The US just attacked Venezuela and reportedly captured President Maduro. Will Venezuelans as a whole be better off at the end of 2026 compared to the end of 2025? Resolves based on my personal knowledge and understanding.
I will not bet in this market. I will try to be unbiased, but I am a Democrat who is generally doubtful of America attacking other countries. I am also not a fan of Maduro.
I will attempt to find trustworthy and objective criteria and reporting to inform the resolution, and may run a poll asking what people think about whether Venezuelans are better off. However, if suitable objective criteria cannot be found, the market will resolve based on my subjective judgment.
A trustworthy poll of Venezuelans themselves asking if they're better off would be the gold standard if available.
This applies to people living in Venezuela, not people of Venezuelan heritage or Venezuelan citizenship.
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Thanks for sharing!
More than three-fourths say things are going badly, and only 6% see things going well, under interim President Delcy Rodríguez — the Maduro regime holdover whom Trump has strongly praised for letting the U.S. take control of Venezuela’s oil.
Almost 90% percent disapprove of Trump’s support of Rodríguez, and 94% say she’s doing too little to move Venezuela back to democracy.
Last week, for example, Rodríguez asserted that a national amnesty process to free Venezuela's political prisoners has run its course — even though about half of them, almost 500, still remain behind bars.
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More than 80% of the Venezuelans also say their economic situation has worsened under Rodríguez's interim presidency.
So far, this sounds like it would resolve NO. Still eight months to go though, let's hope for good things for Venezuelans.
@Gabrielle we should adjust for incumbent polling negativity 😆 (but ya, agree that this would probably be strong evidence towards NO)
Thanks mostly to Maduro's catastrophic socialist economic policieis, Venezuela has only recently begun to recover from the worst humanitarian crisis in modern South American history.
What an incredible journalistic line. Simply stated, with no evidence, reasoning or spellcheck, in the middle of polling data, by the "Americas editor" of this NPR affiliate. Every other line in the article is an "according to". This is the piece of original analysis that must be placed.
Older news here but, repressive state apparatus appears intact per UN report:
Pretty bleak situation, though, I’ll give you that, one economist quoted in the piece leaves some room for cautious optimism.
Somewhat surprising that this has not degraded at all given that it seems like if essentially nothing of substance happens further it will resolve NO, and nothing has really happened for the past two months.
@Balasar Based on my brief research, I think that if the market were to end today, it would resolve NO. However, there's still another nine and a half months to go!
@AhronMaline Venezuela continues to have immense pressure on it diplomatically from the us. Given the us left the current administration intact and are just making demands there’s a minimal chance anything good happens here, it’s just going to be a tighter ship with less resources for the citizens
@Magnify what do you mean by "anything good"? If Rodriguez is less effective than Maduro at suppressing dissent, is that not called marginally "better off"?
@AhronMaline not really, the demands (especially in light of recent events) I predict to centre around the us taking Venezuela’s oil reserves.
Dissent will happen less (for now) because it was focused on the hated figure of Maduro. Delcy has no benefit to the actual governance of the country besides the fact that Venezuelans don’t hate her as much yet.
You’re also looking at this too granular. This is a general market on the whole state of Venezuela. A global economy collapse for example will resolve this NO regardless of what happens in Venezuela, even if Delcy turns heart (which she will not).
Gradual economic decline, forced abandonment of Cuba, military humiliation, and persistence of the authoritarian regime itself seem likely to ovewhelm relief from Maduro being deposed and modest concessions to Trump as far as the Venezuelans in Venezuela are concerned. Would love seeing some good translations of what they're saying so far though!
https://www.cnn.com/2026/01/30/americas/venezuela-amnesty-law-political-prisoners-latam-intl
Venezuela’s acting president has announced a proposed amnesty law that could lead to the release of hundreds of political prisoners, as well as the closure of a notorious detention center, in her latest concessions since the US capture of President Nicolas Maduro.
Ben Rowswell thinks NO (based on Delcy Rodriguez remaining in power)
@MachiNi I spoke to him and heard him speak on this at an in person event, I was invited by him personally. There may be a recording online though, this was the event
https://iid.kislenko.com/sovereignty-or-subjugation-the-stakes-of-the-venezuela-crisis/
They freed the political prisoners I think this is a good sign https://x.com/maps_black/status/2009312548953190718?s=20