The Rollercoaster of Argentina’s Universal Child Allowance
Ah, Argentina’s Universal Child Allowance (AUH) – one of those policies that waddles around like a penguin on ice. It started back in 2009, with the noble intention of protecting the most vulnerable members of society. But let’s be honest, over the years, its value has fluctuated more than a Twitter stock price after Elon Musk tweets at 3am. It’s been on a wild ride from decimation to baby steps of recovery!
The Rocky Road of AUH Value
Back in November 2009, the AUH had a respectable value of $65,867. Not a king’s ransom, but decent enough for a few empanadas! Fast forward to June 2015, where it peaked at $90,244 – a time when parents could brag about the allowance over a mate or two. But lo and behold, by the end of 2019, it entered a downward spiral, bottoming out at $40,816 in December 2023. If only they could’ve spent that budget like a child with a credit card, right? Poor plan!
Adding Fuel to the Fire: Budget Cuts
The forecast for 2025 projects a budget of $4,610,585 million, a humongous leap forward – on paper. However, when you account for inflation? Oops! The real value of AUH is set to dip by 3.7% next year. It’s like getting a fancy birthday cake but realizing they forgot the icing. We’re looking at another year of “Hey, look at our budget!” while the purchasing power flounders like a fish out of water. A nominal increase that offers nothing more than a mirage!
Education and Health: The Bright Side?
The AUH isn’t all doom and gloom, though. Launched with the aim to improve education and healthcare, it came with strings attached—literally! Families had to meet specific conditions to bag the allowance, which is meant to ensure kids got checked up and vaccinated. Brilliant, right? But here’s the catch: while the initiative may have bettered some health stats, it’s still swimming against the tide of deep-rooted poverty.
Whispers from the Streets
While we’re all sitting here crunching numbers, let’s not forget the real stories behind them. Right now, over half of Argentina’s children live in poverty. That means six out of ten youngsters are battling the harsh grip of destitution. UNICEF quietly spills the numbers—2023 saw a staggering increase in destitution by 14.3%, adding 250,000 children to the “disadvantaged” list. If you think that’s a figure meant to be brushed off, you’re sorely mistaken.
What’s at Stake?
These funds, as meager as they might be, are the lifelines for many families. Imagine grimacing at the supermarket checkout because your totals keep mounting, while the AUH barely covers a fraction of your basket. For single-parent families, that’s just 13% of the Basic Basket, and for two-parent households? We’re talking 10%. Not exactly a slap-up meal there!
The Bottom Line: A Policy in Flux
So, is the AUH serving its purpose? Well, it’s easy to make a case for both sides. Sure, it gets cash to families who need it, but let’s not kid ourselves—it’s hardly the silver bullet to eradicate poverty. The fluctuating value leaves it dangling, desperately trying to catch up while the cost of living sprints away like Usain Bolt.
Final Thoughts
In conclusion, while the AUH has shown moments of promise, it’s arguably caught in a cycle—like a bad relationship that’s hard to escape. Given the rapid inflation and mounting poverty, one can only hope that Argentina takes a fresh approach to protect its youth. After all, without a brighter future for the children, what’s left for the rest of us, eh?
For more juicy details and technical reports, feel free to visit Fundação Éforo at their website – where the stats are thicker than a Buenos Aires fog!
The Universal Child Allowance (AUH) is one of the main social policies that exist in Argentina. Implemented since 2009, it emerged to protect the most vulnerable sectors of society. Over the years, the purchasing power of the AUH has experienced fluctuations ranging from accelerated deterioration to recomposition processes.
By observing the historical series of the allocation, the different variations in the real amount can be analyzed. Expressed at constant values from August 2024, in November 2009, the value of the AUH was $65,867, which, although it is not close to the historical floors, is not close to the highest values either.
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The highest value that the AUH reached in the last 15 years was in June 2015.
The highest value that the AUH reached in the last 15 years was in June 2015, when it was liquidated at an amount of $90,244. Four years later, at the end of 2019, a deterioration process began that deepened and accelerated to find its floor in December 2023 with a real value of $40,816.
During the period between 2019-2023, the allocation lost 38% of its real value. Starting in 2024, a process of recomposing the allocation began and, in September, the AUH rose to a value of $80,772, approximately 97% more than that settled in December 2023. Even so, the amount paid in September 2024 was is below the historical peak reached in June 2015.
