Luncheon with Carmelo Mesa-Lago is the Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Economics and Latin American Studies University of Pittsburgh, and held the Greenleaf Chair on Latin American Studies at Tulane University in 2009. His forthcoming book is Performance of two Socialist Economic Models:

Cuba (central plan) and China- Vietnam (socialist market) and their Impact on Social Protection (U. of Pittsburgh Press, 2024).

A Comparison of the Economic Performance of Two Socialist Economic Models: Cuba (Central plan) and China-Vietnam (socialist market). Based on a forthcoming book by the author, the presentation first briefly describes the two diverse models and their key policies. The core of the presentation is a comparison of 20 key indicators (ten economic and ten social) of the three countries and their ranking. The conclusion is that China and Vietnam have performed much better than Cuba, despite the fact that the latter was much more developed than the two Asian countries and the time of their respective revolutions. An intriguing question is addressed: Why despite the success of the socialist market model, Cuba has not followed it?