ptly joined and the US was excluded) . He supported the Sandinistas in Nicaragua against the Samoza Family. Perez even went so far as to send arms to the Sandanistas during the revolution. Although Perez exuded third world politics and third world organizations such as OPEC, it did not participate in the 1973 Oil Embargo, which weakened the strength of the organization. However, Venezuela did fall in line with the price rise before and during the Embargo, which greatly benefited Venezuela. During the Embargo, Perez increased oil shipment to the US to cover the loss of oil from the Arab nations. However, this favor was not returned when the US excluded all the members of OPEC from the "1974 Trade Act, which created the Generalized System of Trade Preferences to lower tariffs on designated imports from developing nations" . This along with the US intervention in the military coup in Chile really miffed Venezuelans. Domestically, Perez began spending millions of dollars on state run industries and increased government spending by 200% . Venezuela took over the iron and oil companies that were largely owned by the US. The influx of money into the domestic market due to the excess of petro-dollars led to conspicuous consumption by Venezuelans. This was largely due to Perez's idea of spreading the wealth of the oil revenues with the public by imposing price controls on commodities and other basic staples. Imported cars and processed foods from the US rose to all time high levels as well as the highest level of importation of Scotch in the world . Perezs' plan of industrialization in ten years funded by the oil capitol had loopholes. For instance Venezuela while it invested millions in industries, they had no way of transporting the goods without heavy industry trucks to carry the product as well as roads to support the heavy trucks. The lack of infrastructure to support the heavy industries was evident. Thousands of workers were sent abroad t...
