- Jose Tarano
The Funeral of the Ration Book and Socialist Equality
Introduction to Article Update
According to unofficial media of the Castro government, Prime Minister Manuel Marrero Cruz, during his speech in the National Assembly, had expressed the elimination of subsidies to the basic basket.
According to the unofficial media of the dictatorship, Marrero had expressed that the process of eliminating subsidies would be implemented gradually, product by product, but without the possibility of reversal. "It is a path that has no turning back," he said, stressing that the measure is part of a broader plan to reactivate the Cuban economy. The plan includes price policies and the elimination of subsidies to basic products and services, decisions that Marrero described as "complex" due to their impact on the purchasing power of Cubans and the stability of the national currency. One analysis that we concluded is to completely eliminate the subsidy from the basic basket, but the issue is complicated because it would not only be necessary to subsidize people in vulnerable conditions. Practically most of the budgeted workers their salaries would not allow them to cover that difference," Marrero said.
This "news" described as false by the regime could have been generated by the dictatorship itself as a strategy of the dictatorship to measure and know in more detail the reaction of the people, since they know that the elimination of subsidies would be a direct blow to the purchasing power of Cubans, especially in a context where the ridiculous monthly installments of the few products that are supposed to be available to the Cuban people. consumers are not regularly distributed, in addition to the fact that prices of basic foodstuffs, such as rice, sugar, salt, eggs, and bread, are already unaffordable for many families who are forced to buy them on the black market or in MSMEs. The "news" spread on social media, in the press, websites, as well as television and radio programs.
According to the official Cuban website "cubadebate.cu" The Ministry of Domestic Trade (Mincin) denied a news circulating on social networks about the elimination of food products from the regulated family basket. In X, Mincin urged the population to stay informed through the official channels of the institution.
The denial of the news in Cubadebate gave rise to opinions that were not in favor of the dictatorship, such as the comment that we reproduce below:
Survivor said: The best thing is that they withdraw the ration book, it denies the news but months go by and the products do not enter, where is the coffee, well what looks like coffee because it is so mixed with so many things, they give you 7 pounds of rice, my question is someone survive a month with that, where is the protein, the gas, Now they reduce the size of the bread, everything is reducing, temporarily removing how many children without milk, chronically ill without medical diets, and they stand at the round table and say that the basic basket is guaranteed, I challenge them to live a month with what they give in the basic basket to see what happens, my opinion take away the ration book.
The ration book has been a fundamental part of the Cuban socialist economic system since its creation in the 1960s. This mechanism, designed to ensure control of and access to basic products, represents an attempt by the Cuban government to show false equality by providing a small number and quantities of food products for the subsistence of the population and a population control mechanism. However, the total elimination of subsidies to the basic basket and the failure to deliver the measly quotas of basic products, plus the imposition of the dollarization of the market have transformed the economic and social panorama of the country, leaving the population facing a difficult reality of inequality due to the scarcity of basic products for the subsistence of the average Cuban. This essay will analyze the roots of the ration book, the impact of its elimination (possible), the dollarization of the economy, the unfulfilled promises of the Cuban regime, and the myth of the equality of socialism.
The Roots of the Ration Book
The so-called "supply" booklet was conceived as a tool for social and economic control of the Cuban population. For decades, it provided access to minimum basic goods at subsidized prices, which was used as propaganda to demonstrate socialist equality. However, as the Cuban economy faced recurring crises caused by the inefficiency of the Castro dictatorship, this system's effectiveness began to crumble. With the Soviet Union's collapse in the 1990s, the shortage of basic products worsened, as the subsidy provided by the former Soviet Union to the parasitic Castro dictatorship was lost, and the ration book became a symbol of a declining system. This context laid the groundwork for the final elimination of subsidies, which, under the handpicked President Díaz-Canel's regime, has come to an end as economic aid from socialist allies like Russia, Venezuela, and China has been lost or considerably diminished.
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