During 1979 and 1984, Venezuela lived under the president of Carlos Andrés Pérez. His presidency was marked by the beginning of the Government intervention of the Free Market, but at a very low level. He started by "Nationalazing" the Oil on Venezuela through buying the Foreign Oil Companies in Venezuela (even though the Nationalization process was going to happen naturally on a few years and it would bring money) and using the high prices of the Oil (nothing like the boom of the 2000's though) to lower the prices of goods in Venezuela.

This created a moment in our history where everything was cheap and everybody said "that's cheap, give me two". This boom would give a moment like no other in recent Venezuelan history, with the creation of national museums, new TV networks, the boom of culture, etc. But this came with a price.

By renting the Oil and making everything cheaper in general, The Venezuelan government brought back an international debt (that was gonce since the dictatorship of Juan Vicente Gómez) and made the citizens of Venezuela very dependable on the State and lovers of easy things. The best way to describe it would be through the words of the President Luis Herrera Campins when he came to the Presidency on 1984:

"I've received a mortgaged Country!"

From the following years, the Bolívar (Venezuela's currency) would start to devaluate more and more and the debt would rise because the State wasn't capable of getting rid of all the help they brought to the Venezuelans (when it was attempted in 1989 by Carlos Andrés Pérez himself, the citizens of Caracas made a huge riot) and that wasn't even counting on the corruption that would be begun by the political parties that wanted to benefit from this buoyancy.

All of this was repeated by Chavismo by even longer lengths, we now owe to China, Russia and who knows how many countries. Meanwhile, all the money was wasted by giving it to other countries and with Social programs that didn't produced anything good for the country (like free houses, without property rights) and now that the boom is gone. Venezuela may dissolve.

This can be told on any country, if you think everything is fine, if you think that "we're better than ever" but you think the State is helping a lot on the Country. Better take a second look, you may see that your country is getting mortgaged.