The immoral thing of monetary duality in Cuba
Victor and Sanchez,
independent journalist
victorernestosanchez@ymail.com

               

                            (Normal Cubano Peso, is only changeable by the CUC, at the rate of 25 to 1)

SANTIAGO OF CUBA, 8 of April, 2009 (www.miamiprogressive.com) the 28 of April of the 2008, was announced that by the end of the 2009 would be realized the postponed one I SAW Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC), ordered to plot the course to follow by the Cuban town in the next years. By such reason the text that will guide the analysis of the subject in meetings of study on the part of the militants of Partido Comunista (PCC) and Union of Jóvenes Comunistas (UJC), tries to correct ignorance who surrounds to the existence of two currencies at national level, the disparity between both and its possible unification.

Nevertheless, specialists in the matter have recognized that the elimination of monetary duality in Cuba, will not give back the spending power of the population nor will create “of in case� new wealth, clarify the document guides for the debate of 6to. Congress of the Communist Party.

In the speech delivered by Raul I castrate the 26 of 2007 July, the Cuban governor indicated: “to avoid traumatic effects and incongruities, any change referred to the currency must take control of an integral approach, in which factors like the wage system, the retail prices and the state gratuities and subsidies to many services and products consider�.

The professor of the Training center of Cuban Economía (CEEC), of the University of Havana, Pável Vidal, talking about to the subject clarified: “People think that when the double currency is eliminated they are going to improve its real income, something that cannot be obtained if there is no a growth of the production�. And in addition it emphasized: “the elimination of the double currency cannot be obtained by means of the substitution of the Cubano Peso by the convertible weight to the rate of one by one, as some erroneously could think�.

Condiscípulo of times of student, who today comprises of the Economic Commission of the Popular Power, commented to me during a coffee in the Isabelica, that the document for the preparation of the Congress of the Party already had been studied by them and the double subject of the clean one had lead to deep analysis “, rational and associated� since there were suggested Raul I castrate when it assumed the 24 of February of the 2008 presidency of the Republic.

Nevertheless, conclusive recommendations were not obtained, according to their expositions, since not even they have been possible to implement the fiance'es reforms announced by Raul, Carlos Lage, who had considered the creator of the cleaning of finanza internal, has been dismissed even of the position, without a convincing explanation on the matter.

With all these antecedents we can reach the conclusion, del that the problem is not the double currency in himself, but the economic policy that governs the country, where it is pleased to them to the people with a currency totally devaluated, in a 125% of its real nominal value with respect to the convertible weight. The primary target of the chavito call is to use it like a burden on the sale, to control the effects of the perennial inflation in Cuba and to avoid the psychological effects of the relation between the wages and the prices, that limit the spending power.

The immoral thing is not that there are two currencies in Cuba, but with them cannot be bought what it is needed from a right and reasonable wage and without discrimination of one on the other.  The Cubano Peso had a printed legend that determined its liberating force to all the national territory. Nevertheless, the last ticket impressions that legend was eliminated to them, that constitutes an immorality from the fist of legal view

The social vindication in Cuba must begin to demand the parity between the wage and the prices and that the wages and all the forms of income correspond with the real value of the circulating currency.

Some activists have headed a civic fight in such sense, to draw attention politically of the citizen right to pay with the same money pay the wages to him, something that is very right, but defocused technically from the economic point of view.  When paying the consumption according to the conversion of the Cubano Peso with respect to the convertible weight (CUC) does not take place any legal disobedience, but an administrative irregularity.

There are other aspects of the double currency that also are necessary to emphasize, the criminal activity that it is generated around all this phenomenon of monetary confusion, the administrative corruption from the duality of the rates of change, that in the state companies is one by one, while in the CADECAS (Houses of Changes) it is 24 pesos to purchase and 25 on sale, in the direct transaction with the population. This it is the mechanism that uses many agencies you are in the outside in conspiracy with Cuban civil servants to deceive the taxes on the dollar that establishes the government and to send remittances to the change one x one, dollar by CUC.

Another negative aspect to emphasize, is the unjust commercial relation between the government and the producers of the country, since they buy products to him in current Cubano Pesos and they sell the consumptions to them in convertible weights CUC, which deforms the cost/value of the merchandize and reduces or annuls the power of entrance of the producers, essentially of the farmers.

What yes he is positive, are the savings that a small sector of the population can do, that having the experience of the legalization of the dollar, knew the use advantages that currency, with which it realizes its savings, with the security which never they will be affected by an exchange of money in a process of political transition in Cuba.

Here I leave the photos them of some denominations of the convertible weight, that them can be very useful to the people who travel Cuba, so that they become familiar with them and to avoid that they are swindled.

Bill of 50 pesoses, nonconvertible National Currency.