I'm surprised that the accountants all say different things.
When I first came here 8 years ago, we went to Cordoba to look at setting up an office for programmers. To be honest, there are probably a lot of others on the board that can be more helpful in terms of exact numbers, but I can tell you this: After a good six months of traveling back and forth and talking with a couple of accountants and a couple of businessmen there, I decided that it would never be profitable here (maybe not just money-wise, but headache-wise as well) to do things legally myself. So I worked with a local company to contract directly employees from them and let them worry about all of that while my company stayed officially int he US.
If you are legal, you also have to pay the employees' portion of income tax. There is not exactly "declaration" like we think of it in the States - and employee comes to work based on the amount of money you told him you were going to pay him and he gets that exact amount. I.e., no deductions from taxes. YOU pay his taxes. As well as your business' portion of his social security and medical, etc. Plus, if you're going to buy the building for your hostel, you have ABL and such to pay for.
Just the employee tax side of things, if I recall correctly, would have cost me an additional 63% of an employee's salary. So if you tell a guy you're going to pay him $5000 pesos a month, you'll pay that to him, and an additional $3150 to AFIP. You also have to pay them Aguinaldo (an extra month of pay - paid usually twice a year, half month in July half month in December).
You also will have a nightmare with labor laws. If someone works for you for more than 90 days in a full-time capacity, you are responsible for paying them 30 days wages (less in some jobs like maids, I believe) for each year that they work for you, if you ever have to let them go. And yes, that first year starts on the 91st day of the first year, not after 365 days of employment. That means the employee could impress you with his or her wonderful work ethic for 90 days and then change completely on the 91st, hoping you'll fire him of her, or just not caring one way or the other. If you fire them, you will almost certainly be called to court to explain your actions and about 95% of the time the judge will find in favor of the ex-employee. A lot of businesses end up paying blackmail money (i.e., they just settle) because they know if they go to court they're going to lose.
Make sure you know real well what you're getting into here with starting a business! People can do business here, no doubt about it. Personally, I choose not to, at least for my primary business, because of the true risk. If you know what you're getting into you can probably succeed, but if you come into it blindly without spending possibly months of time researching and understanding, you'll probably not last long. Remember - these are things that I know about from a long time ago. I imagine you have a lot of other taxes to pay, licenses to worry about, and so on, with a place that will be providing lodging to people.
Yes, many businesses do operate mainly in black. Typically they declare enough to be realistic, give them a reasonable income and the rest goes off of the books. But if one chooses to go that route, you had better be very smart and circumspect about it. Alternately, find yourself a very good accountant who will do everything possible to mitigate your burdens while still keeping you in white (or at least a pale shade of grey).
