar pile of cash, jewelry and gold. He is using his controlling stakes in his companies to advance mankind. Elon’s companies don’t pay dividends. They reinvest all of their capital to accelerate innovation and value creation.

Elon is working 24/7 for all of us. He deserves respect and appreciation, not smears.

Bernie, your socialism would never allow a SpaceX to be built. Socialism has only proven to impoverish mankind and lead to death and destruction.

We need to create the conditions for more SpaceXs to be built, not attack the great entrepreneurs who are helping to advance our country.

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

Inversión necesaria en 10 años para recuperar el sector eléctrico $96.000 mill. y el sistema de saneamiento y distribución de agua $25.000 mill.
Deuda pública externa (2025) $183.000 millones.

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

Usted es de los que cree que:
1) Desear que Chávez se pudra en el infierno es malo;
2) Desear que a Cilia y Maduro le den cadena perpetua es malo;
3) El chavismo debe tener un espacio en las decisiones sobre el futuro del país;
Pues considere lo siguiente:

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

We have to stop listening and giving publicity to these bunch of delusional fanatics.

[Pedro Santa Clara @psantacl]

Six famous economists — @JosephEStiglitz , @PikettyWIL , @jasonhickel among them — published a manifesto in the @guardian last week: "growth is a doomed strategy." They say they've done the maths.

I checked the maths.

The claim that growth failed the poor is contradicted by the most uncontroversial dataset in economics: extreme poverty fell from 44% of humanity in 1981 to under 10% today — during the very decades they call a failure. China alone lifted 800 million people, not with a UN roadmap, but with growth.

The "92% of excess emissions" statistic? It's one of the authors citing his own paper, without saying so — and it's not a measurement, it's a moral allocation dressed up as data.

The policy toolkit — "public control of strategic assets," "credit guidance" — has a track record: Soviet collectivization, the Great Leap Forward, Venezuela, and Sri Lanka's 2021 fertilizer ban, which starved the poor it claimed to serve within eighteen months.

What worries me most: degrowth is being marketed to young people who feel locked out — telling them their stagnation is virtue. It's a swindle. The young aren't victims of too much growth. They are the first victims of its absence.

Growth is the only anti-poverty program that has ever worked.

[Pedro Santa Clara @psantacl]

Six famous economists — @JosephEStiglitz , @PikettyWIL , @jasonhickel among them — published a manifesto in the @guardian last week: "growth is a doomed strategy." They say they've done the maths.

I checked the maths.

The claim that growth failed the poor is contradicted by the most uncontroversial dataset in economics: extreme poverty fell from 44% of humanity in 1981 to under 10% today — during the very decades they call a failure. China alone lifted 800 million people, not with a UN roadmap, but with growth.

The "92% of excess emissions" statistic? It's one of the authors citing his own paper, without saying so — and it's not a measurement, it's a moral allocation dressed up as data.

The policy toolkit — "public control of strategic assets," "credit guidance" — has a track record: Soviet collectivization, the Great Leap Forward, Venezuela, and Sri Lanka's 2021 fertilizer ban, which starved the poor it claimed to serve within eighteen months.

What worries me most: degrowth is being marketed to young people who feel locked out — telling them their stagnation is virtue. It's a swindle. The young aren't victims of too much growth. They are the first victims of its absence.

Growth is the only anti-poverty program that has ever worked.

[Bjorn Lomborg @BjornLomborg]

20 years ago, An Inconvenient Truth put climate change at the center of global debate, shaping politics, influencing leaders, and inspiring a generation of activists.

Two decades later, we can assess not just its impact, but its accuracy. Many of the film’s most alarming predictions did not materialize, while many of the policies it inspired have proven costly and ineffective.

The lesson? Panic is a poor guide for public policy. Focusing on innovation, adaptation, and economic development can do far more to help both people and the climate—at a fraction of the cost.

https://t.co/EIJyuNeFU1

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

The second more stupid thing you can do after believing in communism is believing in the statistics released by communists.

[John Cochrane @JohnHCochrane]

Another example of confusing levels with growth rates.

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

This is what happens when ideology prevails over academic rigor.

[Sylvain Catherine @sc_cath]

The notion that the world is less equal today than it was between 1910 and 1950 is just historically ridiculous and really makes the point that all these metrics should take much more seriously the vast welfare state systems that emerged during and in the immediate aftermath of this period.

This is the main blind spot of Piketty, Saez and Zucman’s empirical view of the world. They consider the distribution of tax rates, of which a substantial part fund social insurance, without considering the distribution of transfers and benefits. They consider the distribution of wealth without considering the value of entitlements…

This approach creates inequality metrics that would improve if we were to dismantle the welfare state. Which is exactly what this graph suggests by implying that the world is just as unequal today as it was during a period that saw two world wars and the greatest economic depression since the Industrial Revolution.

You cannot celebrate Roosevelt, Attlee and so on and use inequality metrics that make social insurance programs look like they foster inequality

[Gad Saad @GadSaad]

I shall take more than 50% of your hard-earned money from you. Because I'm kind and empathetic, I'll give you a check of $100. Now STFU Canadian, and be grateful. - @MarkJCarney

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

Antonelli’s fantastic qualifying lap today was 2.097 seconds slower than Lando’s last year with the longer, wider, and heavier previous generation cars.

[James Woods @RealJamesWoods]

And now Europe is on the precipice of falling to medieval savages and their liberal facilitators.

[🇺🇸RealRobert🇺🇸 @Real_RobN]

Here is:

The domestic terrorist Rashida Tlaib, calling on Hamas supporters to mobilize and take down the United States government, right here on U.S. soil.

“We’re in every corner of the United States.”

[Gad Saad @GadSaad]

Does this alarm you?

[Victor Olivo @velocitymv]

I really admire the hard work you put in disclosing the propagation of an anti-western/anti-capitalist narratives from within the UN

[UN Watch @UNWatch]

“Many so-called U.N. independent human rights experts are engaged in very extreme anti-American, anti-Western, anti-capitalist, far-left, and certainly anti-Israel agendas. That's the dominant ethos.”

— Hillel Neuer with @FDD and @CliffordDMay