Argentinian President Javier Milei scored a major victory on Sunday as voters gave his party La Libertad Avanza a decisive victory in the country’s midterm elections.
Elected president in November 2023 on a libertarian platform of downsizing government and promoting individual and economic freedom, Milei has worked to stabilize his nation’s economy.
Decades of mismanagement ravaged the South American country, resulting in intense inflation as high as 300% in early 2024 and high levels of poverty.
Consistent with his belief that free markets and free people, not governments, are the path to prosperity, Milei has slashed government departments and slashed government regulations (including rent controls).
“The case of Argentina is an empirical demonstration that no matter how rich you may be, how much you may have in terms of natural resources, how skilled your population may be, how educated, or how many bars of gold you may have in the central bank — if measures are adopted that hinder the free functioning of markets, competition, price systems, trade and ownership of private property, the only possible fate is poverty,” he explained in his famous 2024 speech at Davos.
In just two years, Milei has managed to deliver tangible victories. Inflation has fallen significantly, around 30% now. Still high, but much better than the high of 300%. The end of rent control in Buenos Aires has resulted in falling rents as property owners deterred from renting their properties out re-entered the market. Meanwhile, the poverty rate has fallen from 41.7% the year he took office to 31.6% in the first half of this year.
A defeat for Milei’s party in local elections on Sept. 7 shook up the country’s financial markets, as investors feared the country would be dragged back to the failed policies of the past. But with his win on Sunday, the country’s bonds, stocks and currency have all seen gains.
“Argentines don’t want to go back to the past,” Milei said in a speech on Sunday. “There are far more Argentines who want to move forward than those who want to go backward.”
Milei’s project of downsizing government and promoting liberty is a project worth rooting for.