Mexico's turning point

Mexico has come a long way since the days when its unspeakable violence was all it was known for.

Under President Felipe Calderon, Mexico launched its War On Drugs. Conservative estimates place the toll at the very least 60,000 lives.

Drug-related violence unfortunately took center stage of Mexico’s agenda during most of the 2000s, evaporating its potential as Latin America’s powerhouse and turning attention to Brazil instead.

But with the election of President Enrique Peña Nieto, Mexico has refocused its attention on its economy and revitalizing its damaged reputation.

The Mexican president has pushed enough ambitious reform packages through Mexico’s legislature to make even President Barack Obama jealous.

Some of these reforms include a complete overhaul to Mexico’s archaic education system, where some teachers could sell and trade their teaching positions to anyone,
regardless of their actual education level.

Another major reform has been the country’s proposed tax overhaul. Sixty percent of Mexicans work in the informal sector, meaning they work jobs that don’t really exist on paper and, more importantly, can’t be taxed. Some of these include street vendors, rural farmers, servants, small businesses — such as restaurants and small convenience stores — run in many Mexicans’ own homes and a myriad of other under-the-table paid work.

The key part in the tax overhaul is that in exchange for formalizing and being able tax this income, the government has promised social security and a social safety that is currently almost nonexistent.

This is momentous, considering Mexico is a country where children in rags roam the streets and some of the most poor live in aluminum huts.

The most dramatic of the Mexican president’s reforms is the opening of Mexico’s state-owned oil monopoly, which has caught the attention of American investors. This proposal has been the most controversial, given that a Mexican holiday commemorates the nationalization of the oil industry, and petroleum itself is considered a national treasure.

Currently, oil revenues make up 33 percent of Mexico’s budget. But pouring foreign investment into the decrepit oil monopoly has the potential to increase revenues and provide more cash to modernize the developing nation.

Even though Mexico still faces major challenges like staggering inequality, rampant corruption and security that has only marginally improved — though this week the most wanted drug lord in the country was captured — Mexico’s changing narrative should send the message that the country is getting its act together.
 
As a proud Mexican–American, I’m hopeful that Mexico, which has so often been looked at with disdain and concern by the United States, is on the path to being a 21st century state.

­edsalas@indiana.edu