Inflation, even in dollars, dims Venezuelans’ holiday season

By REGINA GARCIA CANO
Associated Press

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Tradition dictates that Venezuelans wear brand new clothes on Christmas and New Year’s. Many often paint their homes. But the dollar bills circulating all across the country might as well show the Grinch instead of Washington this year. The government’s loosening of controls on dollars may have made them easier to get, but it has also made them less valuable in Venezuelan shops. Dollars prices overall are about 40% above those last year. And that has threatened the tradition known as “estrenos,” or premieres — a practice that already had been badly eroded by Venezuela’s sharp, yearslong economic decline.