Yesterday the Indec published the first data of the labor market under the presidency of Javier Milei: initial quarter of 2024. There are several ways of looking at the information: on the one hand, the one prioritized by the national ruling party, which says that despite the devaluation and stagflation in the first months of the year, unemployment covers 7 .7% of the active population, just above the 6.9% in the same quarter of 2023.
In La Libertad Avanza, they understand that the data is not bad considering that it was the bottom of the “Milei era”, with GDP falling 5.1%, as also confirmed this Monday by Indec, in a scenario of collapsing consumption and industrial production.
On the other hand, the opposition focuses on the fact that there was a strong rebound of two percentage points when compared to the last quarter of 2023 (5.7%).
These data correspond to the 31 largest agglomerations in the country.
However, the approach that best reflects the country’s labor situation between January and March is that of sustaining labor sources (formal and informal), but in a context of greater precariousness and a notable drop in wages in the face of inflation. which forces those who have jobs to look for new income because what they earn is not enough for them.
Córdoba Context
This situation can be clearly seen when analyzing the labor market data corresponding to Greater Córdoba, where in the first quarter the unemployment rate was 7.6%, one point less than in the same period of 2023.
In terms of number of people, it fell from 67 thousand to 61 thousand in one year.
According to Indec information for Greater Córdoba, although unemployment has decreased, other data is not at all positive: precariousness remains extremely high, with more than half of the people working without making retirement contributions and the bulk of Formal jobs are poorly paid.
For example, “employed job seekers” totaled 257 thousand in the first quarter, 47 thousand more than a year before. These are people who, even if they have a job, respond in the survey that they are actively looking. In percentage, from 26.8% in the January-March 2023 quarter they went to 32.1% of the active population, a value not recorded since the pandemic.
They are people who work more than 45 hours a week, but whose income is not enough to make ends meet and who seek to work more or change to a better job, but are unable to do so.
Those employed actively looking for work were 129 thousand in the same period of 2017, half.
In the same way, and for the same reason, the number of “underemployed demanders” from Córdoba almost doubled in one year: there were 77 thousand in the first quarter of 2023 and they rose to 130 thousand in the measurement published this Monday by Indec.
These are people who work less than 45 hours a week who are looking to do more.
The sum of unemployed, underemployed job seekers and employed job seekers, that is, people with job problems, was 448 thousand in Córdoba in the first quarter of 2024, 26% more than a year ago. In terms of number of people, almost 100 thousand more in 12 months in an active universe of 800 thousand.
Out of work: 1.1 million
Returning to national data, according to Indec, in urban Argentina there are 1.1 million unemployed people and 13.1 million employed people, of which 9.8 million are salaried and 3.3 million are non-salaried.
The general scenario is for an economically active population of 14.2 million (48% of the total of 29.6 million represented by the Permanent Household Survey, which covers 31 urban conglomerates).
What remains to be defined is what will happen from now on in the labor market in Argentina, with a turning point due to the expectation generated by the implementation of the labor articles of the “Bases law”.
The thing is that both the version that was approved by Deputies and the one that has the Senate changes, provides important modifications that, over time, will be reflected in the Indec indices.
According to those who voted in favor of both of the opinions that were approved, the changes will favor the creation of quality employment.
Detractors claim the opposite, that informality and lack of protection for workers will grow.
Within the employed population (44.3%) throughout the urban country, Indec highlights that 74.7% are salaried and, of them, 35.7% do not have any retirement discount. On the other hand, 21.9% are self-employed, 3.2% are employers and 0.3% are unpaid family workers.
