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      Elecciones en Argentina: lo que hay que saber

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      Los argentinos votan este domingo para determinar si elegirán a Javier Milei, un economista libertario, quien ha sido llamado un ‘mini Trump’, como el nuevo líder de la nación.Este domingo, los argentinos se dirigen a las urnas para elegir a un nuevo presidente que pueda sacar al país de 46 millones de habitantes de su peor crisis económica en décadas, y sus opciones están entre dos políticos tradicionales y un economista libertario de ultraderecha que acepta con beneplácito las comparaciones con Donald Trump.El economista, Javier Milei, ha liderado las encuestas desde que ganó las elecciones primarias de Argentina en agosto, pero su dominio del debate nacional tiene un margen mucho mayor.Milei, un excomentarista de televisión que cumplió 53 años el domingo, ha recibido una cobertura periodística casi general en Argentina y trastocó la contienda presidencial con una campaña impetuosa y desde una postura de outsider centrada en sus propuestas radicales de eliminar el banco central de Argentina y abandonar su moneda en favor del dólar estadounidense.A continuación, lo que hay que saber sobre las elecciones de este domingo.La deprimente economía argentina es una de las principales fuentes de preocupación de los votantes. El estilo impetuoso y poco convencional de Javier Milei lo ha hecho particularmente popular entre la juventud argentina.Sarah Pabst para The New York TimesLa deprimente economía del país es uno de los temas principalesLas propuestas de Milei han obtenido el respaldo de millones de argentinos porque el país ha estado lidiando con una inflación de tres dígitos durante casi un año, con precios que en la actualidad se incrementan un 138 por ciento anual, mientras el valor del peso argentino se desploma. En abril de 2020, al inicio de la pandemia, con un dólar se compraban 80 pesos, utilizando un tipo de cambio no oficial basado en la percepción que el mercado tiene de la moneda. En algún momento de la semana pasada, con un dólar valía más de 1000 pesos.Sin embargo, a muchos economistas les preocupa que las teorías económicas libertarias de Milei, que tienen poco historial de aplicación en el mundo real, puedan en su lugar infligir un daño aún mayor en una economía ya de por sí frágil, la cual es además una de las más grandes de América Latina.Emmanuel Alvarez Agis, exviceministro de Economía de Argentina durante un gobierno de izquierda, afirmó que las propuestas económicas de Milei serían una especie de experimento. “Y nosotros seríamos los ratones”, añadió. “Nosotros, los 46 millones de habitantes”.Para millones de argentinos, Milei representa un quiebre emocionante —aunque poco ortodoxo— de los políticos y las políticas que no han funcionado. Pero para muchos otros votantes y funcionarios, la retórica combativa de Milei, su cuestionamiento de la ciencia y sus primeras acusaciones sobre fraude electoral son preocupantes.Javier Milei se enfrenta a Sergio Massa, un economista de centroizquierda y ministro de Economía de Argentina.Tomas Cuesta/Getty Images¿Quiénes son los otros candidatos?Milei se enfrenta, entre otros candidatos, a Sergio Massa, ministro de Economía de centroizquierda, y a Patricia Bullrich, exministra de Seguridad de derecha.Massa, de 51 años, representa al partido peronista en el poder, el cual ha liderado a Argentina durante 16 de los últimos 20 años y es responsable de gran parte de la mala gestión económica que ha sumido a la nación en un foso financiero profundo. Massa se ha disculpado por el manejo de la economía por parte de su partido y ha prometido estabilizar la situación como presidente, a través de la inversión en industrias locales y la expansión de la producción de energía.Su partido peronista —liderado en las últimas décadas por los expresidentes de Argentina Néstor Kirchner y Cristina Fernández de Kirchner— tiene una base leal y firme de seguidores, lo que ha ayudado a que Massa esté en segundo lugar en las encuestas más recientes, pero también ha atraído una fuerte oposición en todo el país tras una serie de escándalos de corrupción y crisis económicas.Ese sentimiento antiperonista ha creado una enorme oportunidad para un candidato de derecha este año. Pero hasta el momento, Milei y Bullrich han dividido esos votos.En la contienda presidencial también se encuentra Patricia Bullrich, exministra de Seguridad de derecha.Marcos Brindicci/Getty ImagesBullrich, de 67 años, ha buscado posicionarse como una especie de candidata con sentido común, la cual impulsaría políticas fiscalmente conservadoras que son mucho menos radicales que las de Milei. Bullrich quiere recortar el gasto, prohibir al banco central imprimir más dinero para financiar deudas y simplificar el sistema tributario. Bullrich también ha respaldado un sistema monetario en el que el peso y el dólar “convivan”.Según las encuestas, ambos candidatos parecieran estar luchando para llegar a una segunda vuelta contra Milei el próximo mes, mientras que Milei espera ganar las elecciones directamente el domingo. Si ningún candidato recibe al menos el 45 por ciento de los votos, o el 40 por ciento con un margen de victoria de 10 puntos, los dos primeros lugares se enfrentarán el 19 de noviembre.Cajas de boletas de votación apiladas en un depósito del servicio postal en Buenos Aires. Milei ha denunciado haber sido víctima de fraude electoral en las elecciones primarias, pero no ha aportado pruebas.Luis Robayo/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesLas acusaciones de fraude electoral han entrado en el debate de las votacionesMilei ya ha dado indicios de que si no gana el domingo podría alegar que hubo fraude electoral, al igual que lo hizo en las elecciones primarias.En los últimos días, Milei y su equipo de campaña han declarado una vez más que le robaron hasta cinco por ciento de los votos en las elecciones primarias porque las boletas de su partido fueron robadas de algunos establecimientos de votación, las cuales son necesarias para poder emitir un voto a su favor.Las autoridades electorales no recibieron una denuncia formal. Tanto la Cámara Nacional Electoral como la Dirección Nacional Electoral declararon que no hubo evidencia de algún fraude sistemático en las elecciones primarias.En una entrevista, Marcos Schiavi, titular de la Dirección Nacional Electoral, calificó las denuncias de fraude de Milei como algo “inverosímil y desatinado”. Añadió: “Los planteos se dan solamente de una fuerza política, cuando en la elección hay cinco” partidos que compiten por la presidencia.Ningún otro partido ha denunciado fraude, y Argentina, que celebra 40 años de democracia tras el final de una dictadura militar, ha tenido durante décadas elecciones en buena medida tranquilas.El viernes, un fiscal federal abrió una investigación oficial a partir de los comentarios públicos de Milei y pidió que el partido del candidato presentara evidencia. En respuesta, la campaña de Milei aseguró que pronto enviaría lo que llamo evidencia de fraude, incluidos videos de redes sociales que muestran boletas destruidas o descartadas, así como un clip en el que supuestos operativos peronistas dicen que pretenden “hacer desaparecer las boletas de Milei”.El equipo de campaña de Milei declaró que había reclutado a más de 105.000 voluntarios de las redes sociales para que monitoreen los establecimientos de votación el domingo, en busca de alguna señal de fraude. Este tipo de observadores electorales son usuales en Argentina, y otros partidos también los utilizarán.Franco Antunez, un influente de YouTube, viajó con Milei este mes a un evento de campaña en el que el candidato blandió una motosierra como una metáfora de los cortes profundos que quiere hacer en el gobierno argentino.Sarah Pabst para The New York Times¿Cómo influye Trump en la contienda?Milei ha generado comparaciones con Trump y Jair Bolsonaro, el expresidente de Brasil, quienes impulsaron denuncias falsas de fraudes electorales tras perder la reelección.Si bien Milei tiene una inclinación económica más libertaria, su estilo político belicoso se parece al de Trump y al de Bolsonaro, incluidos sus duros ataques contra la prensa, sus rivales y líderes extranjeros.También ha hecho un llamado a una desregulación del mercado legal de armas y ha cuestionado la ciencia detrás del cambio climático, el cual dijo forma parte de la “agenda socialista” en una entrevista con el expresentador de Fox News Tucker Carlson.El movimiento mundial de extrema derecha se presentó con firmeza en Argentina el fin de semana electoral para apoyar a Milei, entre ellos, representantes de partidos de ultraderecha de Brasil, Chile, España y Francia.Milei también ha llamado la atención por su personalidad excéntrica. Sus simpatizantes le han puesto el apodo de “el Peluca” por su corte de cabello revoltoso (otra similitud con Trump) y han apoyado su amor por sus cinco perros mastines clonados, cuatro de los cuales llevan nombres de economistas conservadores.Su estilo impetuoso y poco convencional ha sido particularmente popular entre la juventud argentina, en parte debido al intenso enfoque de su campaña en las redes sociales para llegar a los votantes. Ese trabajo ha sido realizado en gran medida por un grupo de influentes de internet en edad universitaria, a los que no se les paga y que viajan con Milei para publicar videos de él desde todo el país.Franco Antunez, un influente de YouTube de 21 años con 216.000 seguidores, viajó con Milei este mes a un evento de campaña en el noroeste montañoso de Argentina, en el que el candidato blandió una motosierra como una metáfora de los cortes profundos que quiere hacer en el gobierno argentino.Este tipo de maniobras, junto con su retórica a veces profana contra las élites y la clase política, lo han convertido en el candidato “cool” entre los jóvenes argentinos, dijo Antunez. “Es algo exótico”, dijo Antunez. “Che, este chabón es cool. Es un rockstar, el chabón acá, con una motosierra”.En su evento de cierre de campaña realizado el jueves, Bullrich dijo que Milei era más bien peligroso. “Escúchenme bien las mamás y los papás, para que hablen con sus hijos”, dijo. “Me preocupan las ideas de Milei”. More

