Economy Of Lebanon: Explaining The Lebanese Crisis
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- Опубликовано: 10 окт 2020
- The Lebanese Economy is expected to contract by 20% this year. Inflation has reached over 100%. But why?
A small nation on the shores of the Mediterranean, Lebanon is one of the most diverse nations on earth. Once called the Switzerland of the Middle East, Lebanon was known for its banking sector. Yet now it finds itself having defaulted on its debt for the first time ever. Something it didn’t even do during the height of its 15 year civil war.
But how has it defied economic gravity for so long?
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Your video is great but many of the places shown are actually from UAE & Israel .
I’ve noticed many Lebanese people in the comments are laughing at the thought that their country was once considered the Switzerland of the Middle East but perhaps this was because they were born during or after the civil war. However those of us growing up in the mid 1970s we were very much aware that Lebanon was famous for its sophisticated banking sector, which made the world perceive it as the Switzerland of the Middle East and Beruit the Paris of the Middle East too. It was also for a long time the most developed and sophisticated country in that part of the world and used to be a leading gold and precious metals trading hub and one of the top tourist destinations in the world. it was similar to how Dubai was before the pandemic but Lebanon a more sophisticated and cosmopolitan population as it had the highest literacy rate in the Arab world and was its intellectual centre along with Egypt. But all that changed with the mid 1970s religious sectarian civil war which totally destroyed the country and its economy and standard of living and changed Lebanon’s international perception overnight from being a mini Switzerland to being a ‘mini Iraq’ with its once prosperous economy and living standards demolished. So the narrator does not mean it is currently considered the Switzerland of the Middle East he means Lebanon used to be regarded as the Switzerland of the Middle East up till the mid 70s due to its developed banking sector and tourist economy but that image of Lebanon was destroyed in the by the r civil war that collapsed the country and its economy. The banks have somewhat survived up till now. So If you were very young like me in the mid 70s or born during or after the civil war you would only have known Lebanon to be war torn country that has been slowly and struggling to rebuild, you’re less like to know of its glorious past which is a shame and sad, but hey, shit happens and that’s life.
Lebanon was an artificial Switzerland , gulf oil money and Tourism from Arab countries made it the Switzerland of the Mideast , but the above dynamics have changed, thus Lebanon is unlikely to be the Switzerland of the Mideast .
@@Jewzi123 we don't even want to be switzerland anymore we just want a basic life with the minimum of our needs provided, we are sick and tired,thank you dear government with all your foreign allies for making us hopeless❤️
All the glamour and charm of Lebanon in the 60s and 70s wad centerred around the capital beirut. Distant regions were always marginalized and are still lacking until today any proper infrastructure and any form of governement presence and policies
Iraq was also great in the 60s and 70s !
My grandma talked to me about beirut beeing the paris of the middle east. Also, I live in Argentina, other developed rich nation that become third world cause of dictatorships and corruption
I am from argentina and it shocks me how similar these issues are to the ones in my country
Triste
This is why Philosophy, Politics, and Economics exists as a single degree.
Haha we always made fun of the econ students as well. Reminded them every chance we got that their degree was an Arts degree. We also made fun of the accountant beancounters as well and that is a Science degree.
Would like to see your take on current Indian Economy post Covid.
Hi Malav, it's on the list. But get this request to 50 likes by the end of October and we'll do it sooner! 👍
It baffles me that California with 40 million people has almost $3 trillion dollar economy way ahead of india with 1.3 billion people and $2 trillion dollar economy.
@@norcalpinoy9618 its 2.92 trillion and growing at an avg of 7%. The thing is India was a socialist country till 1991 and private players werent allowed but then Indian economy collapsed then had to do reforms and liberalise it was a blessing in disguise since then we have grown tremendously.
@@norcalpinoy9618 India's GDP is ~$T 11, 3rd Highest in the World, on PPP basis. (5th Highest on the nominal basis.)
Dollar goes so much farther in India.
@@norcalpinoy9618 California by itself would be 10th largest country by economy thanks to big tech giants.
This video can also be called "The Economy of Nigeria"
The similarities are striking
As a Lebanese I see this video quite neutral and informative but the shop on the left on 4:45 may not last for a long time if it truly was in Lebanon. Hahaha. Otherwise excellent job.
