Erika Barris

Everyone knew the oil money was plentiful, so they didn't bother to develop other sources of income.

Oil created complacency across the country.

Everybody was just tapping the oil well.

So everyone was kind of playing this game, like the schools, the companies.

After the break, how Venezuela went from a swinging money flinging economy to what it is now.

By the 1970s, oil had turned Caracas into a booming metropolis where the scotch flowed and the rich rocked their oil derrick necklaces.

But Venezuelan historian Miguel Tinker Sala says there was another side to it.

Miguel says the Caracazo was a turning point.

It was called Apertura, the opening.

He says, God bless the people of Venezuela living a resurrection of the country.

And he told Venezuelans, we, Venezuela, we were rich.

Now we aren't.

Where has all that money gone?

He starts redistributing oil profits to poor people.

And over the years, he takes tighter control of the oil industry.

And ultimately, he just takes it over completely.

He says, you oil companies, you don't sell oil to us.

It is just ours now.

Your employees, ours.

Your equipment, ours.