Fredy Machado, 42, a Venezuelan who has been living in the U.S. for five years and Susana Peres, 30, with three weeks, present the news at the El Venezolano internet broadcast TV channel in Miami April 29, 2014. As political strife drags on and an economic crisis brings soaring prices and shortages of even basic goods, Venezuela’s middle classes are increasingly seeing a future abroad. Tomas Paez, a Central University of Venezuela sociologist publishing a study about the diaspora, said up to 1.6 million people, or about 6 percent of the population, are living abroad. Almost 90 percent of them have left since 1999 and the exodus has been fastest in the last six years, toward the end of the Chavez era and into Maduro’s term, he said. Picture taken on April 29. To match Feature VENEZUELA-MIGRATION/ REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins (UNITED STATES – Tags: POLITICS SOCIETY IMMIGRATION MEDIA)