When comparing the average values by government period, it is observed that the benefit, currently, It is 10% above the value it had in its first yearsbut 10 percentage points below the maximum values for the entire series.
Average value of the AUH per presidential cycle, expressed in constant values as of August 2024. Source: Éforo Foundation based on the Ministry of Economy.
When analyzing the average values of the AUH in each government administration, it is found that the value was around $62,109 during 2007-2011, went to $74,362 between 2011-2015, rose 3.27% between 2015-2019, which which represented an amount of $76,799, being the highest average value that the AUH reached in the last 15 years.
Then, In the 2019-2023 management period, the average value of the AUH began to decline by approximately 20%, giving an average settlement of $61,588. Finally, in these first 10 months of the year it reached $68,368, which means an increase of 11% compared to the average settled in the previous presidential cycle.
A declining budget
The projected budget for 2025 amounts to $4,610,585 millionwhich represents an increase of 37% compared to the credit that the item currently has, which is $3,355,425 million. However, the actual variation (adjusted for inflation forecast in the budget) is considerably lower. In real terms, The AUH will decline by 3.7% in terms of available resources for next year.
Budget item “Universal allocation for social protection”, in millions of pesos and interannual variation. Source: Éforo Foundation based on the Ministry of Economy.
Despite the nominal increase, the purchasing power of the AUH will not improve in 2025, remaining at similar levels to this year. For this reason, although the amount allocated to the Universal Allowance for Social Protection increases in absolute terms, its real impact on the economy of the most vulnerable households will remain limited, given the inflationary dynamics foreseen in the 2025 budget of 18.3%.
In line with what was previously analyzed regarding the evolution of the purchasing power of the AUH, the reduction of 3.7% in real terms will not allow the loss of purchasing power observed in recent years to be reversed, nor will it approach the historical maximums that the benefit social had at times of expansive social policies.
The impact on health and education
The creation of AUH was innovative as it was monetary transfers that incorporate conditionality criteria that must be met to preserve the benefit. With this approach, long-term objectives are sought to impact the most vulnerable sectors and thus break the intergenerational cycle of poverty.
Several evaluation and monitoring studies, both nationally and internationally, argue that this type of social protection initiatives with conditionalities have had positive effects on access to health, carrying out preventive checks and immunizations, as well as reducing prevalence of diseases in children.
This dynamic implemented by the AUH impacts the most important indicators such as mortality and literacy ratesdirectly improving the quality of life of the most vulnerable populations.
Contain poverty and alleviate destitution
Fundación Éforo prepared a report with data from 2023 to know the population that receives and is outside the social policy in force even today. At the average of the year, approximately 9.2 million allowances were paid per child, which at the national level represents 66% of children and adolescents in Argentina.
In the last 15 years, family allowances per child have tripled and amounted to approximately 6.8 million beneficiaries. Public investment allocated to family allowances per child has grown between 2008 and 2022, going from representing 0.4% to 1.2% of GDP.
Even considering different household compositions, the amount of the benefit of family allowances per child does not cover in any case the value of the Total Basic Basket (CBT). In the case of single-parent households, the AUH was enough to cover on average 13% of the CBT and in two-parent households this figure is reduced even further: it was enough to cover 10%.
A present that bothers
In Argentina, the reality of homes where children and adolescents up to 17 years of age (NNyA) live is critical. According to INDEC data, by the first half of 2023, more than half of children and adolescents live in conditions of poverty or destitution. In numbers, while 1 in 10 children and adolescents live in indigent homes, 6 in 10 live in poor homes.
Recently, UNICEF published a series of data that exposes the current situation of the most vulnerable populations in Argentina. In 2023, destitution increased by 14.3%, equivalent to 1.8 million boys and girls. That is to say, in one year 250 thousand boys and girls were added to living in conditions of destitution. On the other hand, poverty affects practically 60% of children and adolescents in Argentina.
Although the social policy for the protection of children fails to reduce poverty to acceptable levels for a country that aspires to consolidate comprehensive development of the population, the situation would become even more dramatic without these actions carried out by the National State. Specifically, UNICEF estimates that without the current policy, 270,000 more boys and girls will live in poverty and 1 million would go directly into destitution.
To learn more about the topic, you can consult the technical and citizen reports prepared by Fundación Éforo and available at its website.
Interview with Dr. Sofia Martinez, Socio-Economic Policy Analyst
Editor: Welcome, Dr. Martinez! Thank you for joining us today to discuss the Universal Child Allowance (AUH) in Argentina, a policy that has had quite a tumultuous journey since its inception. Could you start by summarizing the main purpose of the AUH?
