Poverty drops but structural issues remain under Milei, report warns

Poverty dropped to 36% during the third quarter of 2025 in Argentina, 9 points lower than the same period of 2024, according to a report by the Social Debt Observatory from the Argentine Catholic University (UCA, by its Spanish initials). Despite the improvement, the observatory warned that structural inequality remains high, as well as what they called “economic-related stress.” The latter affects almost 47% of the population, a tad lower than the 50% it hit last year, Milei’s first full year in office. The study analyzed data on poverty and destitution — which was at almost 7%, down from 11% — based on figures from Argentina’s statistics institute, the INDEC. The report analyzed the evolution of Argentines’ economic situation between 2010-2025, with a special focus in the past three years. The poverty drop comes after a peak of 53% in the first semester of 2024, the highest number since 2004. The report attributed the outcome to plummeting inflation and a strengthening of social welfare. However, the improvement regarding poverty and destitution may have been “overestimated” by the INDEC due to changes in how they measure those numbers.  “It is possible that around three quarters of the drop in the levels since 2023 may respond to a statistic effect,” the observatory said. While INDEC informed a 31.8% poverty during the second quarter of 2025, the observatory said it should have been 33.9% by current measuring methods. You may also be interested in: INDEC justifies methods after economists question growth figures Economic stress The report included a section called  “economic stress” to provide a better understanding of the Argentines’ economic situation, based on data from the observatory. This concept refers to how households are affected by living with an insufficient income to cover for basic needs. Currently, almost half of Argentine households live with this condition. Although there were improvements in 2024-2025, “so far, there is no evidence of a structural improvement in life conditions,” the report said. Hardship levels are comparable to those from 2022-2023 and 2018-2019, where there also were “high levels of monetary deficit, exclusion and tension in the labor market.” Poorer households are most affected by economic stress. “The [growth] in destitution and poverty [measured] by income — alongside economic stress and savings capacity — shows a steep deterioration in 2023-2024, and a remarkable recovery in 2024-2025,” the report stated. Despite the findings, the brief stated that “structural inequality persists.” Although these issues, which refer to chronic inability to cover basic needs or improve their living conditions, persist in poorer households, medium sectors are also affected by it. The report also states there was an increase in “psychological unrest” — including anxiety, anguish and symptoms of depression. This phenomenon, which has been ongoing since 2022, reached a peak in 2024 and slightly decreased in 2025. According to the observatory, 3 out of 10 Argentines (28%) suffered from anxiety and/or depression symptoms. The figure has dropped to 27% in 2025, according to their last survey.