The Economist Magazine: A Disingenuous "Analysis" Of Cuba's Current State of Existence
S. E. Anderson
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Since the abduction of Nicolás Maduro, the trump administration has ramped up its rhetoric against Cuba, claiming the government is “ready to fall.” But the imminent collapse pipe dream is as old as the embargo itself: Lawmakers, lobbyists and presidents have claimed the Cuban government’s days are numbered for decades.
Major media outlets have long joined in these doomsday forecasts, but in the weeks leading up to and after the U.S. attack on Venezuela, the familiar storyline returned with renewed intensity. The Wall Street Journal, Foreign Affairs and The Guardian have all used the exact same phrase: “Cuba is on the brink.”
These outlets rarely report with any depth on the primary cause behind Cuba’s devastating economic crisis: U.S. sanctions. Such is the case with a November article in The Economist: "Cuba is heading for disaster, unless its regime changes drastically."
This week, journalist Ed Augustin takes a hard look at the British magazine’s context-free reporting — and examines its long history of promoting elite interests and upholding the political status quo.
Also:
- Cuba to Enter “State of War”
- House Approves Bill Funding Cuba “Democracy Promotion”
- More Than Half the U.S. Wants Cuba to Be Sovereign
- Solidarity Activists Organize “Call-in Day” for Cuba
- Cubans in the U.S. Now Treated Like Other Immigrants
- Cuban Man’s Death in ICE Custody Likely a Homicide
- China to Send Cuba New Aid Package
What The Economist Didn’t Say
By Ed Augustin
Ever since it was founded in the 19th century, The Economist has enjoyed a cozy relationship with political and economic power in Britain. The magazine champions elite interests and scorns social justice.
“Cuba is heading for disaster, unless its regime changes drastically,” an article The Economist published in November, is a case in point. The piece rehashes tired clichés about Cuban socialism while ignoring the elephant in the room: U.S. economic warfare that has never been fiercer. The 1,600-word article mentions “the embargo” exactly once — and only in passing.
This is disingenuous.
“To ignore the U.S. blockade — now the longest and most punitive economic war in modern history — is not merely intellectually dishonest; it is propaganda masquerading as journalism,” professor Isaac Saney, coordinator of the Black and African Diaspora Studies program at Dalhousie University in Canada, wrote on Facebook. “For 65 years, Washington has set out to… cripple Cuba’s economy, deny it resources, isolate it from global finance, block food, fuel, medicine, and investment, and punish any country or business daring to engage with it. This is not a metaphorical war; it is a structural, economic, and psychological war designed to produce the shortages The Economist now reports as though they were natural phenomena.”
Belly of the Beast’s corrective
By ignoring the context, The Economist obscures understanding. Here’s our corrective:
The Economist: “Electricity goes on the blink in most places for at least four hours a day.”
Tragically, the reality is even worse: Most Cubans endure daily power outages of well over 12 hours. The Economist doesn’t bother to ask why.
The island has been suffering a fuel crisis since the U.S. government began sanctioning oil tankers to the country in 2019. The measures remain in place today, raising the cost of fuel needed by the island’s decrepit power plants to generate electricity.
U.S. sanctions on Venezuela have driven the decline in the country's oil production. In 2013, Caracas sent Havana almost 100,000 barrels per day; last year, Havana received a daily average of under 30,000 barrels per day. This fuel lifeline has been severed in the last month after trump’s enforcement of “a total and complete blockade” of sanctioned oil tankers. Seven tankers transporting Venezuelan oil have been commandeered.
In recent years, Mexico has become the primary supplier of oil to Cuba, with President Claudia Sheinbaum describing the shipments as part of her government’s humanitarian efforts in the Caribbean and a long-standing policy of Mexico.
Perhaps most importantly, so-called “maximum pressure” sanctions — imposed by trump during his first term, maintained by Biden, and intensified in the last 11 months — have succeeded in their aim of bankrupting the Cuban state. Economists estimate that on top of the embargo, these new measures cost the country billions of dollars per year. Cuba currently spends more than half its money importing food and fuel. Goring state revenues leaves the government with less money to buy fuel on the open market, to maintain power plants and to invest in renewable energy.
No wonder Cubans are suffering from the worst blackouts the country has seen since after the fall of the Soviet Union.
The Economist: “According to the Social Rights Observatory, a Spanish-backed think-tank…only 3% of Cubans can get the medicine they need at pharmacies.”