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      Argentina Election Decides Between Javier Milei and Others

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      Argentines will vote on Sunday on whether to elect Javier Milei, a far-right libertarian economist who has been called a “mini-Trump,” as the nation’s new leader.Argentines head to the polls on Sunday to pick a new president to lead the nation of 46 million out of its worst economic crisis in decades, choosing between two establishment politicians and a far-right libertarian economist who embraces comparisons to Donald J. Trump.The economist, Javier Milei, has led the polls since winning Argentina’s open primary election in August, but he has dominated the national conversation by an even greater margin.Mr. Milei, a former television pundit who turned 53 on Sunday, has received nearly blanket media coverage in Argentina and upended the race with a brash, outsider campaign centered on his radical proposals to eliminate Argentina’s central bank and ditch its currency for the U.S. dollar.Here’s what else you need to know about Sunday’s election.Argentina’s dismal economy is a main source of voter worry. Mr. Milei’s brash, offbeat style has made him particularly popular with Argentina’s youth.Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesThe country’s dismal economy is a top issue.Mr. Milei’s proposals have gained traction with millions of Argentines because the country has been grappling with triple-digit inflation for nearly a year, with prices now rising 138 percent annually, while the value of the Argentine peso plummets. In April 2020, at the start of the pandemic, $1 bought 80 pesos, using an unofficial rate based on the market’s view of the currency. Last week, $1 bought more than 1,000 pesos.Yet many economists worry that Mr. Milei’s libertarian economic theories, which have little history of real-world application, could instead inflict even more damage on an already fragile economy, one of Latin America’s largest.Emmanuel Alvarez Agis, Argentina’s former deputy minister of the economy under a leftist government, said Mr. Milei’s economic proposals would be a sort of experiment. “And we would be the mouse,” he added. “Forty-six million of us.”To millions of Argentines, Mr. Milei represents an exciting — if an unorthodox — break from policies and politicians that have not been working. But to many other voters and officials, Mr. Milei’s combative rhetoric, his questioning of science and his early claims of voter fraud are worrisome.Mr. Milei is facing off against Sergio Massa, a center-left economist and Argentina’s minister of the economy.Tomas Cuesta/Getty ImagesWho are the other candidates?Mr. Milei is facing off against Sergio Massa, Argentina’s center-left minister of the economy, and Patricia Bullrich, a right-wing former security minister.Mr. Massa, 51, represents the incumbent Peronist party, which has led Argentina for 16 of the last 20 years and is responsible for much of the economic mismanagement that has led the nation into such a deep financial hole. Mr. Massa has taken to apologizing for his party’s handling of the economy and promised to stabilize the situation as president by investing in local industries and expanding energy production.His Peronist party — led in recent decades by Argentina’s leftist former presidents, Néstor Kirchner and Cristina Fernández de Kirchner — has a fiercely loyal base, helping Mr. Massa place second in most recent polls, but it has also drawn strong opposition across the nation after a string of corruption scandals and economic crises.That anti-Peronist sentiment has created a wide opening for a right-wing candidate this year. So far, Mr. Milei and Ms. Bullrich have split that vote.Also in the running for president is Patricia Bullrich, a right-wing former security minister. Marcos Brindicci/Getty ImagesMs. Bullrich, 67, has aimed to position herself as a sort of common-sense candidate who would push fiscally conservative policies that are less radical than Mr. Milei’s. She wants to cut spending, prohibit the central bank from printing more money to finance debts, and simplify the tax system. She also has backed a currency scheme in which the peso and dollar “coexist.”Both candidates appear to be battling to make a runoff against Mr. Milei next month, according to polls, while Mr. Milei is hoping to win the election outright on Sunday. If no candidate receives at least 45 percent of the vote, or 40 percent with a 10-point margin of victory, the top two finishers will face off on Nov. 19.Ballot boxes stacked at a postal service warehouse in Buenos Aires. Mr. Milei has claimed electoral fraud in the primary vote, but has provided no evidence.Luis Robayo/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesVoter fraud accusations have entered the election conversation.Mr. Milei has already signaled that if he does not win on Sunday, he could claim voter fraud, as he did in the primary elections.In recent days, Mr. Milei and his campaign have again said that he was robbed of up to 5 percent of the votes in the primary election because his party’s ballots were stolen from some polling stations, which are needed to cast a vote for him.Election authorities said they never received a formal complaint. Both Argentina’s electoral court and the separate national elections agency said that there was no evidence of systematic fraud in the primary elections.In an interview, Marcos Schiavi, the elections agency chief, called the fraud claims “implausible and out of place.” He added, “These issues are only being put forth by one political party when there are five” parties competing for the presidency.No other party has alleged fraud, and Argentina, which is celebrating its 40th anniversary of democracy since the end of a military dictatorship, has had largely smooth elections for decades.On Friday, a federal prosecutor opened an official investigation based on Mr. Milei’s public comments and called on Mr. Milei’s party to present evidence. In response, his campaign said it would soon send what it said was evidence of fraud, including videos from social media that showed destroyed or discarded ballots, as well as a clip of apparent Peronist operatives saying they aimed to “make Milei’s ballots disappear.”Mr. Milei’s campaign said it had recruited more than 105,000 volunteers from social media to monitor polling stations on Sunday for any sign of fraud. Such poll monitors are common in Argentina, and other parties will also use them.Franco Antunez, a YouTube influencer, traveled with Mr. Milei this month to a campaign event where the candidate wielded a chain saw as a metaphor for the deep cuts he wants to make in the Argentine government.Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesHow Trump factors into the race.Mr. Milei has drawn comparisons to Mr. Trump and Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil’s former president, both of whom pushed false claims of fraud after losing re-election.While Mr. Milei has a more libertarian bent economically, his bellicose political style resembles those of Mr. Trump and Mr. Bolsonaro, with harsh attacks against the press, his rivals and foreign leaders. He has also called for looser gun regulations and questioned the science behind climate change, calling it part of “the socialist agenda” in an interview with the former Fox News host Tucker Carlson.The global far-right movement showed up in force in Argentina over election weekend to support Mr. Milei, including representatives from far-right parties in Brazil, Chile, Spain and France.Mr. Milei has also attracted attention for his eccentric personality. His supporters have nicknamed him “The Wig” for his unruly hairdo (another echo of Mr. Trump) and embraced his love for his five cloned mastiff dogs, four of which are named for conservative economists.His brash, offbeat style has been particularly popular with Argentina’s youth, in part because of his campaign’s intense focus on social media to reach voters. Much of that work has been done by a group of unpaid, college age internet influencers who travel with Mr. Milei to post videos of him from across the nation.Franco Antunez, 21, a YouTube influencer with 216,000 followers, was traveling with Mr. Milei in Argentina’s mountainous northwest this month for a campaign event where Mr. Milei wielded a chain saw as a metaphor for the deep cuts he aims to inflict on the Argentine government.Such stunts, along with his sometimes profane rhetoric against elites and the political class, have made him the “cool” candidate among young Argentines, Mr. Antunez said. “He is something exotic,” Mr. Antunez said. “Hey, this dude is cool, he’s a rock star, this dude here with the chain saw.”Ms. Bullrich, in her closing campaign event on Thursday, said that instead Mr. Milei was dangerous. “Moms and dads, listen to me carefully, so you can talk to your children,” she said. “I’m worried about Milei’s ideas.” More