And no matter where it is one day it will not be there anymore hopefully, just like Pissrael.
wastage of public funds, corruption, Hezbollah influence, the decline of tourism because of the Syrian civil war, the large number of immigrants, sectarianism, and patronage system are the main reasons for the economic collapse
Very correct!
Maybe the islamic influences?
@@yurichtube1162 lol
Excellent video
Great video. I wonder where you get your inspiration... ;-)
Haha! We always appreciate ideas from the community 👍
Fantastic channel, great content. Subbed....
Awesome, thank you!
nice info.
Too bad
This is a country with huge potential
You mix videos of Tel Aviv with Beirut ... what's the connection?
I very much hope that Lebanon will get through the crisis
I think its because Beirut and Tel Aviv looks so similar, when he searched Beirut in google images he prob saw many Tel Aviv pictures and didn't know it wasn't Beirut
@@lamichael8659 Yes this makes sense they do look similar .
Very similar situation to what we have in Sri Lanka. I have a feeling we maybe the next Lebanon.
Wait really ? do you also have sectarian politics ?
I doubt it. Geopolitically Sri Lanka can and is playing off the India vs China scenario. They have a great deal to gain from India's expanding maritime push.
Sri Lanka is much better in shape even after a civil war. I dont think so it's as bad as Lebanon.
hope sri lanka recovers
This is why leaders should only make decisions to better their nation and not fill their filthy pockets. It sad seeing an entire country fall and suffer like that
That's why I say somewhat constitutional monarchy ( some power with govt. N some power with king ) somewhat like England is best thing
If govt. Fails to do
king can intervene and can run the country
I like this channel
Thanks for posting! 👍
Pakistans external debt is 80% of budget still it has not failed. Surprising
many of the scenes are from Tel aviv
I also noticed that
It's to show what Lebanon's potential is and what lebanon could be
I think its because Beirut and Tel Aviv looks so similar, when he searched Beirut in google images he prob saw many Tel Aviv pictures and didn't know it wasn't Beirut
Make a video showing what caused hyperinflation in venzuala
Sanctions that's it
The price of oil was high at one time, so Hugo Chavez could spend generously on programs to benefit the poor. However the high price of oil made extracting oil by other means (offshore drilling, fracking, oil sands, etc.) profitable, so the market became flooded with cheap oil. The price of oil collapsed, but the Venezuelan government didn't stop spending. It printed the money that it needed, and thus it produced hyperinflation. (Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states are in a somewhat similar situation.)
usa global bullying
@@jahinsadman1505 -- Just look at the price of oil and the value of the Venezuelan bolivar: When the price of oil fell, eventually the value of the bolivar also dropped. And Venezuelan oil production also fell because the dictators replaced competent company employees with their (incompetent) friends.
I checked in google and found AREA of LEBANON 10452 square km and population around 7 millions mean overcrowd i guess, thank you.
And today Lebanon is red light street of middle east.
When foods are cheap, tourists are plenty and hot money free flowing…
0:00 church behind the mosque,waw
Actually the church was there all the time much before until the sunni Hariri constructed an obstructive mosque to show how much he respected the Christian community..the orthodoxe decided thereafter to raise the cathedrals tower..or be totally obliterated by the huge mosque..
@@HearMeSay2024 There is old big mosque also but it is more than 1350 years old it is called El Omari and some call it Ummayyad so they preferred to build new one rather than messing with the old one and I think Hariri wanted to leave legacy and also the project even before putting 1 stone was a push for him in the Election. And by the way unrealistic promises the politicians made through years is part of the cause of the current catastrophe.
@@abedjb3189 thks for the info...but if I am not wrong..the Umari mosque used to be a church.. obviously too many mosques or churches didn't suffice to stop ransacking the lebanese economy ..
@@HearMeSay2024 The Omari mosque was bought by some people from Umayyad dynasty more than 1350 years Ago even before they got to rule. Some people have to stop selling their churches then say it was this and that even now churches in EU and US are being sold and Turned into Mosques and other things. Anyway yes this doesn't help the economy in Anyway it is just an info. This politicians destroyed the Economy and the problem they didn't make any real economic reforms although this will not even harm them as now they aren't able to steel alot anymore. What lebanon needs is to get rid of all those politicians or this economic crisis will stay between 5 and 10 years maybe even more.
@@abedjb3189 Wait, how can that be? Your prophet moh was 1400yrs ago, and Islam never took off till 100yrs later as a movement, so would be the first or 2nd mosque in history. Think your over stating the age.. anyway i wish Lebanon a better future.
