Ismael Bermudez
07/17/2021 10:31 PM
Clarín.com
Economy
Updated 7/17/2021 10:31 PM
According to data from the Department of Statistics and Censuses of the City of Buenos Aires for the first quarter of 2021, in the last 6 years,
the middle class had a strong shrinkage
: it fell from 53.2% to 44.8% of the 3,076. 000 that make up the population of the City.
If the highest sectors are added, the decline is more pronounced: from 65.7% to 53.4% of the population.
Of 1,976,000 people in the first quarter of 2015, they added 1,640,000 in the same period of 2021:
a decrease of 336,000 people.
The bulk went on to swell the other classes in which the agency divides the Buenos Aires population:
poor, non-poor in a "vulnerable situation" and a fragile middle class,
thus defined because "in the face of an eventual decrease in the purchasing power of family income, For example, due to the rise in prices above their income, or due to the loss of employment or income of any of their members, they have
a high probability of falling into the lower strata
”.
To belong to the middle-middle class, today a household, in addition to owning a home, must have
a minimum income of $ 99,683 and a maximum of $ 318,988.
If it exceeds that amount, it rises to the category of "affluent household", according to the parameters of the statistics department of the Government of the city of Buenos Aires.
The poor increased by 291,000 people
(from 526,000 to 817,000), the “vulnerable” increased from 281,000 to 341,000 (+ 60,000) and the fragile middle sector increased from 262,000 to 278,000 (+16,000).
Thus, in the City of Buenos Aires, "
24.7% of the salaried population is in a precarious employment condition
(that is, their employers do not give them retirement discounts)", while "32.8% of the self-employed population recognizes a situation of irregularity in the registration and / or in the payment for the exercise of the activity ", according to the Buenos Aires Statistics Department.
More compromised is the situation in the
suburbs
, a true “social powder keg” due to the extent and magnitude of unemployment, informality and poverty.
The same is repeated in the provinces of
northern Argentina
.
Due to the growth of inequality, wealth was concentrated at the other end, absorbing a larger piece of the "cake", increased by savings or flight to the dollar.
This is evidenced by the
US $ 347,875 million
, according to INDEC data for the first quarter of this year, which are
under the mattress,
in safes or outside.
Returning to the city of Buenos Aires, in relation to the beginning of the series in 2015, and comparing homogeneous quarters, the percentage of poor in 6 years rose from 17.2% to 26.5%.
It is the highest level of indigent and poor of the whole period.
The “vulnerable” increased from 8.8% to 11.1% and the fragile middle class went from 8.3% to 9%.
Almost half of the porteños are indigent, poor, vulnerable or a fragile sector.
A bit of history: Inflation, Rodrigazo and later
For much of the 20th century, Argentina was recognized as one of the countries in the region that was
able to develop a large middle-class sector
.
Due to the wide scope of public education, labor and social laws, upward social mobility, wide coverage of health services and even access to housing were some of the factors that explained this recognition.
In the last decades - but especially in the 70s, with
a process of inflationary acceleration that led to the Rodrigazo of 1975
- this process was shaken by the sharp rise in prices, recessions, devaluations of the peso, and rising unemployment. and job insecurity and even the confiscation and pesification of savings, as happened in 2001/02.
The subsequent economic rebound made it possible to heal some of these wounds but in recent years, hand in hand with adjustments, stagnation and recession,
the extended middle class has steadily descended several steps,
swelling the legion of fragile, vulnerable or directly poor and destitute.
All this was happening before the pandemic and, logically, the restrictions on activity by the Covid,
aggravated the social deterioration.
From the extended middle class, Argentina went to a very different reality, which today shows
widespread poverty that affects more than 40% of the population
(almost 20 million).
Due to the loss of income, due to informality and unemployment, a sector of the population was also left out of the coverage of social work or prepaid, Of the new retirees, more than 60% have to resort to moratoriums because they do not he meets 30 years of contributions and retires with the minimum amount of money ($ 23,065) or less, with the PUAM ($ 18,452).
Of the registered employees, an estimated 30% have incomes below the poverty line
.
Among the unregistered, it amounts to more than 70%.
Poverty among boys, girls and adolescents exceeds 65%, a present and a future more than mortgaged.
An important sector of small manufacturers or traders had to close the blinds or go informal.
In December 2015, there were 424,262 companies that employed between 1 and 5 workers registered with the AFIP with contributions to Social Security.
In December 2019, before the pandemic, that number dropped to 403,422.
And by the end of 2020, to 386,024.
Thus, for a vast sector of society,
the once “blank” job was replaced by unemployment or precarious and informal employment.
The guarantee of a dignified old age, for a welfare retirement.
The family SME could not support itself.
And of a structural poverty of 20/25%, the mark exceeds 40%.
In this way, the
broad base of the social pyramid,
made up of the middle class, was compressed and those who "fell" began to enlarge the precarious, fragile, vulnerable, poor and indigent sectors.
Numbers that mark a strong
reversal of the once upward social mobility,
measured in terms of income and consumption.
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