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      Javier Milei y sus similitudes con Donald Trump

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      Se hizo famoso denigrando personas en la televisión. Lanza duros ataques contra sus críticos en línea. Porta un revoltoso corte de cabello que se ha convertido en meme. Y hoy es el líder de la extrema derecha de su país.Donald Trump, y su ascenso a la presidencia estadounidense en 2016, comparte algunas similitudes sorprendentes con el hombre detrás del momento que se desarrolla en la actualidad en Argentina, la nueva sensación política del país, Javier Milei.Milei, un economista libertario y comentarista televisivo, solía ser visto como un actor secundario en la contienda presidencial argentina, al que ni los medios de noticias ni sus rivales tomaban en serio. Pero actualmente, tras una campaña impetuosa y desde una postura de outsider basada en la promesa de que solo él puede solucionar los profundos problemas económicos del país, es el favorito para ganar los comicios este mismo domingo o pasar a una segunda vuelta el próximo mes.Milei, de 52 años, ya ha trastocado la política de su país de 46 millones de habitantes. Sus promesas de eliminar el banco central de Argentina y abandonar su moneda en favor del dolar estadounidense han dominado el debate nacional, y al mismo tiempo han ayudado a impulsar un mayor colapso en el valor del peso argentino.Sin embargo, ha sido su estilo político belicoso el que le ha ganado comparaciones con Trump, así como una preocupación generalizada en Argentina y la región sobre el daño que su gobierno podría infligir en la tercera economía más grande de América Latina.Milei ha atacado a la prensa y al papa; ha declarado que el cambio climático forma parte de la “agenda socialista”; calificó a China, el segundo socio comercial más importante de Argentina, de asesina; prometió la desregulación del mercado legal de armas; afirmó que es víctima de un fraude electoral; cuestionó las elecciones presidenciales más recientes en Estados Unidos y Brasil; y sugirió que los disturbios de extrema derecha que siguieron a esos procesos electorales habían sido complots de la izquierda.Milei rodeado de seguidores en Salta, Argentina. Su campaña impetuosa y desde una perspectiva de outsider lo ha convertido en uno de los favoritos para las elecciones del domingo.Sarah Pabst para The New York Times“Muy claramente es un mini Trump”, dijo Federico Finchelstein, un argentino que dirige el departamento de historia en la New School en Nueva York y estudia a la extrema derecha en todo el mundo.Milei, Trump y Jair Bolsonaro, expresidente de Brasil, son todos practicantes destacados de la corriente moderna de la política de extrema derecha, dijo Finchelstein, marcada por la vulgaridad, los ataques a las instituciones, el descrédito de los medios de comunicación, la desconfianza en la ciencia, el culto a la personalidad y el narcisismo.“Trump es un ícono de esta nueva forma de populismo extremo”, afirmó Finchelstein. “Y Milei quiere emularlo”.Milei ha aceptado con beneplácito las comparaciones con Trump, a quien ha llamado “uno de los mejores presidentes” en la historia de Estados Unidos. Ha utilizado gorras con el eslogan en inglés de “Make Argentina Great Again” (“Haz que Argentina sea grande de nuevo”) y, al igual que Trump, ha forjado su campaña en mayor parte en las redes sociales. Y en los dos meses previos a la votación del domingo, le concedió una entrevista a una personalidad televisiva estadounidense: el expresentador de Fox News, Tucker Carlson.El grupo de campaña de Milei rechazó repetidas solicitudes de entrevista con The New York Times.Partidarios de Milei en la sede de su partido en Salta. El uso de Milei de las redes sociales lo ha hecho especialmente popular entre los argentinos jóvenes.Sarah Pabst para The New York TimesCon dos maestrías en economía, Milei puede llegar a sonar como profesor en ocasiones, cuando opina sobre la política monetaria y una corriente del libertarismo que sigue llamada anarcocapitalismo.Ha llamado al Estado “una organización criminal” que “vive de una fuente coactiva de ingresos llamada impuestos”. Además, afirma que lo impulsa una misión de reducir el gobierno y eliminarlo de las vidas de las personas, comenzando con el banco central argentino.Sus ideales libertarios también lo han hecho menos conservador en algunos temas sociales. Ha dicho que mientras el Estado no tenga que pagar por ello, podría apoyar la legalización de las drogas, la inmigración abierta, el trabajo sexual, los derechos de las personas trans, el matrimonio igualitario y la venta de órganos.Sin embargo, ha calificado al aborto de “asesinato” y ha prometido someterlo a referendo en Argentina, donde ha sido legal desde 2020.Milei sorprendió a las encuestadoras en agosto cuando ganó las elecciones primarias de Argentina, con cerca del 30 por ciento de los votos. Desde entonces ha liderado en las encuestas, superando a sus dos principales rivales: Sergio Massa, político de centroizquierda y ministro de Economía del país; y Patricia Bullrich, exministra de Seguridad de derecha.Milei ha recibido una cobertura periodística casi general durante la campaña, tanto por sus propuestas económicas radicales como por su personalidad excéntrica. Es un autoproclamado profesor de sexo tántrico con cinco perros mastines clonados. Su novia es una imitadora profesional de una de sus archirrivales políticos. Su directora de campaña y principal asesora política es su hermana.Un dólar con la imagen de Donald Trump en la oficina de uno de los asesores de Milei. El candidato ha elogiado la presidencia de Trump.Sarah Pabst para The New York TimesAl igual que Trump, Milei habla sobre la importancia de la imagen, como cuando le dijo a Carlson que su pasado como portero de fútbol semiprofesional y cantante de una banda de versiones de The Rolling Stones conforman una “combinación atractiva en términos de producto televisivo”. Milei hace casi siempre la misma mirada con el ceño y los labios fruncidos en todas las selfies que se toma con los votantes, lo que también hace recordar a Trump.El estilo característico de Milei —una chaqueta de cuero, una melena indomable y patillas largas— está diseñado para evocar al personaje de los cómics Wolverine, según Lilia Lemoine, una artista de cosplay profesional quien también es la estilista de Milei y se está postulando para el Congreso en su fórmula. Esto, según Lemoine, es porque, al igual que Wolverine, “él es un antihéroe”.El resultado es una legión de seguidores que se asemeja a un culto. En un evento reciente en Salta, una ciudad en el noroeste montañoso de Argentina, Milei iba en la caja de una camioneta mientras miles de votantes se empujaban para verlo de cerca. Sus partidarios llevaban pelucas despeinadas, repartían billetes falsos de 100 dólares con su cara y exhibían arte de sus perros, cuatro de los cuales llevan nombres de economistas conservadores.