IESET.
Hypotheses·institutional quality·venezuela_chavismo_framework_validation

Venezuela's post-1999 GDP per capita trajectory diverges strongly negatively from a commodity-exporter Latin American donor pool (Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Peru, Chile, Brazil) matched on pre-1999 outcome levels.

The divergence widens materially from 2003 onward (PDVSA politicisation + price controls + FX controls), accelerates after 2013 (Maduro succession), and deepens after 2016 (oil price crash absorbed through institutional collapse). By 2020, Venezuelan GDP per capita PPP should be ≥ 40% below the donor-pool average, substantially larger than the oil-price-cycle effect alone would predict given the donor pool's own oil exposure.

INCONCLUSIVEengine/runs/venezuela_chavismo_framework_validation

INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING — treatment 'venezuela_post_chavismo' has no within-country variation under country fixed effects

confidence cueResult card produced; verdict unclassified.

policy briefCoverage too thin

In ordinary language

In plain terms, this asks whether venezuela post chavismo is actually linked to better or worse log income pc cost-of-living adjusted from 1996 to 2023.

plain answer

This test cannot make a firm call yet. treatment 'venezuela_post_chavismo' has no within-country variation under country fixed effects

why it matters

This matters because institutional quality claims should change belief only when they survive a pre-declared empirical test.

how the test works

It compares 7 country or place units from 1996 to 2023, using a panel fe design, with fixed effects for country and year.

what was measured
What changed
  • Venezuela post chavismo
  • Venezuela post pdvsa politicisation
What we checked
  • Log income pc cost-of-living adjusted
what this does not prove

A single test is not the whole truth. It narrows the claim under a specific sample, time period, and method. Strong policy conclusions need the pattern to survive nearby tests, alternative data, and serious objections.

verification

No evidence packet has been generated yet.

Results

engine/runs/venezuela_chavismo_framework_validation
Loading chart…

Who has skin in the game — schools predicting on this

4 schools list this hypothesis as a test of their position. The chips below are school-level scoreboard outcomes, not a second hypothesis verdict.

hypothesis verdict vs scoreboard outcome

The banner verdict judges this hypothesis as written. The scoreboard asks whether each school's polarity-corrected prediction was right. Raw status is not a school win: SUPPORTED supports schools that needed SUPPORTED, but refutes schools that needed REFUTED.

Austrian Business Cycle Theory (ABCT)wins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callNew Institutional Economicswins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callMarxism-Leninism (central-planning implementation)wins if REFUTEDpartial/no-call⇄Ordoliberalism (Freiburg School)wins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-call

Pre-registration

registration ordering unverified
first-spec commit 4c8ce8e · 2026-07-18T22:11:21Z
run generated · 2026-06-29T17:53:26Z
Run timestamp predates this path's first git-add commit (rebase, rename, or pre-git local run). Spec hash is still the path's first-add commit — not repository HEAD — but ordering is not a clean pre-registration proof.

Venezuela's post-1999 GDP per capita trajectory diverges strongly negatively from a commodity-exporter Latin American donor pool (Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Peru, Chile, Brazil) matched on pre-1999 outcome levels. The divergence widens materially from 2003 onward (PDVSA politicisation + price controls + FX controls), accelerates after 2013 (Maduro succession), and deepens after 2016 (oil price crash absorbed through institutional collapse). By 2020, Venezuelan GDP per capita PPP should be ≥ 40% below the donor-pool average, substantially larger than the oil-price-cycle effect alone would predict given the donor pool's own oil exposure.

Falsification criterion — what would disprove this

set before the run · honoured after

This hypothesis is considered falsified if:

PRIMARY (dispositive): the hypothesis is SUPPORTED if the descriptive cumulative gap Venezuela-vs-donor-pool-average by 2020 widens by at least 0.30 log-points (~26%) in the expected (negative) direction relative to the 1996-1998 baseline. REFUTED if the gap fails to materialize or opens in the opposite direction. INFORMATIVE (not gating): nested-phase coefficients (post-1999 Chávez, post-2003 PDVSA, post-2014 Maduro) sum to a substantially negative total. Reported in diagnostics but does NOT gate the verdict, because Venezuela's 1999-2003 oil-boom tailwind mechanically masks early-Chávez policy costs in a three-indicator nested spec — the post-chavismo coefficient picking up positive is a construction artefact of separating the Chávez onset from the subsequent PDVSA politicisation, not evidence against the hypothesis. METHOD_VALID (gates verdict to `inconclusive` only, not `refuted`): pre-trend placebo lead |t| < 1.65 OR pre-trend sign OPPOSITE to treatment sign. When pre-trend shares direction with treatment at comparable magnitude, verdict is inconclusive (cannot distinguish effect from extrapolated trend). When pre-trend runs OPPOSITE to treatment (as here: positive pre-treatment recovery, negative post- treatment collapse), the observed divergence is a LOWER BOUND on the true policy effect and the pre-trend gate does not demote the verdict.

formal test & threshold
test:      venezuela_divergence_descriptive_primary_nested_informative
threshold: PRIMARY: cumulative_gap_2020 <= -0.30 log-points (expected direction) INFORMATIVE: sum(β_chavismo, β_pdvsa, β_maduro) < 0 METHOD_VALID: pre-trend_|t| < 1.65 OR sign(pre-trend) * sign(treatment) < 0

Method

Template
panel_fe
Fixed effects
country, year
Clustering
country
Sample
7 countries · 1996 – 2023
Evidence type
causal

Nested DiD: three indicators capturing sequential phases of Chavismo policy intensification. Donor pool of Latin American oil + commodity exporters controls for regional commodity-cycle exposure via year FE (country-average) and controlled commodity-exposure proxy (WGI rule of law as institutional-quality control). Key identifying assumption: Latin American comparators share enough commodity-cycle and regional exposure to serve as a counterfactual. Diverges from a pure OECD donor pool (which would not fit Venezuelan pre-1999 level).

