The picture of the Argentine labor market is increasingly bleak. The Social Debt Observatory (ODSA) of the Catholic University of Argentina (UCA) presented a study this Wednesday that hits the nail on the head: there is employment, yes, but increasingly precarious. The report, titled “Deterioration and Cracking of the Social Structure of Work in Argentina (2010-2025),” analyzes fifteen years of transformations and leaves an alarming diagnosis.
According to the researchers, the economy generates jobs, but of low quality. While unemployment remains at relatively low levels, the proportion of employed workers in informal conditions or without union protection is growing. “During the period, the proportion of employed workers who, despite being in registered positions, are outside collective agreements has grown by 4.5 percentage points,” detailed the team made up of Ramiro Robles, Julieta Vera, and Alejo Giannecchini.
The study shows a change in the country’s productive composition: less productive but labor-intensive branches lost share, while sectors linked to natural resources, finance, or business services gained ground, but without translating into more jobs. “The most dynamic sectors of the economy did not translate their growth into enough jobs to improve opportunities for access to more productive and well-paid jobs,” the analysts noted.
The main transformation, according to the ODSA, was the recomposition of employment towards low-productivity sectors, without unemployment rising. “Recent labor mobility does not seem to express a drastic break from the initial cycle, but rather a regressive reorientation of trajectories: the micro-informal sector reinforces its role as a destination for unemployed and employed workers who need to generate income,” they indicated.
The report also confirms that workers with formal and protected employment are much more likely to be in the highest income brackets. “Labor gaps are worsening due to precariousness,” said Robles.
Regarding the future, UCA researchers do not see a light at the end of the tunnel. They flatly ruled out that the labor reform promoted by Javier Milei’s government could solve the problem. “A labor reform that is mainly aimed at stimulating greater flexibility in the functioning of companies and the fluidity of the labor market can hardly address the other side, which is quality employment,” Robles argued.
The document notes that between 2023 and 2025, changes in the labor market were limited, and that people’s strategies to generate extra income reflect more of a need than an aspiration to improve job quality. “This suggests more obstacles to accessing productive jobs and more prominence of self-generated employment strategies, characteristic of the non-wage micro-informal sector,” they summarized.
In short, the UCA report paints a gloomy picture: employment grows, but more and more Argentines work in precarious conditions, without union protection and with low incomes. The labor reform, far from being a solution, seems not to touch the underlying problems.
Para mí la UCA es un curro más, llorando por empleo precario mientras los K y los sindicalistas se llenan los bolsillos. Esto huele a excusa para no rajar impuestos y planes sociales que son una mierda. Yo creo que si sacan todo eso, sobra laburo posta. Dejense de joder con reformas tibias, gato.
che la UCA ya lo dijo claro para mi el empleo crece? si pero todo precario una miseria la reformita de estos gorilas no sirve ni para llenar la panza es puro verso neoliberal mientras ellos se llenan los bolsillos a nosotros nos explotan como esclavos basta de ajuste carajo