Venezuelans Find Jobs and a Home in Panama

Leonardo Zambranok left Venezuela in 2011 to take a marketing job with Procter & Gamble in Panama. Watching the latest wave of violent protests back home, Zambranok thinks he made the right choice. “Everyone said I was making a big mistake,” says Zambranok, 27. “Now it’s more insecure than ever, and you’re starting to see young people want to move away like crazy.”

An exodus that began under Venezuela’s late President Hugo Chávez has continued under President Nicolás Maduro, who vowed to extend his predecessor’s socialist policies after winning election a year ago. Panama has emerged as a primary destination: Last year, 233,921 Venezuelans entered the country, up from about 147,000 in 2010. They’re mostly young, middle-class job seekers driven by their country’s shortage of basic goods, quickening inflation, and antigovernment demonstrations that have claimed at least 41 lives since February.