Hi’.
Argentina elected Javier Milei (Reuters) to fix their country’s budget. Explicitly.
Milei is pledging economic shock therapy. His plans include shutting the central bank, ditching the peso, and slashing spending, potentially painful reforms that resonated with voters angry at the economic malaise.
This was his platform, the very mandate he was running for and his victory speech. And now, a hundred days later, I, a Swiss foreigner,
get to read this (RTS Info, in French):
A hundred days after Javier Milei’s access to power and his “austerity shock”, the social situation is getting tense in Argentina. The middle class, that largely contributed to the President’s election, is now victim of the ultraliberal politic of their leader. [...]
Those past weeks the bus ticket price exploded over the whole territory, after president Javier Milei decided to end the national subsidy fund for public transportation. “He could have ended other subsidies, like those for the agro-industrial sector, that is not as affected as the workers who work on a day-to-day basis”, Evelyn judges. [...]
“It’s true that the middle class is paying, but I think it had to happen. We must create jobs and end social welfare”, Sebastian assesses for his part; he is a worker in construction, a sector that has lost 100,000 jobs since Javier Milei suspended all public infrastructure work.
Leopard, meet face. Okay, the article makes clear that half of Argentina still supports their government, giving it a year or a whole term before judging.
Now can that patience pay off? Sure. It only took 12 years for Greece (Politico, 2022):
The Greek GDP fell from $355.9 billion in 2008 to $188.7 billion in 2020 and is now starting to grow again at around $216.4 billion in 2021. The economic depression left Greeks exhausted, angry and disillusioned. Nearly half a million left for Europe’s more affluent north, and few have returned.
See? It’s booming! (NYT) Helped by tens of billions of EU investments and with millions left behind but booming! Absolutely not a mental scar for the entire European continent that shaped future elections and disaster responses alike. So yeah, if Milei has a twelve years mandate he should turn things around in time.
Look, I don’t know how Argentina will fare, I think Milei is honest and wish he succeeds.
But you have to admit, a crowd demanding harsh austerity especially on social welfare, turning to an ultralibertarian to get it (and then finding out they were the recipients)… Lucky you if it doesn’t evoke you anything.