What I Learned About Entrepreneurship on a Sidewalk in Venezuela

See original El Cronista article

I was 18 years old standing on a sidewalk in Ciudad Ojeda, Venezuela, having just visited my fourth hardware store.

The price on steel rebar had changed. Again.

I thought they were all making the same mistake.

They weren’t.

My father had been operating in 30-35% annual inflation for years. He didn’t complain about it. He built monthly contract amendments into his process and netted 30% on the development anyway.

That lesson stayed with me. It shaped how I think about markets, about pricing, about what entrepreneurs actually do when the ground moves under them.

Years later I’d end up as Vice-Chairman of the Board of the Montreal Economic Institute, spending time with people who study free markets for a living. I started to understand, in a more structured way, what I’d witnessed at 18 on that sidewalk.

So when El Cronista invited me to contribute, I knew exactly what I wanted to write about.

The full circle was hard to miss.

Fue un honor que El Cronista me invitara a escribir sobre lo que significa ser emprendedor en un entorno de libre mercado. Venezuela, Canadá, Argentina. El mismo desafío de fondo. Siempre hay una manera.