This is exactly what is happening in Nigeria right now in 2022
this is what happens when you "kick the can" down the road for far too long and overly rely on foreign investments like tourism and overly rely on diaspora payments
Foreign politic meddling has always been the Achilles heel of Lebanon.
That, coupled with the secterian fault lines in place as well as the corruption by the ruling oligarchy class makes for the perfect recipe in the current catastrophe. Add covid+financial meltdown, default on debt repayment and Viola....
today's dollar rate hit 19 000 LBP, gas, electricity, and food prices skyrocketed and keep on climbing, roads closed with cars making lines to gas stations, power outages are regular and increasing, its fucking mayhem !!
Man, i really hate stock images and videos.
Well the sky is still blue.
It's too complicated.
very small population ,you should be able to fix it.
Very separated small population ...
Wonder how many "u see" already said by the narrator...
I guess we'll have to wait and see! 👍 Thanks for the comment!
@@AltSimplified ahahaha.. Btw thanks for the good information video... Love this kind of video.... Keep it up bruh.... Support from Malaysia...
1:49 This is Abu Dhabi, UAE
Please use accurate stock videos for the countries for which your videos are intended. It is really misleading and confusing to use random videos. Not all Arab states look the same.
Take it easy. One scene out of the whole video was off; offer your correction and move on. Better to not get your feelings hurt.
@@jameskresl I spotted many others, and so did others in the comments reported seeing Tel Aviv and other cities. It seems that you are the one who is really butt hurt.
Nice video, yet with a few flaws. After the civil war lebanon didn't have much debt, and the capitol controls nowadays are not official as they were not imposed be a law, the banks just did what they thought was right for them. Anyway, it could have been the most beautiful country in the world, yet the people are paying now for there poor political choices, and to be honest they deserve it...
you're saying that people deserve to have their country crumble before a corrupt political oligarchy that can't be removed due to the taif agreement?
@@foufou3616 the lebanese are sectarian to the bone. They supported and lived off this system for decades, see how the elections go in lebanon. Even now, people are worried about their sectarian interests because they don't trust each other and don't believe in a united lebanese state. I hope things will get better, but after some radical changes have happened.
Lebanon had the support of a lot of countries with each of them having there own agenda, making, building, and sustaining Lebanon was never an option, it's a time bomb made to increase western values to the middle east, in the same time destroy the harmony collaboration of the Arabs counties, a very successful project, but like every single successful project when all its targets are met it's time to pull the plug.
I feel sorry for everyday Lebanese (who are honestly some of the most sophisticated people you'd ever meet) because their politics are fucked in such a profound way that i cannot even see how it can be unfucked even in a hundred years. Seriously, if you're reading this just do some research on Lebanese politics, it is astoundingly catastrophic.
4:14 that’s not Lebanon that’s my city Tel Aviv😂
Edit: 4:50 is Tel Aviv too, 7:50
Hi Arian, thanks for pointing out! The clips were mislabelled, but hope it doesn't detract from the content too much 👍
@@AltSimplified the video was still great
your country is one of lebanon's main problems :)
@@moesh5475 your country is also one of a Israel’s main problems :)
The thing is that israel wasnt a thing before 1948 and when they came they tried to take over egypt in October war but failed, tried invading lebanon in 1980 but failed and got kicked out in 2000 tried again in 2006 but got their ass kicked out again. Yet again israel lost the war in syria while they were alies with US Saudi Arabia and ISIS :)
We all know that all countries need to backbto gold standard at least have their currencies attached to something of Value.....like silver or gold.
A Diverse nation goes to shit? SHOCKED
China is diverse yet owns more than half of the Europoors 😂😂
@@anishapoorwakispotta7754 liking your own comment? sad no china is not diverse is diverse like 1995 Europe was diverse as in its more than 90% han Chinese, and were still a hell of a lot richer than you Islamapoor
Carlos slim can help them. 10 lebanese billionaires on the fact addict youtube channel
i just came here to say : lebanon was NEVER the switzerland of the middle east, any lebanese would've laughed at you if you told them that.
aight my job is done, im out.
That is your view as a Lebanese but to most people elsewhere Lebanon used to be the most liberal and most developed Middle Eastern country before its civil war and Beruit was the Paris or Dubai of the Middle East. It was famous for banking (making the country a mini Switzerland) and gold and jewellery shopping for the rich etc all of this before the mid 1970s which led to its collapse. one wonders why an enlightened population would allow sectarian warlords to destroy their country.