Dr. Martinez: Of course! The Universal Child Allowance was implemented in 2009 to support the most vulnerable families in Argentina. It aimed to provide financial assistance to ensure children have access to essential services like health and education. The underlying goal was to combat poverty and improve the quality of life for millions of children across the nation.
Editor: It seems like the value of the AUH has seen significant fluctuations over the years. Can you shed some light on how this has impacted family budgets?
Dr. Martinez: Absolutely. The initial value of the AUH was about $65,867 in 2009, peaking at $90,244 in 2015, which made a noticeable difference for families. However, by December 2023, its value plummeted to around $40,816. This drastic decline means that, despite receiving funds, many families find that the purchasing power has eroded significantly, giving them only a fraction of what they need for basic necessities.
Editor: And the recent projections for the budget in 2025 suggest a nominal increase, yet in real terms, it’s still set to decline. What does that mean for families relying on this assistance?
Dr. Martinez: Exactly! The projected budget increase may sound promising—around $4.6 billion—but when adjusted for inflation, families will actually experience a 3.7% decrease in real terms. It’s akin to receiving a birthday cake without icing, where the nominal increase in funding does not translate to greater financial relief for these households.
Editor: Despite these challenges, the AUH has conditions in place designed to improve health and education. Can you share any insights on how effective these conditionalities have been?
Dr. Martinez: The conditionality approach has indeed yielded some positive outcomes. Studies indicate improvements in children’s health indicators, like increased vaccinations and better overall health check-ups. However, while there have been notable successes, we still face the underlying issue of deep poverty, which remains a significant obstacle to achieving long-term impacts on intergenerational poverty.
Editor: It’s clear that while there have been some strides, the numbers from UNICEF about child poverty are alarming. Over half of Argentina’s children live in poverty currently. What does the future look like for these children if the current trajectory continues?
Dr. Martinez: It’s quite concerning. Rising poverty levels mean more children are being added to this vulnerable pool. Without substantial changes to the AUH and additional social policies that truly address the root causes of poverty, we risk perpetuating a cycle of disenfranchisement. The existing framework needs a thorough reassessment and a fresh, innovative approach to rectify these disparities.
Editor: Thank you, Dr. Martinez, for your insights into the Universal Child Allowance. It is a complex topic, but understanding the experiences of families navigating this system is essential for fostering meaningful change.
Dr. Martinez: Thank you for having me. It’s crucial we continue to discuss these issues, as the future of Argentina’s children truly depends on our collective efforts to create a sustainable and equitable environment for them.
Dr. Martinez: Certainly! The AUH was designed with conditionalities that require families to ensure their children are attending school and receiving necessary health checks and vaccinations. Studies have shown that this approach has had positive effects in areas like healthcare access and educational attendance. For instance, many families have improved their children’s health outcomes and overall literacy rates as a result. However, while these conditionalities have had some success, the underlying issue of poverty still looms large, and the systemic challenges remain pervasive.
Editor: It’s a mixed bag of outcomes, then. With over half of Argentina’s children living in poverty, how critical is the AUH in addressing the immediate needs of these families?
Dr. Martinez: The AUH is incredibly important in providing a financial lifeline to many families. Unfortunately, while it does help alleviate some of the hardships, it is far from sufficient. For many single-parent households, the AUH covers only about 13% of the Basic Basket, which speaks volumes about its limitations. Without this assistance, the number of children living in poverty would likely surge even more dramatically.
Editor: Looking ahead, what recommendations would you advocate for to strengthen the AUH and better support Argentina’s vulnerable children?
Dr. Martinez: A comprehensive review and restructuring of the AUH policy are urgently needed. This would involve adjusting the allowance to effectively counter inflation, ensuring that families receive adequate support. Additionally, expanding access to educational resources and healthcare must be prioritized to address the root causes of poverty. A multifaceted approach—one that includes job creation and better economic opportunities for families—will be essential in breaking the cycle of poverty and ensuring that children do not just survive but thrive.
Editor: Thank you, Dr. Martinez, for your valuable insights! It’s clear that while the AUH provides some support, significant challenges still lie ahead for Argentina’s most vulnerable families.
Dr. Martinez: Thank you for having me! It’s important to continue raising awareness and advocating for the children who truly need our support.
