lThe poverty rate in Argentina was 52.9% in the first half of the year, the highest rate since 2003one of the worst effects of the cocktail of economic adjustment and high inflation that has characterized the first half year of the Government of Javier Milei, who considers the dramatic social situation a “legacy.”
According to the criteria of
According to a report released this Thursday by the National Institute of Statistics and Censuses (Indec), the rate that measures the sector of the population that is not able to cover its basic needs for food and services grew 11.2 percentage points compared to the second half of 2023 and jumped 12.8 points compared to the first half of last year.
The poverty rate of 52.9% recorded in the first semester is the highest since the first semester of 2003, when the index was 54% under a statistical series prior to the current one.
Meanwhile, the indigence rate stood at 18.1% in the first half of the year, 6.2 points above the previous semester and with an increase of 8.8 points in the interannual comparison, constituting the highest value since the second half of 2003.
The measurement, whose results were released this Thursday, takes into account the standard of living in the 31 most populated urban centers in the country, which covers 29.6 million people, out of a total population in Argentina of about 47 million people.
If the urban poverty rate is extrapolated to the entire population, in Argentina there were 24.8 million poor people in the first semester, 5.4 million more than at the end of 2023, when Milei assumed the Presidency of the country.
The number of homeless people, meanwhile, grew by 3 million in just half a year.
Given that Indec measures poverty based on the ability to access the basic basket, social indicators have a direct link with the evolution of household income and the cost of food and services.
In the first semester, the value of the basic basket of food and services, which marks the poverty line, had an increase of 76.1% in that period, while the value of the food basket that marks the poverty line Destitution grew by 63.4%.
Along with the severe adjustment launched by Milei to try to stabilize Argentina’s macroeconomic imbalances, the South American country’s economy contracted by 3.4% in the first half of the year, while unemployment stood at 7 in the second quarter. .6%, with a jump of 1.4 points in interannual terms.
Labor market data also show destruction of formal jobs, greater labor informality and more people working on their own.
In these last two groups, income is lower and they clearly lose the race against inflation, pushing thousands of people into poverty, even those with a job.
The Milei Government admitted that the poverty rate known this Thursday reflects the “crude reality” that Argentine society is experiencing, but attributes it to previous administrations and not to current policies.
“The Government inherited a disastrous situation. (…) Inflation means more poverty for the poorest. The best way to fight poverty is, first, fight inflation,” the spokesperson said at a press conference this Thursday. presidential, Manuel Adorni.
The spokesperson alleged that Milei, with its policies of fiscal and monetary discipline, managed to avoid hyperinflation that, if it had occurred, would have shot the poverty rate to 95%.
“We would have entered a sea of absolute poverty if hyperinflation was not avoided,” he said.
Those who do not understand macroeconomic arguments are the almost seven out of ten children under 14 years of age who are poor today, nor the three out of ten who, in that group of the population, do not even cover their daily food needs.
The second most vulnerable group is young people: 60.7% of Argentines between 15 and 29 years old are poor and 21.2% are indigent.
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