Chapter 1: What is the strange partnership between Chevron and Venezuela?
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In the wake of news that the United States had captured and arrested the leader of Venezuela and would run the country for some amount of time, one specific American company found itself suddenly in a very strange spotlight.
A case in point, a huge meeting last week at the White House.
But today I'm delighted to welcome almost two dozen of the biggest and most respected oil and gas executives in the world to the White House.
President Trump assembled basically the entire American oil industry to discuss his goal of turning Venezuela back into a booming petroleum exporter.
But Trump appeared to be looking out into the crowd for one company in particular.
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Chapter 2: How did Venezuela become the world's first petrostate?
Where's Chevron?
Where's Chevron, he asks.
Where are you? No, I thought you'd have a better location. You were the only one that was there for all that.
Yes, Chevron was there in Venezuela from the time that oil literally rained down on the country, caused a boom, and turned Venezuela into the biggest oil exporter in the world.
Chapter 3: What economic challenges did Venezuela face due to its oil dependency?
Chevron was there when that oil money transformed Venezuela into the first petrostate and transformed Caracas into a gilded global capital.
But most notably, Chevron kept being there when things went bad and when Venezuela took more and more of the oil industry away from foreign companies.
And so in that White House room full of the most powerful oil executives on the planet, Trump singled out Chevron's executives.
I used to call you and say, what the hell is going on with Venezuela? He stuck it out. I don't know if you made money or not, but you stuck it out. They got to give you a lot of credit for that.
Chapter 4: How did Chevron navigate Venezuela's changing political landscape?
Pretty sure Chevron did make money and are pretty well positioned to keep making it. Hello and welcome to Planet Money. I'm Kenny Malone.
And I'm Erika Barris. Venezuela and Chevron are perhaps one of the strangest public-private partnerships ever. One of the world's most famous and profitable corporations has for decades been plugging away in one of the world's most famous and infamous socialist countries.
Chapter 5: What role did Juan Pablo Perez Alfonso play in Venezuela's oil industry?
Today on the show, before Saudi Arabia, before Iran, there was Venezuela, the first petrostate, the first country whose entire economy became dependent on oil. And with that blessing, an entire economic textbook of complications opened up, from the Dutch disease to the resource curse to mono-economic vulnerability.
And oddly, along for that ride, little old Chevron. Or at least it was little at first, because thanks in part to Venezuela, Chevron is now the second largest oil company in the U.S.
Yeah, even if they got seated pretty far from the president at the White House.
Marco just gave me a note. Go back to Chevron.
Chapter 6: How did the 1970s oil boom affect Venezuelan society?
They want to discuss something. Go ahead. I'm going back to Chevron. Thank you, Marco.
The economic history of Chevron in Venezuela. The OG Petro State after the break. So you had all those oil executives at the White House talking about Venezuelan oil and not all that excited, except for Chevron.
We very much look forward as a proud American company to help it build a better future.
Chapter 7: What led to the rise of Hugo Chavez and his oil policies?
And so, Mr. President, thank you for your leadership. You really suffered there. You stuck it out.
To understand what happened to make all those companies leave while Chevron stayed, we called up Stanford political economist Terry Carl, who told us she's interviewed every Venezuelan president except Nicolas Maduro since she started following the story of oil in Venezuela back in the 1970s.
Venezuelan oil was discovered more than 100 years ago at Lake Maracaibo, which actually happens to be the same lake that inspired Italian explorer Americo Vespucci to give Venezuela its name.
He sees these indigenous people living in houses on stilts. And he says, my goodness, it looks like Venice. And he calls it Little Venice, which is what Venezuela means.
Over the next couple centuries, Venezuela became a Spanish colony. Then it was part of Colombia.
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Chapter 8: Why is Chevron still operating in Venezuela today?
And by the early 20th century, it had gained independence, was run by a series of dictators, and had its own export economy.
Venezuela is an agrarian country. It exports one thing.
I was going to ask, should we guess? Erica, you want to guess?
I think I'm going to guess coffee. It has to be coffee. Atta girl. The country's number one export was my favorite bean.
But not for long. This is a time in the world where there are European and American explorers and botanists and geologists all over the Americas looking for something on land or in the ground that might make them rich. And in Venezuela, some of them were digging up oil in that same place that gave Venezuela its name.
Yeah. In 1922, they made a huge oil discovery at Lake Maracaibo, the Lake Maracaibo Gusher. Some surveyors had been digging for oil for years around that lake. And then one morning, the earth started to rumble and there was a loud roar. And this small well came alive in a way that no one had ever seen before. It started spouting up oil.
You want sound effects?
Yeah, please do. 200 feet above the derrick. That's what we call the oil well tower thing. It spewed oil. This black, tarry oil that sprayed everyone and everything in the town.
And that oil, it blew for nine straight days. Raining oil on people and trees and houses. It made headlines. It made lines of oil on people's heads. Also, kind of freaked out the townspeople reasonably. It made a huge mess, and then it caused a proper oil rush to Venezuela.
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