Unemployment in Argentina rose to 7.9 percent in the first quarter of 2025, according to data from the INDEC national statistics bureau.
This figure represents an increase of 1.5 points compared to the 6.4 percent recorded in the October-December 2024 period. It also rose in comparison with the January-March quarter of 2024, although by just 0.2 points.
The new rate marks an end to the decline in unemployment that had been observed since the second quarter of 2024.
The activity rate – which measures the economically active population as a proportion of the total – fell slightly to 48.2 percent, indicating that fewer people were seeking employment, as it had stood at 48.8% between October and December 2024.
Last week, statisticians with the Buenos Aires City government published its own unemployment report. Unemployment in the capital rose during the first quarter: from 6.7 percent in the final quarter of 2024 to 7.8 percent in the first three months of 2025, it showed.
INDEC reported that across the 31 main urban agglomerations surveyed, there were a total of 1,136,000 unemployed people in the first quarter of 2025. That is, people who actively sought work but were unable to find it.
A year earlier, in the same period of 2024, the figure stood at 1,088,000, meaning around 48,000 more people are now unemployed.
When projected across the country as a whole, the number of unemployed reaches 1,807,000 – some 68,085 more than a year ago.
Daniel Schteingart, Director of Productive Planning at Fundar, pointed out that the comparison with the first quarter of 2023 is “even worse, as around 250,000 more people have become unemployed since then.”
Indeed, during the first quarter under the current government – following a 118 percent devaluation of the peso, a peak in inflation, and a drop in economic activity – unemployment rose sharply.
“Labour market data for the first quarter of 2025 are rather poor. Although the economy has picked up, unemployment hasn’t gone down,” Schteingart noted on social media.
He explained that unemployment rose from 7.7 percent to 7.9 percent, meaning there are around 250,000 more people out of work than in the first quarter of 2023 (when the rate stood at 6.9 percent).
The specialist also noted that “formal employment continues to decline. Only 46 percent of those in work had registered salaried employment in the first quarter of 2025. It’s the lowest level since 2007.”
He added: “There is growth in self-employment and other non-salaried forms of work, and a trend towards precarious employment that has been ongoing for a decade is becoming increasingly entrenched.”
– TIMES/NA
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