The labor market is currently undergoing a declining transition, reflected in the net destruction of officially paid jobs since the current government administration, bringing the proportion of officially paid workers to a historic low of 45% of the total workforce.
This is stated by the Gino Germani Institute of the UBA (University of Buenos Aires), which adds: “In parallelA record level of work informality was reached in the second quarter of 2025, affecting 48% of the workforce. “Nine out of ten newly created jobs are precarious, which reinforces a regressive re-composition of employment.”
The report points out that “this deterioration is a widespread phenomenon throughout the national territory, with the six regions recording negative balances in formal employment. Greater Buenos Aires is the hardest hit region, losing 82,167 jobs“.
The report’s other key points point out:
There is a structural change in the professional matrix: Key production sectors such as manufacturing and construction recorded the largest declines, while sectors with lower productivity and greater precarity, such as accommodation and food services, showed momentum.
Precarity leads directly to insufficient income.
Workers excluded from the formal sector are reintegrated in conditions of extreme vulnerability, with incomes approximately 50% lower than those of formal wage earners.
72% of the total workforce earns a monthly income of $1,000,000 or lessa value lower than the value of the Total Basic Basket ($1,213,799 in October 2025).
The income crisis has consolidated the phenomenon of the “poor worker”. 19% of those who work a full 40-hour workday per week live below the poverty line. This rate rises to as high as 41.3% among full-time informal workers, as opposed to 10.5% among their formal counterparts.
The lack of income is also reflected in the increase in multiple employment, which reaches 12% of the workforce, showing that even formal wage earners need to resort to additional employment to avoid poverty. 67% of the economically active population face employment problems, whether due to unemployment, underemployment or inclusion in precarious positions.
The evolution of income poverty: After peaking at 55% at the start of the current government’s term, the indicator recorded a sharp decline, reaching a similar level of 31.8% at the end of 2018. This improvement was largely attributed to slowing inflation and relative income growth, particularly among informal workers.
The workers who increased their labor income the most last year were those in the accommodation and food services industry (who earn an average of 563,000 pesos a month and only 8% of them earn more than 1 million pesos a month), those in commerce (who earn an average of 648,000 pesos a month and only 12% of them earn more than 1 million pesos a month), and those in construction (who, on average 599,000 pesos and only 8% of them earn more). (more than 1 million pesos per month) and those in transportation who earn an average of 1.1 million and only 29% of them earn more than 1 million pesos per month).
Regarding budgetary strategies to address the crisis, The use of bank or financial loans rose from 10% in the second quarter of 2024 to 14% a year lateralthough the use of family savings and credit remains constant.
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