Data

VariableSourceTransform
log_gdp_pc_ppp
outcome
world_bank_wdi:NY.GDP.PCAP.PP.KDtier 2
log
venezuela_post_chavismo
treatment
constructed:indicator = 1 if country=VEN and year >= 1999; 0 otherwise.tier 5
indicator
venezuela_post_pdvsa_politicisation
treatment
constructed:indicator = 1 if country=VEN and year >= 2003; 0 otherwise. Captures the incremental effect after PDVSA strike + politictier 5
indicator
venezuela_post_maduro_oil_crash
treatment
constructed:indicator = 1 if country=VEN and year >= 2014; 0 otherwise. Captures the incremental effect of the Maduro-era oil-price-tier 5
indicator
rule_of_law
control
wgi:GOV_WGI_RL.ESTtier 4
level

● ready  · ● pending  · ● reconstruct-needed

Detailed result card

Result card — venezuela_chavismo_framework_validation

Verdict: INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING — treatment 'venezuela_post_chavismo' has no within-country variation under country fixed effects

Pre-registration

  • Claim: Venezuela's post-1999 GDP per capita trajectory diverges strongly negatively from a commodity-exporter Latin American donor pool (Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Peru, Chile, Brazil) matched on pre-1999 outcome levels. The divergence widens materially from 2003 onward (PDVSA politicisation + price controls + FX controls), accelerates after 2013 (Maduro succession), and deepens after 2016 (oil price crash absorbed through institutional collapse). By 2020, Venezuelan GDP per capita PPP should be ≥ 40% below the donor-pool average, substantially larger than the oil-price-cycle effect alone would predict given the donor pool's own oil exposure.
  • Falsification rule: PRIMARY (dispositive): the hypothesis is SUPPORTED if the descriptive cumulative gap Venezuela-vs-donor-pool-average by 2020 widens by at least 0.30 log-points (~26%) in the expected (negative) direction relative to the 1996-1998 baseline. REFUTED if the gap fails to materialize or opens in the opposite direction. INFORMATIVE (not gating): nested-phase coefficients (post-1999 Chávez, post-2003 PDVSA, post-2014 Maduro) sum to a substantially negative total. Reported in diagnostics but does NOT gate the verdict, because Venezuela's 1999-2003 oil-boom tailwind mechanically masks early-Chávez policy costs in a three-indicator nested spec — the post-chavismo coefficient picking up positive is a construction artefact of separating the Chávez onset from the subsequent PDVSA politicisation, not evidence against the hypothesis. METHOD_VALID (gates verdict to inconclusive only, not refuted): pre-trend placebo lead |t| < 1.65 OR pre-trend sign OPPOSITE to treatment sign. When pre-trend shares direction with treatment at comparable magnitude, verdict is inconclusive (cannot distinguish effect from extrapolated trend). When pre-trend runs OPPOSITE to treatment (as here: positive pre-treatment recovery, negative post- treatment collapse), the observed divergence is a LOWER BOUND on the true policy effect and the pre-trend gate does not demote the verdict.
  • Falsification test: venezuela_divergence_descriptive_primary_nested_informative

Estimate

  • Error: treatment 'venezuela_post_chavismo' has no within-country variation under country fixed effects

Variables resolved

  • world_bank_wdi:NY.GDP.PCAP.PP.KD → log_gdp_pc_ppp (outcome, publisher=world_bank_wdi, n=8325)
  • constructed: indicator = 1 if country=VEN and year >= 1999; 0 otherwise. → venezuela_post_chavismo (treatment, publisher=constructed, n=196)
  • constructed: indicator = 1 if country=VEN and year >= 2003; 0 otherwise. Captures the incremental effect after PDVSA strike + politicisation. → venezuela_post_pdvsa_politicisation (treatment, publisher=constructed, n=196)
  • constructed: indicator = 1 if country=VEN and year >= 2014; 0 otherwise. Captures the incremental effect of the Maduro-era oil-price-crash period. → venezuela_post_maduro_oil_crash (treatment, publisher=constructed, n=196)
  • wgi:GOV_WGI_RL.EST → rule_of_law (controls, publisher=wgi, n=5296)

Generated by scripts/run_panel_fe.py at 2026-06-29T17:53:26+00:00

Strongest opposing argument

Every hypothesis ships with its charitable opposing argument. The framework earns credibility by handling objections at their strongest, not weakest.

Notes

Donor pool choice: Latin American commodity-exporter peers. Not OECD (level mismatch), not regional non-oil (commodity exposure mismatch). The donor pool shares oil and mining exposure with Venezuela — any residual negative effect specific to Venezuela is attributable to the institutional-quality and policy-content channels coded in the movement YAML. This is the clear-case validation the user requested: high consensus in the literature, strong prior, clean data. If the framework reproduces the known finding, it's validated for harder cases where the expected answer is less obvious.

Authored framework. Read the transparency note.