Cuban Engineers make very little and Cuban Doctors are extorted by their government according to my step dad.
This happened a few years ago so I, unfortunately, cannot remember all the details of the conversation. But even so it still bothers the hell out of me to this day.
Cuba was obviously the topic of discussion and I was raving about how their doctors are the best in the world, my step dad then mentioned that when they are sent overseas they must return home, they cannot just leave Cuba at all (perhaps for vacation but other than that they apparently have to remain in Cuba forever). I was unbothered by this, because honestly I wasn’t fully convinced, and said “thats fine.” He laughed in disbelief because what he just described was “extortion.” The Cuban government is extorting their doctors.
At some point my mom and step dad were talking about their vacation to Cuba and how their cab driver was apparently an engineer but had to work this side job to make more money. I guess being a cab driver is more lucrative? I do not remember why he was telling me this, maybe it was a way to criticize the Cuban economic system? Regardless, this discussion has bothered the hell out of me ever since it happened, and although I cannot remember some of the specifics the main parts still eat at me to this day.
So, is anything that he told me true? I have a hard time looking this information up as all the sources I get are from the West and very anti-Cuba in general so they’re unhelpful. Thanks for any information you can provide!
Edit: grammar/spelling mistakes.
The Cuban state takes a portion of the salary the Cuban doctors earn during their foreign missions, yes.
It’s called a TAX, not extortion.
The funniest part is that education in Cuba is fully free for citizens. It’s obvious that if the state is paying for your specialized education, you give back to society so others can also learn, just like your education was paid for by others. That’s how it works in any society that isn’t atomized to hell
It’s obvious that if the state is paying for your specialized education, you give back to society so others can also learn, just like your education was paid for by others.
The problem is that this is anything but obvious to liberals. They don’t recognize the concept of working for the benefit of the society that gave you the education which enabled you to get to where you are. It is assumed to be self-evident that everyone only works for their own personal gain and profit with no obligation to anyone but themselves. Because fundamentally, when you boil it down to the underlying philosophy behind it, liberalism doesn’t recognize society, it only recognizes the individual.
This is also why liberals are incapable of recognizing how big of a crime brain drain is: when you take away the skilled and educated workers into which a country has invested years and years to educate, you are literally robbing that country. This is especially bad when people who were educated for free under socialism then leave the country that gave them their education. The socialist bloc was portrayed as oppressive for restricting travel and emigration but those policies were absolutely reasonable from the point of view of a society which put so many resources into developing its human capital, of course they don’t want to give it away for free.
This makes so much sense, it would be a huge loss for those educated (paid for by public funds) to just up and leave their home high and dry.
It’s very silly & lazy, yet it works almost every time.
🇺🇸 Our democratic taxes | Their authoritarian extortions 🇨🇺
If that’s the thing he’s complaining about that’s fucking crazy. It sounds like a typical income/travel tax which we get over here in Canada too!
There is thing called ‘income tax’ that the Cuban state uses to provide free education, healthcare, and housing. The capitalists call it ‘extortion’ because there is no private industry to make huge profits out of these Doctors.
Canada also has an income tax so I do not know why there are complaints. I think maybe the anger comes from the fact that Doctors are “supposed” to make a shit-ton of money (only if you’re super senior) so when they don’t people get weird about it. I do not think my step dad is aware of the embargo. Anyway, I am glad Cuban doctors help those abroad and at home, they’re really amazing and I do not know why their movement is seen as “”extortion.”
Capitalism has turned the needs as basic as education and healthcare into luxuries. So when Cuba shows the world how providing medical education to anyone who is capable of pursuing it can solve healthcare, it creates an incongruence in the capitalists’ belief system. Thus the liberal world feels the need to condemn Cuba for exposing the inherent contradictions of their doctrine. The market-worshipping liberal mind can’t fathom the fact that a doctor is just another worker, and in a society that doesn’t profit off of ailing people’s misery, they won’t have the opportunity to exploit large amounts of money.
No. They don’t. These are lies from the Miami gusanos and have been debunked even at Narco Rubio’s face by the Jamaican Prime minister, Andrew Holness.
For more than six decades, Cuba, a country with limited resources and under a cruel sanctions regime from the most powerful nation on the planet, has demonstrated that true solidarity translates into action. That is why more than 605,000 Cuban health professionals have voluntarily participated in missions in 165 countries, attending to more than 2.3 billion patients, performing around 17 million surgeries, assisting more than 5 million births, and saving more than 12 million lives.
