Thank you Fidel!

For making Puerto Rico look like paradise.

Journalists today will be making excuses like "Cuba is doing OK compared to developing countries."  They wouldn't dare make those comparisons to parts of the United States, because we ought to expect better.

Thanks to a Communist system, Cuba left the ranks of developED countries.  In contrast, nearby Puerto Rico far outpaced Cuba while the latter was practicing Communism.  In 1950, both were former Spanish colonies and had annual GDP per capita of about $350.  In 2014, Puerto Rican GDP per capita was more than quadruple Cuba’s.  And a number of people escaped Cuba to begin a new life in Puerto Rico, with hardly anyone doing the reverse.

And this chart does not count the fact that, by comparison to Puerto Rico, so much of what a Cuban produces goes to the government rather than the workers.

It is quite irrelevant that there are some African countries doing worse than Cuba.

See also my podcast with Russ Roberts and written observations on Communist Cuba.

Update.  Gross national income takes out some of the "effect" of mainland businesses (arguably Cuba would have enjoyed mainland investment too, if it had taken another path), but is available for fewer years.  The chart below adds those in orange -- bottom line for GNI is 3-4 times rather than 4-5 times.