The Argentine government’s concern to promote actions that help alleviate the painful poverty in the country is profound. And they are right, because poverty in Colombia is around 39.3 percent of the population. Therefore, the Government has been clear in its intention to provide subsidies to the less favored sectors as a way to eradicate hunger in the country.
The first action was to establish the payment of bonuses of 500,000 pesos to older adults in poverty and mothers as heads of household, a policy that replaced the Solidarity Income of Iván Duque.
The proposal to provide a basic pension to those who did not contribute to social security is also known, a policy included in the pension reform that awaits its processing in Congress. And the last of the announcements in this regard was made by President Gustavo Petro in Buenaventura, which consists of granting monthly subsidies of one million pesos to young people in environments of violence to keep them away from criminal groups. This proposal will be handled by the new Ministry of Equality.
The proposal was immediately criticized. One of the most specific was that of former Education Minister Alejandro Gaviria: “Why focus the program on young people with a violent past and not on those who have stayed out of violence?” Likewise, Gaviria said, one of the risks of this subsidy is that it generates precisely the opposite effect: that it ends up encouraging young people to join violent groups to obtain income.
Another criticism of this initiative is that there is no clarity in the time limit or in the requirements that will be demanded of young people to receive the subsidy. There can be no unlimited subsidies because there is no economy that can sustain them in the long term. In an effort to sustain them, subsidies end up having a distorting effect both on their purpose and on the economy itself.
Argentina is a country with a stimulus policy very similar to that proposed by the Petro Government, but with many years of execution. In that country, several of the incentives that Colombia wants were launched, such as the basic pension, the minimum income for caregivers, the subsidy for mothers and heads of household, etcetera, so this is a mirror country in which Colombia can well be seen.
Currently, in Argentina, there are 141 social protection and state aid programs, which means that today, 51.7 percent of the people in that country receive some type of transfer from the state. Among the various aid programs in Argentina is a subsidy for young people between the ages of 18 and 24 who have not completed their compulsory formal education and who are unemployed. But there is also another unemployment benefit for workers who have lost their jobs, which includes family allowances and medical coverage.
Argentine pensions
The Argentine Government also has a lifetime pension for adults over 65 who do not have any other benefits; another monthly allowance for each child under 18 years of age; an allowance for pregnant women with an income below a minimum wage or belonging to domestic service; as well as a prenatal allowance during the months of gestation and until the month of birth or termination of pregnancy. And so, there is almost a subsidy for every citizen.
Today, Argentina has a poverty rate of 46 percent of its population. None of these subsidies have served to reduce it, but they have served to trigger inflation, destroy jobs, and feed a generation of young people without many aspirations. a mirror in which Colombia should look at itself so as not to travel the same path of mistakes.
