Word: argentinas
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...sellout crowds. Since the bigger kids always used to hog the baseball field, we first-graders would have the large field in the back of our school (San Benito in Humacao. Puerto Rico) all to ourselves. There were about 15 of us and every game was Brazil against Argentina. Problem was, everyone wanted to be Pele; no one liked the Argentines...
While the occasional street activist will inevitably mumble something about "yankee imperialism" and "ruthless American multinationals," the vast majority of Argentines know better: namely that throughout the past 45 years, their economy, along with the Soviet Union's, has been the world's most mismanaged. In fact, Argentina has become the classic example of a nation that, simply through misguided economic policies, has virtually destroyed its once-competitive position in the world economy...
...depths of the tragedy can be measured elsewhere: Unemployment has risen to its highest level in fifteen years. Over 44 percent of the population in Greater Buenos Aires is now living in poverty. And for the first time in recent history, Argentina, which has traditionally prided itself as a haven for German, Italian, Russian and, more recently, Korean immigrants, saw a net flow of emigrants out of the country...
...then appointed the selfproclaimed guru of free-market economics in Argentina, Alvaro Alsogaray, to be his leading economic adviser. Ignoring the opposition of the telephone unions, Menem gave Alsogaray's daughter the task of privatizing the state-run telephone company that has for years been ridiculed by Argentines, who have a host of horror stories to tell about how tough it is to make routine local calls...
...Menem can successfully implement the necessary economic reforms (privatizing the woefully inefficient state-run enterprises that cause the massive state deficits, allowing the central bank greater autonomy in setting monetary policy and overhauling the primitive system of tax collection that enables economic elites to get a free ride) Argentina will likely recover, though the process will inevitably be very long and painful for the nation...