Despite economic activity having reverted part of last year's plunge, with evident signs of pick up, formal employment in the private and public sectors has not been affected. According to the data from the SIPA (Sistema Integrado Previsional Argentino) pension fund system, over 7,000 jobs were lost in March. Formal jobs lost during President Javier Milei’s presidency to date comfortably top 100,000.
A report by the CEPA (Centro de Economía Política Argentina) think tank shows 7,310 formal jobs were lost in the third month of this year, with the cumulative total rising to 115,353 since November 2023. Up until August of the same year, registered employment had climbed for 37 months running – a streak only interrupted in September 2023, in the midst of electoral uncertainty.
With the arrival of Milei’s La Libertad Avanza administration to office, the downward employment trend sharpened due to a contraction of economic activity. Since August 2024, its evolution has been erratic, with months of improvement interwoven with others of decline. Yet even when economic activity started to show positive signs, employment did not respond in the same direction.
Between November 2024 and January 2025, Argentina’s economy grew a monthly 0.9 percent and 0.5 percent respectively but the job figures kept falling. The exception was last February when both activity and employment grew. In March both variables shrank with activity retreating 1.8 percent, accompanied by a new dip in jobs.
Daniel Schteingart, the Productive Planning director of the Fundar think tank, underlined this disconnection by affirming that "the economic revival of recent months has not come accompanied by new jobs." After the plunge in the first half of 2024, he explained, formal private-sector employment “stabilised but without triggering a significant recovery.”
To this should be added the fact that not even the push of vibrant energy sectors, like Vaca Muerta or lithium, were sufficient to sustain employment levels in oil and mining, which lost almost 3,000 jobs in the period under study.
By sector, province
As for the most stricken sectors, construction is responsible for over half the jobs lost since last December – to be exact, 61,956 destroyed, representing 53.7 percent of the total in the context of the political decision to paralyse public works completely.
Argentina's manufacturing industry also showed a significant decline – 4,162 less jobs in March while there were 2,088 less workers in agriculture, livestock, hunting and forestry and 1,185 less in education.
In contrast, only a few sectors showed some level of growth. Retailing added 1,871 jobs, followed by hotels and restaurants (+1,696) and community, social and personal services (+743). Nevertheless, these gains are modest in comparison with the total losses and do not manage to revert the general trend.
At provincial level, job destruction is uneven. In March, 14 of the 24 districts nationwide (23 provinces plus Buenos Aires City) shed jobs with Salta (-1,810), Santa Cruz (-1,277) and Córdoba (-1,095) the most affected. Among the provinces creating employment, Buenos Aires (+660), Santa Fe (+333) and Formosa (+153) stand out.
Even so, the general panorama is worrying – since Milei came to power, 79.2 percent of districts (19) have seen employment fall. The most extreme situation is registered in La Rioja Province, where the losses amounted to 11.8 percent of the formal private-sector employment.
State workers down, self-employed up
Faced with a decline of salaried employment, many workers have resorted to monotributo self-employment although the official statistics reveal that this has not compensated for the loss of formal jobs. Since November 2023, 74,997 persons have joined the simplified tax regime, a number inferior to the 115,353 salaries lost in the private sector.
Nor has the public sector proved a refuge. As of March 2025, state employment accounted for 3,408,521 persons nationwide but there have also been falls there – in that month alone 802 jobs were lost with an accumulated total of 58,210 jobs in total since the beginning of December 2023, taking into consideration the national, provincial and municipal levels. In total, the destruction of formal salaried employment since Milei’s inauguration climbs to 173,563 jobs, adding together the private and public sectors.
Luis Campos, a researcher for the Instituto de Estudios y Formación think tank of the Central de Trabajadores de la Argentina - Autónoma (CTA - Autónoma) labour umbrella, offers a critical outlook on the evolution of formal employment. According to him, the labour market entered into a phase of "very marked destruction" between September 2023 and July 2024, followed by prolonged stagnation.
“Private-sector employment stopped falling in July 2024, and in the following eight months grew barely 0.3 percent,” he warned, remarking that such growth is insufficient to compensate for population growth over the same period.
Campos also questioned the government's promises: “Some said that labour reform would beef up formal employment. That has not happened.”
“A pretty clear pattern is being consolidated: if nothing weird happens, in the best of cases, the situation of the workers will not improve,” said Campos.
The researcher further highlighted that the fall in employment has possibly been conditioned by the downturn of activity in March, especially in industry and construction, though he noted that the relationship between both variables has not been linear in recent months. In his analysis, “employment was not informed of the rebound.”
The perspectives look challenging. To Campos, the scenario “looks ugly” due to the wage recovery verified in the second half of 2024 already running out of steam. Consumption, he warns, is barely holding up by extraordinary means.
“Credit, dollars from under the mattress, whatever. The labour market is needing somebody to drive it,” Campos summed up.
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