Until 2019, Cubans could get just about all the medicine they needed in local pharmacies at affordable prices. But since then, they have suffered chronic medicine shortages leading to empty pharmacy shelves.
The Economist’s numbers are again off the mark.
Cuban Prime Minister Manuel Marrero Cruz told Cuba’s parliament in December 2024 that 29% of medicines were available in the necessary quantities at hospitals and pharmacies.
Family doctors and pharmacists interviewed last month by Belly of the Beast say that since then, the situation has gotten worse: They estimated they are now receiving between 20% and 25% of the medications their communities need.
“Three percent is an absurd figure,” said Dr. Mayda Mauri Pérez, president of BioCubaFarma, the state-run biotech and pharmaceutical group that produces most of the island’s medicines. “Anyone making this claim is lying and will not be able to substantiate it.”
The statistic comes from the Social Rights Observatory, which The Economist presents as “a Spanish-backed think-tank.” The magazine fails to mention that the organization is a U.S. government cutout: It forms part of the Cuban Observatory of Human Rights, which was granted $2.2 million between 2019 and 2025 by USAID for Cuba “democracy promotion” (a.k.a. regime change) programs.
The Social Rights Observatory did not respond to questions about how it arrived at the 3% figure.
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The Economist: “Tourism, once a pillar of the economy, has collapsed…after the covid-19 pandemic the industry never recovered.”
Covid was a major blow for all Caribbean economies dependent on tourism. But for Cuba, it was a double whammy. The island was hit by the pandemic and potent new U.S. sanctions at the same time.
Following Barack Obama’s historic detente, tourism on the island surged to historic highs. Conversely, following the unprecedented hardening of U.S. policy, tourism tumbled from 4.75 million visitors in 2018 to just 2.2 million last year.
Successive administrations have designed policies to maximize damage. trump banned U.S. cruise ships from docking in Cuba and stopped flights to all Cuban cities except Havana in 2019. The Biden administration quietly rescinded ESTA privileges, or electronic visa waivers, for citizens from 40 countries who travel to Cuba. That means a British reader of The Economist who visits Cuba would be barred from going to the United States unless they first obtain a visa — a lengthy and uncertain process.
For most Europeans, traveling to the U.S. is an easy process. They qualify for the U.S. Visa Waiver program (ESTA), meaning they just have to fill out an online form. However, U.S. law denies normally eligible individuals access to ESTA if they have visited countries on its State Sponsors of Terrorism list. Cuba has been on the list since 2021 even though there is no credible evidence Cuba sponsors terrorism.
The emperor's new clothes
The Economist: “‘This system is so screwed up it’s unfixable,’ says a 52-year-old taxi driver who would leave if he didn’t feel obliged to look after his sick mother. ‘All you can do is get rid of it and start all over again.’”
For The Economist, calls to replace socialism are par for the course. The magazine was founded in 1843 by James Wilson, a British hat manufacturer who would go on to become a politician and banker. From the get-go, the magazine consistently opposed progressive politics on the grounds of advancing “free trade.”
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In the 19th century, The Economist advocated for abolishing Britain’s meager state welfare system known as the Poor Laws, policies that, according to the magazine, only encouraged “improvidence, idleness, fraud, and lying.” It opposed the Factory Act, which limited child labor to nine hours per day. It even moralized that steps toward public sanitation in Britain’s cities should be opposed: “There is a worse evil than typhus or cholera or impure water, and that is mental imbecility.”
The Economist has regularly cheerled state violence to crack open foreign markets. “We may regret war,” mused a 1857 editorial as British ships shelled Chinese ports during the second Opium War, “but we cannot deny that great advantages have followed in its wake.” More recently, it backed the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan, the 2003 invasion of Iraq and the 2011 bombing of Libya.
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In Latin America, The Economist celebrated the 1973 coup in Chile that replaced Salvador Allende’s democratically elected leftist government with Augusto Pinochet, who oversaw the murder of 3,000 people and the torture of tens of thousands more. A 2013 Economist article derided food and public health programs in Venezuela that extended fundamental human rights to millions of people, casting them as state “handouts.”
Serious critiques of Cuba — especially of the economy’s glaring internal problems and the current level of suffering on the island — are invaluable. But despite its smug self image as a magazine that marshals the facts to arrive at authoritative conclusions, The Economist shows no interest in rigorous inquiry when it comes to Cuba. Instead, it cherry picks data, uses dodgy sources and airbrushes the main driver of Cuba’s economic and humanitarian crisis. This is not journalism. It’s dogma.