“Sí, todos lo califican por loco, por todo, pero qué mejor que un loco para que saque adelante el país”, dijo María Luisa Mamani, de 57 años, dueña de una carnicería. “Porque los que estuvieron cuerdos no hicieron nada”.Los argentinos han sobrellevado una de las peores crisis financieras del país.Sarah Pabst para The New York TimesMilei tuvo una aparición breve pero no habló. En realidad, el evento fue en gran medida un escenario para generar contenido para redes sociales creado por influentes en edad universitaria a los que no se les paga y que viajan con Milei y lo graban.Ellos lo han ayudado a construir una enorme presencia en línea así como una intensa base de simpatizantes jóvenes. (La edad legal para votar en Argentina es de 16 años).Luján López Villa, un estudiante de último año de bachillerato de 20 años, proveniente de a pequeña localidad de Chicoana, dijo que Milei tenía un apoyo casi unánime entre sus compañeros de clase, porque era el candidato “cool”, a pesar de las advertencias de sus profesores de que sus planes para dolarizar la economía eran peligrosos.“Nos quieren cambiar el pensamiento para no votarlo”, dijo. “Igual lo seguimos”.No sorprende que los argentinos estén ansiosos por un cambio. Décadas de mala gestión económica, gran parte de ella en manos del movimiento peronista en el poder, del que Massa es parte, han sumido a la Argentina en un agujero financiero.En abril de 2020, al inicio de la pandemia, con un dólar se compraban unos 80 pesos; un día de la semana pasada, ese mismo dólar podía comprar más de 1000 pesos. Esas cifras están basadas en un tipo de cambio no oficial que refleja mejor la visión del mercado sobre el peso, parte de un sistema bizantino de controles cambiarios que el gobierno utiliza para tratar de mantener los dólares estadounidenses en el país.Seguidores de Milei en Salta. Quiere reducir el gobierno, empezando por eliminar el banco central de Argentina.Sarah Pabst para The New York TimesMilei quiere eliminar esas regulaciones cuando sea presidente, en parte haciendo una transición al dólar.Tanto Milei como varios economistas han dicho que dolarizar la economía muy probablemente requiera de decenas de miles de millones de dólares, pero no se sabe con certeza dónde podría Argentina obtener una inversión de esa escala. El país ya tiene problemas para pagar una deuda de 44.000 millones de dólares al Fondo Monetario Internacional.Milei tampoco tendría mucho apoyo en el Congreso para la dolarización, aunque ha afirmado que tiene pensado someter el tema a un referendo nacional.Emmanuel Alvarez Agis, exviceministro de Economía de Argentina durante un gobierno de izquierda, afirmó que si Milei lograra la dolarización, resolvería en gran medida la inflación, pero produciría una serie de otros problemas, incluida la disminución de los salarios reales, una mayor tasa de desempleo y menor flexibilidad para suavizar los efectos de las crisis económicas.Milei también ha expresado su compromiso con implementar cambios a favor del mercado y con una presencia menor del gobierno, y ha prometido: reducir los impuestos; eliminar regulaciones; privatizar las industrias estatales; cambiar la educación pública a un sistema basado en vouchers y la atención de salud pública a un sistema basado en seguros; reducir el número de ministerios federales de 18 a ocho; y recortar el gasto federal en un 15 por ciento del producto interno bruto de Argentina.Estos profundos recortes del gasto requerirían reducciones significativas en las pensiones, la educación y la seguridad pública, dijo Alvarez Agis. “No creo que estén discutiendo los números de manera seria”, dijo.Carteles de campaña en Salta para otro de los candidatos principales en la elección del domingo, Sergio Massa, el ministro de Economía de centroizquierda.Sarah Pabst para The New York TimesTras meses de campañas de los candidatos, este domingo será la prueba que determinará si los votantes están dispuestos a darle una oportunidad a Milei. Podría ganar las elecciones de forma directa con el 45 por ciento de los votos, o con el 40 por ciento si tiene un margen de diferencia de al menos 10 puntos porcentuales. Si ningún candidato obtiene algunas de esas condiciones, la contienda irá a una segunda vuelta el 19 de noviembre, entre los dos candidatos con más votos.Aunque ganó las elecciones primarias, Milei siguió afirmando que hubo fraude electoral y que sus rivales se robaron boletas de su partido de los establecimientos de votación, evitando que los ciudadanos votaran por él. Milei también afirmó que se encontraron boletas de su partido escondidas en una escuela. Su partido no proporcionó ninguna prueba.Milei dijo que su partido había puesto la denuncia ante las autoridades electorales, pero los funcionarios electorales la cuestionaron.“No hubo denuncia ni impugnación, ni que ocurriera robo de boletas de modo sistemático”, declaró la Cámara Nacional Electoral de Argentina a través de un comunicado. “Nos preocupa que se hagan declaraciones así sin acompañarlas con presentaciones judiciales para investigar”.El equipo de campaña de Milei dijo que había reclutado a 100.000 voluntarios para monitorear las mesas el día de las elecciones. Pero en una entrevista televisiva el jueves, Milei afirmó que todavía le preocupaba el robo de votos.Milei afirmó que el presunto fraude en las primarias le había costado al menos varios puntos porcentuales de apoyo. “Hay unos que dicen que son dos puntos y medio, otros dicen que son tres. Y otros que dicen cinco”, dijo. “Sea al número que sea, puede ser determinante”.Natalie Alcoba More

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      Javier Milei, a ‘Mini-Trump,’ Could Be Argentina’s Next President