Our medical cooperation is neither a business nor an instrument of exploitation. It is solidarity that saves lives and responds to the requests of sovereign governments whose people benefit from it. Participation in these missions is voluntary, regulated by bilateral agreements, and respectful of international law and the rights of Cuban professionals, who return to their countries with social and professional recognition. The accusations of “forced labor” are unfounded and part of a political narrative.
It seems that you have way more questions so I recommend the website “cubainformacion.tv” because they are usually the ones that debunk every single lie from the gusanos that are spread through Latin America and Spain.
Sources
Thank you so much for the resources, I do have a lot of questions so I appreciate this a lot. I know that what was said to me was propaganda but wanted to know more so I can better combat it.
Glad that I could help! Even though most of the information is in Spanish, it will help you as long as you translate it for your needs.
there is literally a memo from the 1950s from the office of the secretary of state where they’re like “castro is super popular, that probably isn’t going to change, we’re going to embargo them so that people literally starve to death until they overthrow the government”
which sounds more like extortion to you
https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1958-60v06/d499
That’s not what extortion is. Extortion is when you threaten someone so that they do something to benefit you. Cuba is not threatening it’s doctors, and it’s not trying to get the doctors to do something that benefits Cuba, other than just be doctors who get paid to be doctors.
As for the cab driver story, yeah, the country is being starved of everything. If you want money, you get it from the rich American tourists. That’s how every poor country has always worked with white tourists. Poor in China? Do work for the American tourists, they have no idea how much anything costs locally.
That’s just Cuba being poor because the US is extorting them. The US is saying we are going to keep starving your children, your sick, and your elderly unless you do what I say.
That was my immediate thought too regarding the cab driver. Like, yeah, the embargo makes it so the country is poor so the people have to do extra like getting tips from tourists! This is done in so many other countries too.
Well here’s a definition I can find on extortion:
to obtain from a person by force, intimidation, or undue or illegal power
the act or practice of extorting especially money or other property
I’m not sure I can even envision how exactly Cuba would go about taking money from its overseas doctors through threats. (Which is the only related scenario I can think of that would fit the definition.) Cuba is not exactly an empire who can make shit happen at will with military force outside its borders. It’s under siege by the empire as we speak.
Like what would they do? End the program and make the doctors come home if they aren’t doing what they want or something? How are they going to enforce that?
It sounds a lot like an example of psychological projection. The empire acts in extorting, forceful ways across borders. So people who pick up on this might project this trait onto other countries that they think are being led by “bad leaders”.
The possibility that people could be loyal to the revolution and want to work towards its success because it has supported them and works toward humane goals is completely off the table for that kind of worldview. Every sign of struggle means someone is a victim of communism and every sign of success must be propaganda.
“nonfalsifiable orthodoxy” as Parenti put it:
spoiler
“During the cold war, the anticommunist ideological framework could transform any data about existing communist societies into hostile evidence. If the Soviets refused to negotiate a point, they were intransigent and belligerent; if they appeared willing to make concessions, this was but a skillful ploy to put us off our guard. By opposing arms limitations, they would have demonstrated their aggressive intent; but when in fact they supported most armament treaties, it was because they were mendacious and manipulative. If the churches in the USSR were empty, this demonstrated that religion was suppressed; but if the churches were full, this meant the people were rejecting the regime’s atheistic ideology. If the workers went on strike (as happened on infrequent occasions), this was evidence of their alienation from the collectivist system; if they didn’t go on strike, this was because they were intimidated and lacked freedom. A scarcity of consumer goods demonstrated the failure of the economic system; an improvement in consumer supplies meant only that the leaders were attempting to placate a restive population and so maintain a firmer hold over them. If communists in the United States played an important role struggling for the rights of workers, the poor, African-Americans, women, and others, this was only their guileful way of gathering support among disfranchised groups and gaining power for themselves. How one gained power by fighting for the rights of powerless groups was never explained. What we are dealing with is a nonfalsifiable orthodoxy, so assiduously marketed by the ruling interests that it affected people across the entire political spectrum.” ― Michael Parenti, Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism
my step dad then mentioned that when they are sent overseas they must return home, they cannot just leave Cuba at all (perhaps for vacation but other than that they apparently have to remain in Cuba forever)
I don’t really know. It may have been at least somewhat true until 2013. But what is Cuba going to do, extraordinary rendition? The question nowadays may be, what countries will allow them permanent residency or citizenship?
I’ve heard that there’s been bullshit propaganda about Cuban doctors, but I’ve never looked into the facts, so that’s all I can say.
