Max Purchase US$200 per Month for individuals..!

[Ceviche]

We were planning on leaving regardless but frankly recent developments have not convinced us that we were mistaken.

We will miss your posts, here.

 

[Ries]

personally, I am interested to see what the limits will be on bringing dollars into the country, as opposed to taking them out...

 

[Bajo_cero2]

We were planning on leaving regardless but frankly recent developments have not convinced us that we were mistaken.
Anyone needs an A/C in great shape do let me know.
(Or, for that matter, a fridge; tabletop oven; washing machine; car; some other stuff).

Sorry to hear that you are leaving. I hope you will continue to participate in this forum. I wish you well.

No. I hope not. I wish him well.

 

[Joglide]

I agree - the people have spoken, get over it. I was a supporter of Macri - but unfortunately he made some bad mistakes. I believe he wasn’t bold enough with reforms - gradualism was a disaster. The Argentine economic issues cannot be resolved easily - and it will take pain (austerity). But Argentines seem to prefer constantly robbing the future for the present. The Kirchneristas, I believe, are very corrupt. But people wanted a change - any change, even back to the K’s. This time around, they won’t have the commodity price uplift that fueled Nestors “economic success”. Unfortunately it will get much worse, as the financial markets have no trust in Fernandez (in part because he is so vague on his economic plan; in part because they see Kirchner as a puppet master), and Argentina has lost all credibility. Financial markets reward stability and consistency - neither is in great supply here. It’s a shame that we will see criminals return to power (and don’t hand wave the argument that Macri is also a criminal - that’s a false argument to misdirect away from Christina’s corruption), but it is what the people want.

Some good discussions here and I broadly share Perry's perspective, though to take yp what Stevied says: the missing factor is surely consent. What we have is a country so divided that deep austerity and radical reform can only be achieved with strong consensus or by dictatorship with some consensual backing from the wealthy and powerful in society. You say Gradualism was a disaster but could radical neo-liberal policies have possibly delivered and achieved consent? The evidence indicates that such policies only arise in crisis periods or with a fundamental change of regime (post Allende Chile, post Communist Russia and Europe), and even then there is massive medium term poverty and disadvantage. The chances are that Macri's attempts to do anything like this would have mobilised mass civil resistance and troops on the streets. His key was to get the middle classes to believe his programme but the middle classes now suffer along with the mass of poorer people as a consequence. Basically, his programme failed massively by any measure and its not clear what radical policies would have worked in that time frame. Corruption is as endemic as deep inequality and they are related. If radical reforms include a major overhaul of the tax system to redistribute wealth and earnings incentives for the ambitious and the able (not just the usual conservative cry of "dismantle the labor laws and make labor even cheaper to hire!"), then the consensus for radical change is unlikely to emerge. Argentinians are not anti Macri because they are incurably stupid. They saw him fail in even the limited promises he made and social conditions by all agreements have become significantly worse.

 

[Ries]

Austerity, as an economic policy (as opposed to moral scolding) has failed in every country it has been tried in. It only succeeds in making the average person poorer, with, of course, exceptions for the monied class, before it is eventually abandoned.
Please- demonstrate how it has "saved" Greece, or the UK, or Kansas?

 

[Joglide]

Austerity, as an economic policy (as opposed to moral scolding) has failed in every country it has been tried in. It only succeeds in making the average person poorer, with, of course, exceptions for the monied class, before it is eventually abandoned.
Please- demonstrate how it has "saved" Greece, or the UK, or Kansas?

Agree that austerity in general is a poor remedy, though hyper-Keynesianism and corporatism can also fail dismially as Argentinian history (and that of many other countries) vividly demonstrates. Austerity meaning cutting expenditure can be essential if the books simply do not balance and foreign earnings dry up. You may say 'austerity should mean cutting the armed forces, bureaucracy, political handouts, tax breaks...' etc but that still means a form of austerity for some at least. In the hands of the neo conservatives austerity did, as we have discussed before, 'work' in the sense of crushing labor market bargaining power and enabling employers to drive down wages and renegotiate the effort bargain with labor unions and to break labor unions. This is what 'worked' for Reagan, Thatcher and other conservatives in the 1980s. It is much more preferable to have a New Dealism investment in infrastructure etc that actually works, and this is possible providing there is consensus on tackling inflation etc, which probably means controlling wage inflation as well as prices. Then there is the elephant in the Casa Rosada, not CK, but the IMF bankers who still have a lot of leverage and wont just sign expenditure checks for the new President.

 

[Ries]

Reagan is a terrible example- he tripled the US deficit, and he also "borrowed" trillions by creating Technical Debt- by putting off social services, infrastructure, and essential maintanence of all aspects of government, he created an on paper short term gain, and a decades long debt we still havent faced in the USA.
Thatcher did, indeed, lower debt- again by transfering it to hidden technical debt, and caused 2 recessions and horrible unemployment and economic inequality.

Focusing on debt, without also addressing tax reform, education, increasing exports, and income inequality, has never worked for anybody but the 1%.

An Icelandic approach might have more to learn from.

 

[Joglide]

Reagan is a terrible example- he tripled the US deficit, and he also "borrowed" trillions by creating Technical Debt- by putting off social services, infrastructure, and essential maintanence of all aspects of government, he created an on paper short term gain, and a decades long debt we still havent faced in the USA.
Thatcher did, indeed, lower debt- again by transfering it to hidden technical debt, and caused 2 recessions and horrible unemployment and economic inequality.

Focusing on debt, without also addressing tax reform, education, increasing exports, and income inequality, has never worked for anybody but the 1%.

An Icelandic approach might have more to learn from.

The point is that both Reagan and Thatcher succeeded politically and were undefeated in any election. Reagan was (I think) the most popular president in US history in his second term. They were both able to manage massive increases in military spending etc including the ridiculous star wars project and the horrible unemployment etc is just the point: it 'succeeded' in breaking labor. That is what I meant by conservative 'success' in both USA and UK (and also in Europe to much lesser degree). So 'working for the 1% or 10%' is what conservative success is all about. If you define success as the welfare of a larger number still less the majority then of course 'success' means something very different. If Macri had succeeded in the same way in breaking labor resistance while preserving deep social inequalities then conservatives (inc some on thi forum) would be toasting his success with expensive champagne while denouncing the corruption of minor officials and opposition politicians.

 

[hansaleague]

Sorry if I ask obvious question but why does this matter? Does anyone actually use banks to change currency here? As far as I know there are still many cuevas, don't they use the blue rate? Why does it matter what the formal restrictions are?

 

[Ries]

Actually, the majority of argentines dont have US dollars, or use cuevas. So if "anyone" means the expats, and the wealthy, then, yes, you are correct- that tiny minority uses cuevas.
The formal restricitions affect businesses- who, theoretically, provide tax income to the government, employment to the citizens, exports that increase the available dollars to pay off all those dollar denominated loans, and create the GDP.

If we dont care about any of those things, only the convenience of people, like me, who have dollars, then, no, the Cepo is not relevant.
But for most argentines, the frictional costs, the inflation, the businesses closing and unemployment will filter down to their daily lives.

I consider it my role, as an expat, bring dollars in, and spend em.
foreign aid from the USA, on a non-governmental basis.
but, unfortunately, I dont have $150 Billion to do that with.
my dinners at Gran Dabbang and my purchases at the pulgas and going to see bands is the best I can do.