Argentina started 2024 with inflation of 20.6% in January and inflation of 254.2% year-on-year

Argentina started 2024 with inflation at 20.6% in January. Argentina’s year-on-year inflation reached 254.2% in January, after closing 2023 with a 211.4% price increase, the highest rate in the world, surpassing Lebanon and Venezuela. The rise in prices in January, unprecedented in the world, has been a recession of almost five points compared to December for Argentina, reaching 25.5% – a record in 30 years – in a month marked by a presidential change.

Inflation figures for the first month of the Javier Meili-led government alone show price increases following liberalization and devaluation imposed by the new government in mid-December. Goods and services have increased by 40%, transportation has increased by 26%, and health and food have both increased by more than 20%. Presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni said Wednesday that the Argentine government, which completed two months in office last week, is “very excited” about the work being done to attack inflation, noting that “clearly “There’s still a long way to go.” “To feel some satisfaction from these numbers.” Meanwhile, Argentina faces uncontrolled prices because of its purchasing power. According to the index which Measures the wages of formal workers – more than half of working-age Argentines – Argentina’s purchasing power fell 13% in December alone, the worst figure since 2002. The index marked a six-year decline while the minimum wage Argentina has fallen to about $150 today, the worst-hit in the region, ahead of Venezuela.

Argentina are off to a bad start this year due to unknown reasons. Javier Miley’s government suffered its first political defeat last week when it withdrew from Congress its mega legislation to abolish the state, which failed in the vote. This text of approximately 400 articles was generally approved by a part of the opposition, which saw the urgency of the reforms, but it notably failed in the vote on each article. On 6 February, when delegates sat down to discuss it and rejected half of the first 13 reforms, the ruling party decided to suspend the discussion and Miley walked out, pointing to the delegates one by one. , who sat down to talk, started a witchcraft. law, but they refused to let him sign a blank check and give him special legislative powers in a private vote.

From Rome, where he had recently been on an official visit, Miley chalked up his defeat to animosity between his government and a “political caste” that “the only thing they do is change the status quo over personal business.” ” “They have to choose which side they are on. Argentina already knows which side we are on and we are going to sue them,” he wrote in a tweet on February 9. It was his most institutional response after days of fury in which he circulated photos and data of wayward MLAs and promoted his followers’ insults toward other political parties on social networks. Feeling betrayed by provincial forces that had left his hand in Congress, Miley last week fired officials such as the mining secretary and the director of the Social Security Administration because of their political connections.

Legislative factions such as the center-right Radical Civic Union, or federal independents grouped into a larger coalition, have endured weeks of presidential abuse to negotiate reforms. Caught between the new far-right government and the Peronism-led opposition, these blocs preferred to negotiate despite the abuses so as not to get caught in the rejection of the law promoted by the Peronist opposition, which had just lost the election.

With the failure of the law, and after the end of the extraordinary sessions in Congress, which will stop the assemblies this Thursday to start their official calendar in March, the great reform of the new Argentine government is left up in the air. Miley has threatened to have his law approved by referendum, which has the support of 56% of the votes with which he won the presidency in the second round in November last year, but the path to his reforms is unknown today.

This moment has fueled the opposition. This Wednesday, after more than half a year of silence, Cristina Kirchner, former president (2007-2015) and vice-president of the previous Peronist government (2019-2023), returned to the public scene with a monograph in which she said that Argentine democracy is on the threshold of “its third debt crisis in 40 years” and opposed Miley’s fiscal measures, pointing out that the country’s inflation crisis is not the product of a fiscal deficit, but of debt in dollars. According to the last great leader of Peronism, Miley’s only plan is “destabilization” that will not only fuel an inflationary spiral, putting society on the brink of shock, but will inevitably lead to a rise in unemployment and social frustration. A kind of planned anarchy.” “It is quite clear that the only stabilization plan in the resident’s mind is dollarization. The measures adopted are not explained in any other theoretical framework,” wrote the former president, who did, however, initiate discussions for some reforms.

“We agree that Argentina must review the efficiency of the state, and that the slogan of the ‘current state’ is not enough to solve the country’s problems, which are enormous,” Kirchner wrote, and proposed, new In line with the government, there is a need to discuss the need for a “labor update”, “tax simplification”, “integration” of private capital into state companies, and “rethinking” the public health system. However, Kirchner put a red line on dollarization. This is not the only one. According to a large part of the opposition, this was Miley’s only plan in case of crisis, and this Wednesday has added another wound.

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