True monetary unification will be difficult to achieve in Cuba. The steps taken so far, coupled with what we know about how the Party-State operates, suggest we will continue to see the opportunistic use of multiple exchange rates.
Read MoreCoverage in Cuba on the situation of the poor in other countries is extensive and crowned by bold headlines. Here, on the other hand, we get a mere slice of our news, a hidden phrase somewhere at best.
Read MoreIn the course of recent weeks, Cuba has experienced a number of situations in which government officials made mistakes and later rectified them but tried to avoid asking for apologies.
Read MoreWhat makes one left or right-wing isn’t what one says but one’s position with respect to the political and civil rights of the majorities and to popular sovereignty.
Read MoreCuba is socially and economically exhausted, and neither Raul Castro nor the opposition have any time to implement the structural reforms needed to keep the country from falling off the edge of the cliff.
Read MoreThough political factors have taken center stage in Hong Kong’s current and massive protests, economic and financial interests could turn the tide definitively. Cuban HT reader Isidro Estrada brings us a first hand view of the situation from Peking.
Read MoreThe Cuban capital is being invaded by a new form of pollution that spreads quickly and causes much damage to the city’s appearance. I am referring to the many flyers, in black and white or living color, that are posted wherever there is room to do so. Through these, Havana is practically being sold piecemeal.
Read More“Folks, get a nose-full o’ this!” my friend Nene said, prompting the passengers that thronged at the front of the bus to laugh and nod their heads in agreement, while the group of Russians who had gotten on at the previous stop continued to talk with the driver and ask him something to do with the address they were heading to.
Read MoreCuba’s panorama today is not identical to that of the USRR in the times of Brezhnev, but it is similar. If Cuba’s so-called “historical leadership” does not wish to end up like Brezhnev’s generation, it must implement important economic and political reforms.
Read MoreSome days ago, the official newspaper of Cuba’s Communist Party, Granma, referred to the need to improve the country’s productivity and thus increase salaries, calling on workers to make greater sacrifices with a view to creating more wealth (the only conceivable way of improving wages).
The truth of the matter, however, is that achieving greater productivity and efficiency is often not in the hands of Cuban workers, but rather depends on their company’s managers and the bureaucratic structures created by the government to control and centralize these.
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