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      He made his name disparaging people on television. He levels harsh attacks against critics online. He sports an unruly hairdo that has become a meme. And he is now the leader of his country’s far right.Donald J. Trump, and his rise to the American presidency in 2016, shares some striking similarities with the man behind the moment unfolding in Argentina, the nation’s new political sensation, Javier Milei.Mr. Milei, a libertarian economist and television pundit, was once seen as a sideshow in Argentina’s presidential race, not taken seriously by the news media or his opponents. Now — after a brash, outsider campaign based on a promise that he alone can fix the nation’s deep economic woes — he is the favorite to win the election outright on Sunday or head to a runoff next month.Mr. Milei, 52, has already upended the politics of this nation of 46 million. His pledges to eliminate Argentina’s central bank and ditch its currency for the U.S. dollar have dominated the national conversation, while also helping to fuel a further collapse in the value of the Argentine peso.But it has been his bellicose political style that has attracted comparisons with Mr. Trump, as well as widespread concern in Argentina and beyond about the damage his government could inflict on Latin America’s third-largest economy.Mr. Milei has attacked the press and the pope; declared climate change part of “the socialist agenda”; called China, Argentina’s second-largest trade partner, an “assassin”; pledged looser controls on guns; claimed he is the victim of voter fraud; questioned the most recent presidential elections in the United States and Brazil; and suggested that the far-right riots that followed those votes were leftist plots.Mr. Milei surrounded by supporters in Salta, Argentina. His brash, outsider campaign has made him a favorite in Sunday’s election. Sarah Pabst for The New York Times“He is quite clearly a mini-Trump,” said Federico Finchelstein, an Argentine who chairs the history department at the New School in New York and studies the far right around the world.Mr. Milei, Mr. Trump and Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil’s former president, are all leading practitioners of the modern strain of far-right politics, Mr. Finchelstein said, marked by vulgarity, attacks on institutions, discrediting of the news media, distrust of science, a cult of personality and narcissism.“Trump is an icon of this new form of extreme populism,” Mr. Finchelstein said. “And Milei wants to emulate him.”Mr. Milei has embraced comparisons to Mr. Trump, whom he has called “one of the best presidents in the history of the United States.” He has worn “Make Argentina Great Again” hats and, much like Mr. Trump, waged his campaign largely on social media. And in the two months before Sunday’s vote, he granted an interview to one American broadcast personality: the former Fox News host Tucker Carlson.Mr. Milei’s campaign declined repeated requests for an interview with The New York Times.Supporters of Mr. Milei in the headquarters of his party in Salta. Mr. Milei’s use of social media has made him especially popular among younger Argentines.Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesWith two master’s degrees in economics, Mr. Milei can sound professorial at times, opining on monetary policy and a strain of libertarianism he follows called anarcho-capitalism.He has called the state “a criminal organization” that collects taxes “at gunpoint.” And he says he is driven by a mission to shrink government and remove it from people’s lives, starting with Argentina’s central bank.His libertarian ideals have also made him less conservative on some social issues. He has said that as long as the state doesn’t have to pay for it, he could support drug legalization, open immigration, sex work, transgender rights, same-sex marriage and selling organs.Abortion, however, he calls “murder” and promises to put it to a referendum in Argentina, where it has been legal since 2020.Mr. Milei surprised pollsters in August when he won Argentina’s open primaries with about 30 percent of the vote. He has since led his two main challengers in the polls: Sergio Massa, Argentina’s center-left economy minister; and Patricia Bullrich, a right-wing former security minister.Mr. Milei has received nearly blanket news coverage during the campaign, both for his radical economic proposals and his eccentric personality. He is a self-proclaimed tantric-sex teacher with five cloned mastiff dogs. His girlfriend is a professional impersonator of one of his political archrivals. And his campaign manager and chief political adviser is his sister.A dollar note with Donald J. Trump’s image in the office of one of Mr. Milei’s advisers. The candidate has praised Mr. Trump’s tenure as president in the United States. Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesLike Mr. Trump, he speaks about the importance of image, telling Mr. Carlson that his past as a semipro soccer goalie and a singer in a Rolling Stones cover band “make for an attractive television product.” Mr. Milei makes nearly the same furrowed-brow, pursed-lip look for every selfie with voters, also calling to mind Mr. Trump.Mr. Milei’s signature look — a leather jacket, an untamable mop of hair and long sideburns — is designed to conjure the comic-book character Wolverine, according to Lilia Lemoine, a professional cosplay performer who is Mr. Milei’s stylist and is running for Congress on his ticket. Because, like Wolverine, she said, “he is an antihero.”The result is a cultlike following. At a recent event in Salta, a city in Argentina’s mountainous northwest, Mr. Milei rode in a truck bed as thousands of voters pushed in for a closer look. Supporters wore messy wigs, passed out fake $100 bills with his face and displayed art of his dogs, four of which are named for conservative economists.“Yes, everyone describes him as crazy, for everything, but who better than a crazy person to move the country forward?” said María Luisa Mamani, 57, a butcher-shop owner. “Because the sane ones didn’t do anything.”Argentines have weathered one of the country’s worst financial crises.Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesMr. Milei appeared briefly but did not speak. Instead, the event was largely a stage for social-media content created by unpaid college-age influencers who travel with Mr. Milei and film him.They have helped him build an enormous online presence and intense youth following. (The legal voting age in Argentina is 16.) Luján López Villa, 20, a high school senior in the small town of Chicoana, said Mr. Milei had near-unanimous support among her classmates, largely because he was the “cool” candidate, despite warnings from teachers that his plans to dollarize the economy are dangerous.“They want to change our minds,” she said. “We’re going to keep following him.”It is no surprise that Argentines are eager for change. Decades of economic mismanagement, much of it in the hands of Mr. Massa’s incumbent Peronist party, have plunged Argentina into a big financial hole.In April 2020, at the start of the pandemic, $1 bought about 80 pesos; one day last week, $1 bought more than 1,000 pesos. Those figures are under an unofficial exchange rate that best reflects the market’s view of the peso, part of a byzantine system of currency controls the government uses to try to keep U.S. dollars in the country.Supporters of Mr. Milei in Salta. He wants to shrink government, starting with getting rid of Argentina’s central bank.Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesMr. Milei wants to discard those rules as president, partly by switching to dollars.Both Mr. Milei and economists have said that dollarizing the economy will most likely require tens of billions of dollars, but it is not clear where Argentina could get such an investment. The country is struggling to pay a $44 billion debt to the International Monetary Fund. Mr. Milei would also not have much congressional support for dollarization, though he has said that he would put the issue to a national referendum.Emmanuel Alvarez Agis, Argentina’s former deputy economy minister under a leftist administration, said that if Mr. Milei could dollarize, it would mostly solve inflation — but produce a host of other problems, including a decrease in real wages, higher unemployment and less flexibility to soften the effects of economic downturns.Mr. Milei has also promised a pro-market, small-government overhaul, including pledges to: lower taxes; slash regulations; privatize state industries; shift public education to a voucher-based system and public health care to insurance based; reduce the number of federal ministries to eight from 18; and cut federal spending by 15 percent of Argentina’s gross domestic product.Such deep spending cuts would require significant reductions to pensions, education and public safety, Mr. Alvarez Agis said. “I don’t think that they are discussing numbers in a serious way,” he said.Campaign signs in Salta for another top candidate in Sunday’s election, Sergio Massa, Argentina’s center-left economy minister.Sarah Pabst for The New York TimesAfter months of campaigning by the candidates, Sunday will test whether voters are ready to take a chance on Mr. Milei. He could win the election outright with 45 percent of the vote, or 40 percent with a margin of at least 10 percentage points. If no candidate reaches any of those thresholds, the race will go to a runoff on Nov. 19 between the top two finishers.Even though Mr. Milei won the primary, he still claimed fraud, saying rivals stole his parties’ ballots from polling stations, preventing citizens from voting for him. Mr. Milei also said his party’s ballots were found in the trash at a school. His party did not provide any evidence.Mr. Milei said his party had complained to election officials, but election officials disputed that.“There was no complaint or challenge, nor was there any systematic ballot theft,” Argentina’s electoral court said in a statement. “We are concerned that such statements are made without accompanying legal filings to investigate.”Mr. Milei’s campaign said it had recruited 100,000 volunteers to monitor polling stations on Election Day. But in a television interview on Thursday, Mr. Milei said he was still worried about stolen votes.He claimed that the alleged fraud in the primaries had cost him at least several percentage points of support. “Some say two and a half points, others say three, and others say five,” he said. “Whatever the number is, it may be decisive.”Natalie Alcoba More