Cuba to Enter “State of War”
Cuba’s National Defense Council on Saturday approved a plan for Cuba to enter a “state of war” following U.S. threats in the wake of Maduro’s abduction. A press release said it would be based on the concept of “War of All the People,” a Cuban defense strategy adopted in 1959 that relies on the participation of the armed forces, civil institutions and civilians in resisting foreign aggression. The announcement comes a week after National Defense Day in Cuba, during which civilians were trained how to operate rifles and machine guns.
House Approves Bill Funding Cuba “Democracy Promotion”
The House approved the Fiscal Year 2026 National Security, State Department and Related Programs Appropriations Act, which cuts spending by about 16% from 2025. But one area that has not been hit by cuts is “democracy promotion” aimed at “transition” in Cuba. Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart (R-FL), a close ally of Secretary of State Marco Rubio, is trying to help secure $25 million for the cottage industry of political operators, activists and media outlets seeking to bring about regime change in Cuba, as well as $30 million for Radio and TV Martí, long considered a pork barrel project benefiting Miami politicians and Cuban-American hardliners. The act must be approved by the Senate before becoming law.
More Than Half the U.S. Wants Cuba to Be Sovereign
Fifty-seven percent of people in the United States would like to see Cuba remain an independent nation, while 18% want the island to become a U.S. territory and 4% would prefer to see it as a U.S. state, according to a recent poll. The survey, conducted by Canadian public opinion research firm Research Co., also asked the around 1,000 participants the same questions regarding Canada, Greenland, Mexico, Panama and Puerto Rico — other countries trump has threatened with military intervention. Over half thought the countries should remain independent.
Solidarity Activists Organize “Call-in Day” for Cuba
The Alliance for Cuba Engagement and Respect (ACERE) organized a call-in day for Cuba on Wednesday. Participants across the United States called their congressmembers to oppose U.S. intervention in Cuba and demand a more humane policy toward the island. “The trump administration is escalating toward confrontation with Cuba while ignoring diplomacy, humanitarian needs, and the will of the American people,” said ACERE.
Cubans in the U.S. Are Being Treated Like Other Immigrants
For years, Cubans who immigrated to the United States benefited from a privileged policy known as “wet foot, dry foot.” From 1995 to 2017, Cubans who reached U.S. shores without being intercepted at sea by U.S. immigration authorities were allowed to pursue legal permanent residency after one year. But according to a recent New York Times article, “Cubans in Florida Are Being Deported in Record Numbers,” trump deported over 1,600 Cubans to Cuba in 2025 — more than any other year — and more were deported by land to Mexico. The trump administration has also frozen all Cuban immigration cases, scrapped family reunification programs and tightened visa approval processes that already took years. Watch our video: “Inside the U.S. Deportation Flights to Cuba.”
Cuban Man’s Death in ICE Custody Likely a Homicide
55-year-old Cuban immigrant Geraldo Lunas Campos was likely killed in an ICE detention center in Texas on January 3. ICE claims Campos committed suicide, but witness accounts and a medical examiner’s preliminary assessment suggest he died after being restrained by guards while pleading that he couldn’t breathe. One of Campos’ fellow detainees said at least five guards participated in choking Campos after he refused to enter his detention unit because he wasn’t provided with his medication.
Cuban Man’s Death in ICE Custody Likely a Homicide
55-year-old Cuban immigrant Geraldo Lunas Campos was likely killed in an ICE detention center in Texas on January 3. ICE claims Campos committed suicide, but witness accounts and a medical examiner’s preliminary assessment suggest he died after being restrained by guards while pleading that he couldn’t breathe. One of Campos’ fellow detainees said at least five guards participated in choking Campos after he refused to enter his detention unit because he wasn’t provided with his medication.
China to Send Cuba New Aid Package
This week, China announced a new assistance package for Cuba that includes $80 million for electrical equipment to improve the energy sector and 60,000 tonnes of rice. A ceremony at a grain transit warehouse took place on Monday to mark the first batch of rice delivered. China’s Ambassador to Cuba Hua Xin said at the ceremony: "We believe that through joint efforts, no blockade can extinguish the light of hope, and no difficulty can hinder our progress. China is willing to continue strengthening cooperation with Cuba, overcoming difficulties together, and injecting greater momentum into building a China-Cuba community with a shared future."
s. e. anderson
author of The Black Holocaust for Beginners
www.blackeducator.org
"If WORK was good for you, the rich would leave none for the poor." (Haiti)
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