@@prospektarty1513 there’s always politicians and war profiteers with an agenda using war to further their best interests, that usually is what prolongs it; Lebanon fell victim to being a proxy front for the surrounding regional players. Otherwise though they have major racism/sectarianism and social unrest that’s always been problematic, and that issue not being addressed is what fueled the fire. Just seeing what happened in America recently, it’s easy to see how a population could be programmed and polarized. In Lebanons case the situation was much worse; Palestinian refugees tend to be blamed for inciting this and that, but the truth is the hate ran deep way before their arrival, too much hate between different sects from all religious backgrounds there. That was the agenda for the colonial powers that carved up the Middle East post WW1; it was calculated for it to turn into a shitshow eventually. Now most of the major tribal leaders who operated in the civil war are still around and in positions of power to this day,,,the best bet for anybody who’s from there is to leave the place and work hard to build a better life elsewhere.
Lebanon was not liberal it was racist and an Apartheid that was crated by France to serve the sectarian political objective of the Catholic Maronite ( counter to popular belief secular France is sectarian , no country supports Catholicism like France financially and politically .
What made Lebanon an artificial Switzerland was the flow of oil money from the Arabian gulf and tourism from the Arab world due to the Good wether and tourism infrastructure after Egypt in terms of size .
Why did an enlightened people go to war in Lebanon ? I recommend reading this book by EC Hagopian - Maronite hegemony to Maronite militancy: The creation and disintegration of Lebanon. Elaine C Hagopian Professor of Sociology
They will never recover !
its the Lebanese lira not pound
بسموها pound كمان ...مش غلط
LBP : Lebanese Pound
But diversity is strength =p
the US is the most diverse and therefore the strongest, so yeah
Diversity is not Strength neither the problem.
Lebanon went to a civil war because of the Catholic right , I recommend reading the book by EC Hagopian - Maronite hegemony to Maronite militancy: The creation and disintegration of Lebanon.
Elaine C Hagopian Professor of Sociology
What made the Middle East unstable is France policy of minority’s against the majority , the Middle East is the only place on earth were the minority’s rule over the majority and ethnicity cleanse them or prosecute them ( The French are sectarian thus they implanted the policy to undermine Sunni Muslims ) .
@Eugene Kendrick so is India, China, Russia, Iran, UK, Germany, France, Cuba, New Zealand, Australia, Canada. Wtf you even mean ?
A country in ruins due to a sectarianism... No comparison to Switzerland...
He doesn’t mean it is currently considered the Switzerland of the Middle East he means Lebanon used to be regarded as the Switzerland of the Middle East up till the mid 70s due to its developed banking sector and tourist economy but that image of Lebanon was destroyed in the mid 1970s by the religious civil war that collapsed the country and its economy. The banks have somewhat survived.
Lebanon went to a civil war because of the Catholic right , I recommend reading the book by EC Hagopian - Maronite hegemony to Maronite militancy: The creation and disintegration of Lebanon.
Elaine C Hagopian Professor of Sociology
@@Jewzi123 You live in fantasy land
So who actually owns the Lebanon central bank.
The Lebanese Government?
@@unkouwnfigure2746 I don't think so. No central bank is owned by its government. Not even the Federal Reserve in the USA.
Its not owned by anyone just like the Parliament, Government or Court is not "owned" by anyone, they're parts of what makes a state and sovereign states like Lebanon are not owned by anyone.
look for china
🇱🇧😓
all you said is wrong
as an Israeli jew, i feel sorry for my neighbors in Lebanon, and pray that the good and honest will eventually win over extremists and corruption, so they will prosper alongside with us, in peace.
Respect you
diverse? what kind of diversity?
religious most probably
@@bbbbnnbnj5195 yep that is true
religious diversity... don't you ever read?...
Lebanon is very sectarian 60%, Muslim, 34% Christians, 5% Druze.... It's political structure is very sectarian the President a Christian; the Speaker of the Parliament, a Shia Muslim; and the Prime Minister a Sunni Muslim
@@jekboy2003 What should I read? I ask because in the video i heard "diverse nation".
I'm seeking it out in the internet, theres no explaination, so here i am asking. Well, it is religious sect diversity. Well it's a new knowledge for me for the least. Since I came from a diverse country too
You forgot to mention the Israel problem
That's a Hezbollah problem.