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      Venezuela Pledges Small Steps Toward Fair Elections Next Year

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      The agreement signed on Tuesday by the country’s authoritarian government and the opposition would not allow all candidates to run.The government of President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela and the country’s opposition resumed talks on Tuesday designed to move toward free and fair elections, though the agreement that was announced fell short of what human rights activists and the U.S. government are ultimately seeking.Hopes were high that, as part of the agreement, Mr. Maduro would allow opposition candidates already disqualified by his government to participate in the 2024 presidential vote in exchange for the lifting of sanctions on Venezuela’s vital oil industry.Doing so would be a critical move toward a credible race, given that the front-runner in an opposition primary election set for Sunday, María Corina Machado, is barred from running in the general election.But the agreements signed on Tuesday, during a ceremony on the Caribbean island of Barbados, were vague. While they included commitments to allow international election observers and access to the news media in 2024, there were few other concrete promises. Experts say it is unlikely that the United States will fully lift sanctions if Ms. Machado is not allowed to run.“We are going toward the supreme objective of lifting the sanctions,” said Jorge Rodríguez, the president of Venezuela’s legislature, at the ceremony. But “if you received an administrative disqualification,” he added, “then you cannot be a candidate.”Even before an official announcement, some Venezuela experts expressed skepticism that the agreement would lead to real political change.“It’s a minimalist deal that will not lead to free and fair elections,” said Phil Gunson, an analyst with International Crisis Group who lives in the country’s capital, Caracas. But he said, it “is the best available in the circumstances. It allows Maduro to hang on to power unless something really dramatic happens. Baby steps, really.”He added, “The Maduro government has a history of failing to abide by agreements it signs.”Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, in a joint statement with his British, Canadian and E.U. counterparts, welcomed the agreement as a “necessary step” in the “restoration of democracy in Venezuela.”“We continue to call for the unconditional release of all those unjustly detained, the independence of the electoral process and judicial institutions, freedom of expression including for members of the press, and respect for human and political rights,” the statement added.Mr. Maduro came to power in 2013, after the death of President Hugo Chávez, the founder of the country’s socialist-inspired revolution. Under Mr. Maduro, Venezuela, once among the richest countries in Latin America, has witnessed an extraordinary economic decline, leading to a humanitarian crisis that has caused widespread migration.President Nicolás Maduro claimed victory in a 2018 election widely viewed as fraudulent and that led to stricter U.S. sanctions.Meridith Kohut for The New York TimesMore than seven million Venezuelans have fled the country of roughly 28 million people, and in recent years, hundreds of thousands have begun trekking by foot to the United States.Mr. Maduro claimed victory in a 2018 election widely viewed as fraudulent. In response, the U.S. government significantly tightened sanctions on the country’s oil industry, Venezuela’s key source of revenue, a move that exacerbated the economic crisis and isolated Mr. Maduro from much of the world.To help the economy, Mr. Maduro needs sanctions to be lifted. At the same time, the opposition wants him to set competitive conditions for the next presidential election that would give it a legitimate shot at winning.The two sides, however, have been at an impasse over how to achieve these goals, and Mr. Maduro has seemed unwilling to do anything he believes would risk his grip on power.In November, as a sign of its openness to lifting sanctions in exchange for ensuring fair elections, the United States granted the oil company Chevron a license for a limited expansion of energy operations in Venezuela, a small step toward the country’s possible re-entry into the international oil market.The Biden administration is under pressure to ensure that oil prices remain stable going into next year’s presidential election. The threat of a broader conflict in the Middle East combined with ongoing disruptions to Russian energy exports threaten to fan another episode of inflation and potentially cause gasoline prices to rise in the coming months.But even after lifting sanctions, it would still take years and billions of dollars of investment to increase oil production enough to lower prices, said Francisco Monaldi, an expert on Venezuelan energy at Rice University in Houston.He said the Biden administration was most likely motivated more by trying to stem the flow of Venezuelan migrants to the U.S.-Mexico border than by driving down oil prices in the short term.Mr. Maduro’s government is being investigated by the International Criminal Court for possible crimes against humanity committed since 2017, including torture and persecution on political grounds.Isayen Herrera More

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      Gobierno de Venezuela y oposición firman un acuerdo

