Argentina is gearing up for a highly anticipated election in October, and with the country facing economic turmoil, voters are looking for a change. With an annual inflation rate of 109 percent, a rapidly depreciating black-market peso, and a severe drought affecting a large part of the country, the electorate has undergone a dramatic shift.
Enter Javier Milei, a libertarian economist and congressman whose policies are striking a chord among voters facing economic chaos. At 52 years, Milei is currently leading in some polls as the most popular individual politician, particularly among men under 30.
Milei’s rise in popularity is surprising in a country where left-wing populism has been the norm for decades. His coalition—La Libertad Avanza, or “Freedom Advances”—aims to drastically cut government spending, deregulate private gun ownership, and even a controversial plan to privatize the market for organ donors.
Supplanting the Argentine peso with the U.S. dollar is the libertarian economist’s cornerstone proposal, an idea that has caught the attention of one prominent American economist.
“Given Argentina’s institutions, there’s only one way forward: dollarization,” Steve Hanke, professor of applied economics at the Johns Hopkins University, told The Epoch Times. “Milei clearly understands this and has the right ideas about what to do with Argentina’s endemic currency problem—dump the peso.”
Formerly an economic advisor to the Reagan White House, Hanke also advised Argentine president Carlos Menem throughout the 1990s. The professor has been a decades-long proponent in favor of the South American country’s dollarization.
Some economists have argued that while dollarization would cure inflation, it would leave Argentina with fewer tools to combat shocks to the economy and likely require partial defaults on the country’s fiscal obligations.
Steve H. Hanke, professor of applied economics at Johns Hopkins University, in his office. (Courtesy of Steve Hanke)Milei’s Twitter feed features quotes from prominent free-market philosophers, such as early nineteenth-century French economist Frédéric Bastiat: “Everyone wants to live at the expense of the state. They forget that the state lives at the expense of everyone.”
And mid-twentieth-century American economist Murray Rothbard: “The State is a gang of thieves writ large—the most immoral, grasping, and unscrupulous individuals in any society.”
While the Johns Hopkins professor hopes for Milei’s success, he worries about the trending direction of modern politics.
“The public and public opinion tend to run the show in popular democracies, and the public’s voracious appetite is for instant sound bites and ‘news,’ dramatically portrayed. This appetite tends to crowd out serious fundamentals.”