Milei admits recent months have been hard, asks Argentines for more patience

President Javier Milei said that Argentina is “much better than in 2023,” when he rose to power. However, he admitted that in recent months there has been less economic activity and more inflation and asked for more patience for his economic program to succeed. In a new attack against journalists, the libertarian leader accused the press of building “a narrative” by reporting only about the negative economic figures of his administration. “It is unsustainable that 100% of television news tickers insist that ‘everything is wrong’ when we have the lowest poverty level in the last seven years,” Milei wrote in an X post. According to Argentine statistics institute INDEC, poverty decreased by 3 percentage points in the last semester of 2025 to 28%. In the first half of 2024, the figure had reached 53%. Leaders of economic observatories and consultant agencies have argued that the drastic drop may not respond to a palpable improvement in people’s living conditions, but rather to a stabilization of inflation and other economic indicators which affect measurements. “Does that mean everyone is better? No. And it would be intellectually dishonest to claim otherwise,” Milei said, referring to the poverty numbers. “That is precisely why we must persevere: to stabilize the economy and, with it, the lives of all Argentines. That is why we ask for patience,” he said. “We are on the right track. Changing course would undermine what we have achieved.” PRIMERO LOS DATOSEl periodismo se arroga ser la voz de la gente, pero cada día queda más expuesto que no son más que la voz de sus amigos… o directamente de sus jefes.Podemos discutir la metodología todo lo que quieran, pero los datos son contundentes: la Argentina está…— Javier Milei (@JMilei) April 9, 2026 Milei acknowledged that recent months “have been hard,” but blamed it on Kirchnerists — those who were part of or defend Cristina and Néstor Kirchner’s governments — saying that they “tried to make the economy explode” in 2025 in the lead-up to the legislative elections, when several political scandals broke, involving government officials. “That (attack) was not free: it meant having higher interest rates, less activity, and more inflation. But the results are visible: the economy is starting to take off,” the president stated. Argentina’s economic activity grew by 1.9% interannually in January, an INDEC report said in late March. The agriculture, livestock, hunting, and forestry sector had the greatest positive impact on the index’s year-over-year change, followed by mining and quarrying. As stated by political essay writer Adrian Genesir in a recent column for the Herald, those sectors generate value, exports, and investment, but they do not create employment, which is why people may not be feeling the economic improvement first-hand. “The sectors that do employ people have been moving in the opposite direction,” Genesir said, citing commerce, manufacturing and construction. “That is what explains that in a year in which the economy grew 4.4%, unemployment still rose, reaching 7.5% by the end of 2025.” Economist Hernán Lechter, head of the Centre of Argentine Political Economy (CEPA), said that “the sectors driving growth account for only 9.2% of registered private-sector employment.” “The worst-performing sectors account for 44.7% of registered private-sector jobs,” he posted on X.