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      El acuerdo firmado el martes por el gobierno autoritario del país y la oposición no permitiría que todos los candidatos puedan postularse.El gobierno del presidente venezolano Nicolás Maduro, y la oposición del país, reanudaron el martes las conversaciones para avanzar hacia unas elecciones libres y justas, aunque el acuerdo que se anunció tiene limitaciones en los temas que los activistas de derechos humanos y el gobierno de Estados Unidos buscan en última instancia.Había esperanzas de que, como parte del acuerdo, Maduro permitiera que los candidatos de la oposición que han sido inhabilitados por su gobierno participen en las elecciones presidenciales de 2024, a cambio del levantamiento de las sanciones impuestas a la vital industria petrolera venezolana.Esto sería un paso fundamental hacia una contienda creíble porque a María Corina Machado, la candidata favorita de las elecciones primarias de la oposición que se realizarán el domingo, le prohibieron postularse a las elecciones generales.El acuerdo firmado el martes, durante una ceremonia en la isla caribeña de Barbados, es vago. Aunque incluye el compromiso de permitir la presencia de observadores electorales internacionales y el acceso a los medios de comunicación en 2024, hace pocas promesas concretas. Los expertos afirman que es poco probable que Estados Unidos levante las sanciones si no se permite que Machado se postule a las elecciones.“Vamos hacia el objetivo supremo de levantamiento de las sanciones”, dijo Jorge Rodríguez, presidente de la Asamblea Nacional de Venezuela, en la ceremonia. Y agregó: “Si usted recibió una inhabilitación administrativa por el órgano que le corresponde, desde el punto de vista constitucional legal, que es la Contraloría General de la República, pues tampoco puede ser candidato”.Incluso antes de un anuncio oficial, algunos expertos en Venezuela expresaron su escepticismo de que el acuerdo lograra un cambio político real.“Es un acuerdo minimalista que no logrará unas elecciones libres y justas”, dijo Phil Gunson, analista del International Crisis Group que vive en Caracas, la capital del país. Pero “es lo mejor que hay en estas circunstancias. Le permite a Maduro aferrarse al poder, a menos que ocurra algo realmente dramático. En realidad, son pequeños pasos”.Y añadió: “El gobierno de Maduro tiene un historial de incumplimiento de los acuerdos que firma”.Maduro llegó al poder en 2013, tras la muerte del presidente Hugo Chávez, el fundador de la revolución de inspiración socialista que ha gobernado el país. Bajo el mandato de Maduro, Venezuela, que fue uno de los países más ricos de América Latina, ha experimentado un declive económico extraordinario, generando una crisis humanitaria que ha provocado una migración masiva.El presidente Nicolás Maduro reclamó la victoria en unas elecciones de 2018 ampliamente consideradas fraudulentas y que originaron sanciones más estrictas por parte de Estados Unidos.Meridith Kohut para The New York TimesMás de siete millones de venezolanos han huido del país, cuya población es de unos 28 millones de habitantes. Además, en los últimos años, cientos de miles de personas han emprendido el viaje hacia Estados Unidos a pie.En 2018, Maduro se declaró vencedor en unas elecciones ampliamente consideradas como fraudulentas. En respuesta, el gobierno de Estados Unidos endureció significativamente las sanciones contra la industria petrolera del país, la principal fuente de ingresos de Venezuela, una medida que exacerbó la crisis económica y aisló a Maduro de gran parte del mundo.Para mejorar la economía, Maduro necesita que se levanten las sanciones. Al mismo tiempo, la oposición quiere que establezca condiciones competitivas para las próximas elecciones presidenciales con el fin de tener una oportunidad legítima de ganar.Sin embargo, ambas partes no han logrado estos objetivos, y pareciera que Maduro no está dispuesto a hacer nada que crea que puede poner en riesgo su control sobre el poder.En noviembre, como señal de su disposición a levantar las sanciones a cambio de garantizar unas elecciones justas, Estados Unidos concedió a la petrolera Chevron una licencia para una expansión limitada de las operaciones energéticas en Venezuela, un avance modesto hacia la posible reincorporación del país al mercado petrolero internacional.El gobierno de Biden se encuentra bajo presión para garantizar que los precios del petróleo se mantengan estables de cara a las elecciones presidenciales del próximo año. La amenaza de un conflicto más amplio en Medio Oriente, aunada a las actuales interrupciones de las exportaciones energéticas rusas, amenazan con avivar otro episodio de inflación y provocar una potencial subida de los precios de la gasolina en los próximos meses.Pero, incluso después de levantar las sanciones, se necesitarían años y miles de millones de dólares de inversión para aumentar la producción de petróleo lo suficiente como para bajar los precios, dijo Francisco Monaldi, experto en energía venezolana de la Universidad Rice en Houston.Monaldi cree que lo más probable es que el gobierno de Biden centre sus motivaciones en tratar de frenar el flujo de migrantes venezolanos hacia la frontera entre Estados Unidos y México, en vez de hacer bajar los precios del petróleo a corto plazo.El gobierno de Maduro está siendo investigado por la Corte Penal Internacional por posibles crímenes de lesa humanidad cometidos desde 2017, lo que incluye torturas y persecuciones por motivos políticos.Isayen Herrera More

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      What to Know About the New Zealand Election

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      Voters head to the polls this weekend in an election that is likely to show a rightward and populist shift in the country’s politics.New Zealanders are exhausted. Their pocketbooks are threadbare, the dog years of the pandemic have dragged on, and there is a strong sense that the country has never been further off track.And so, when they head to the polls on Saturday, polls show, most will vote to punish the governing center-left Labour Party, which under Jacinda Ardern won a historic majority just three years ago.“There’s a real vibe around of tiredness, frustration,” said Bernard Hickey, an economic commentator. When New Zealanders last went to the polls, they were celebrating their coronavirus wins. From 2021, he said, “it was all downhill.”The opposition center-right National Party is therefore expected to form the next government with some smaller parties, despite what critics describe as a lack of vision for many of the country’s more vexatious issues.Still, New Zealand’s proportional voting system could deliver last-minute twists, and New Zealand First, a small and populist party known for opposing immigration and supporting retirees, may once again become kingmaker, as it did in 2017.Here’s how the campaign has played out, and what to watch for in Saturday’s results.Who are the main candidates?The incumbent leader is Prime Minister Chris Hipkins, who took over from Ms. Ardern early this year and who has spent the penultimate week of the campaign stuck in a hotel room with Covid. Their Labour Party has been in power since 2017.Ms. Ardern’s legacy hangs heavy over New Zealand, where many now ignore her world-leading pandemic response, Mr. Hickey said.“She was a prime minister, who, however you look at it, managed a crisis fairly well,” he said. “And now she’s one of the most reviled politicians in the country, and she can’t walk down the street without protection.”Ms. Ardern, who is pursuing a fellowship at Harvard University, has mostly stayed out of the race. But the “transformational change” that she campaigned on in 2017 has failed to materialize, and many New Zealanders blame her and her party for the difficulties they face, such as inflation or higher mortgage payments.Prime Minister Chris Hipkins, the incumbent leader, took over from Jacinda Ardern in January. He represents the center-left Labour Party.Hagen Hopkins/Getty ImagesThe main challenger is the National Party’s Christopher Luxon, a former chief executive of Air New Zealand, the country’s national airline, who was elected to Parliament for the first time in 2020.Though Mr. Luxon leads Mr. Hipkins as potential voters’ preferred prime minister, he has mostly failed to energize voters, who see him as bland or corporate.“People are saying that they feel there’s not much difference between the two Chrises,” said Grant Duncan, an independent political scientist and commentator.What are pollsters predicting?With voters scurrying to smaller parties, the National Party was expected to garner 34 percent of the vote, according to a Guardian Essential poll released this week, to Labour’s 30 percent.Mr. Luxon is likely to lead the next government with support from Act, a right-wing libertarian party, and from New Zealand First, which helped catapult Ms. Ardern into the prime minister’s office in 2017.There is a very slim chance of a Labour-led coalition government with Te Pati Maori, the country’s Indigenous rights party, and the Green Party. (Mr. Hipkins has said he will not work with New Zealand First.)What are New Zealanders voting on?Cost-of-living issues, as in many other comparable economies, dominate at the polls.“It may or may not be the government’s fault,” said Ben Thomas, a former press secretary for the National Party, “but it’s the government’s problem.”To battle inflation, New Zealand’s independent central bank has raised rates to a 15-year high of 5.5 percent. That has inflicted considerable pain on homeowners, most of whom are subject to floating mortgage rates. New home loans command rates of at least 7 percent, more than three times what they were in 2020, and many expect rates to go even higher.Inflation remains high, even as it slowed to 6 percent in July compared with 6.7 percent in the same month a year earlier, according to the most recent government data. Food prices jumped 12.3 percent over the same period.New home loans in New Zealand have risen sharply in the past few years, now commanding rates of at least 7 percent.Ruth McDowall for The New York TimesThe proposed solutions from both major parties — like the tax and benefit cuts from the National Party, or the targeted subsidies and financial support from Labour — are unlikely to provide widespread relief, analysts say.“The electoral numbers will fall on what is basically two estranged parents doing a bidding war over pocket money,” Mr. Thomas said.A spate of unusual violent crime and “ram raids” — when a vehicle is driven into the windows of a store so it can be robbed — has haunted voters. The National Party has sought to seize the issue, promising to reintroduce the youth boot camps that the country has previously tried and abandoned.Race has also emerged as an issue. New Zealand has longstanding arrangements with Maori, its Indigenous people, many of which are governed by an 1840 treaty. But some New Zealanders say these go too far. Act, the libertarian party run by David Seymour, has promised a referendum on “co-governance,” the practice of including Maori in policy decisions — a vow that has prompted widespread allegations from the left of racism. Act rejects those claims, saying it just wants equal rights for all citizens.What comes next?New Zealand’s other economic problems — which include an aging population, a crumbling health service, inadequate infrastructure and an economy reliant on dairy and other food exports that is set to be tested by extreme weather events — have defied the efforts of successive governments, said Craig Renney, an economist for the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions.“We still have an economy which, structurally, is a commodity-exporting, low-wage economy,” Mr. Renney said, “supported by a giant housing market where we sell houses to each other.”There is a particular antipathy toward public spending to solve those problems, even as the liabilities of not acting continue to climb, he added. “We have a national debt that is the envy of every developed country in the world,” he said, “yet we have this insistence that there is a debt crisis just around the corner.”Despite these challenges, New Zealand’s trajectory was largely positive, said Shamubeel Eaqub, a New Zealand-based economist. “I’m optimistic about New Zealand,” he said. “I’m not optimistic about our politics.”And while New Zealanders may approach Saturday’s vote with a sense of irritability, after an election campaign that has been characterized by mudslinging and small-target campaigning, there have been few allegations of the misinformation or antidemocratic behaviors that have bedeviled elections elsewhere in the world.“In New Zealand, we don’t stop and think, ‘If you look at all of the indicators and league tables around the world, we’re actually one of the best-governed countries on earth,’ ” said Dr. Duncan, the political scientist. “But if you actually tried to say it to most New Zealanders, they’ll ask you, ‘What are you on?’” More

