Venezuela’s Lying Statistics

Surprise! Venezuela, the world’s most miserable country (according to my misery index) has just released an annualized inflation estimate for the quarter that ended September 2015. This is late on two counts. First, it has been nine months since the last estimate was released. Second, September 2015 is not January 2016. So, the newly released inflation estimate of 141.5% is out of date.


I estimate that the current implied annual inflation rate in Venezuela is 392%. That’s almost three times higher than the latest official estimate.


Venezuela’s notoriously incompetent central bank is producing lying statistics – just like the Soviets used to fabricate. In the Soviet days, we approximated reality by developing lie coefficients. We would apply these coefficients to the official data in an attempt to reach reality. The formula is: (official data) X (lie coefficient) = reality estimate. At present, the lie coefficient for the Central Bank of Venezuela’s official inflation estimate is 3.0.