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      In Argentina, the U.S. Dollar Could Soon Become King

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      Americans complain that inflation has eroded the value of their money, but the U.S. dollar looks lovely to the people of Argentina, where consumer prices rose 124 percent in August from a year earlier. The threat of hyperinflation has become a central issue in the presidential election on Oct. 22, which The Times has described as “a new test of the strength of the far right around the world.” The leading candidate in the race, which could go to a November runoff, is a radical libertarian who promises to bring rising prices under control by getting rid of the peso and fully dollarizing the Argentine economy.Buena idea, o mala?I’ll get to the pros and cons of dollarization in a minute, but first a few words on why Argentines would even consider such a drastic step. Argentina is blessed with abundant natural resources. Early in the 20th century, it was richer than Germany or France. “Until the 1930s, the French used the phrase ‘riche comme un Argentin’ to describe the foolishly rich,” the economists Edward L. Glaeser, Rafael Di Tella and Lucas Llach wrote in the Latin American Economic Review in 2018.But Argentina’s economy has been stunted by disastrous economic policies and chronic political instability. There were periods of military rule, hyperinflation, defaults on external debt, protectionism and under-industrialization. Argentina has been a democracy since 1983 but successive governments, whether left- or right-leaning, haven’t managed to match neighbors such as Chile, Uruguay and Brazil in bringing down inflation and stabilizing finances.That record of failure is written on the currency. Since 1970, Argentina has burned through several currencies: the peso ley, the peso argentino, the austral and now the peso convertible. Today there is no single exchange rate with the dollar that all residents can use. As colorfully explained recently in The Buenos Aires Herald, there is the official, or “wholesale,” exchange rate, for international trade; the savers’ exchange rate, which is supposedly for savers but is not widely accessible; and the “blue” dollar, which is essentially the black-market rate. Foreign tourists can buy pesos at yet another rate, the M.E.P., short for Mercado Electrónico de Pagos. There are even temporary exchange rates, such as the Vaca Muerta rate, which is named after where it was announced last month (not because it’s for buying or selling dead cows).Javier Milei, who leads the polls in the presidential race, wants to chuck the whole rickety system, abolish the central bank and adopt the U.S. dollar, as three smaller Latin American countries — Ecuador, El Salvador and Panama — have already done.Milei, it’s important to say, has extreme and I would argue insupportable stands on a number of issues. He wants to drastically cut taxes and spending, as The Times wrote, “including by charging people to use the public health care system; closing or privatizing all state-owned enterprises; and eliminating the health, education and environment ministries.” He is an economist and a member of the legislature who has large dogs named Milton Friedman, Robert Lucas and Murray Rothbard.But let’s separate the message from the messenger and look at the dollarization proposal on its merits. The biggest plus is that it would most likely get rid of Argentina’s high inflation overnight. The money available for spending inside Argentina would be only the dollars that the country already has in reserves or manages to acquire by, say, running trade surpluses with the United States or borrowing. The general price level can’t rise if there is no increase in the supply of dollars, unless the velocity of circulation increases. As Milton Friedman (the economist, not the dog) once said, “inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon.”Dollarizing the economy is like locking oneself in handcuffs and then throwing away the key. It’s an act of desperation when nothing else works.And like most acts of desperation, dollarization has big drawbacks. By switching to dollars, Argentina would effectively adopt the monetary policy of the United States, thus losing the ability to raise or lower interest rates to suit local conditions. It would lose the profit known as seigniorage that comes from printing money. And dollarization wouldn’t solve the structural problems that have caused high inflation, such as government overspending, as Guillermo Ortiz, a former governor of Mexico’s central bank, told reporters in September.This week I interviewed Iván Werning, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who grew up in Argentina and earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees there before getting a doctorate at the University of Chicago. With two graduate students who are fellow Argentines, he has written two recent papers about dollarization, which he calls a “dangerous delusion,” and has wrestled with opponents on X, formerly Twitter.Werning isn’t persuaded that dollarization really would tie the government’s hands. In an email to me, he pointed out that Argentina tried once before to link to the dollar, through currency board “convertibility,” but abandoned the program in 2002. “Argentina could reissue the peso in short order, in a manner similar to how its provinces have issued government pesos in the past to pay for bills,” he wrote. Ecuador, he said, has found “creative accounting ways” to loosen the constraint of its dollarization, such as having the central bank finance the treasury.The Argentine government doesn’t have enough dollars to replace all of its pesos at current exchange rates, even at the unofficial “blue” rate, Werning told me by phone. There are rich people with lots of dollars squirreled away abroad, but that doesn’t help the ordinary Argentine, he said. So in his view, if the conversion were done today, there could be an extreme shortage of money in the economy, which would most likely cause a deep recession because prices and wages would not adjust smoothly to the dollar scarcity. Postponing the conversion could make matters worse, by triggering an anticipatory burst of inflation, he added.The problem could be solved if Argentina were able to raise more dollars, but in that case it probably wouldn’t need to dollarize in the first place, he said.Understandably frustrated by years of dysfunction, the Argentine people are looking for a quick fix for inflation, Werning told me. But the quick fix would have bad consequences in the long term, he said. He prefers more conventional solutions such as bringing government budgets closer into balance. On that score, he is slightly hopeful.“Today there’s a lot more consensus” about the need to reduce spending, Werning said. The message is coming not just from Milei, the extreme libertarian, but also from Patricia Bullrich, a center-right candidate who served in the cabinet of Mauricio Macri. Even Sergio Massa, a candidate who is the economy minister in the current, center-left government of Albert Fernandez, has talked about cutting spending, although “his actions do not match his words,” Werning said. Whether any of the candidates would be as resolute in office, when anti-austerity protests begin, is another question. But Werning said, “If ever there was a chance” for righting Argentina’s finances, “it might be now.”The Readers WriteDonald Trump and his lawyers persist in re-arguing points and generally annoying the judge because they hope to elicit an intemperate response that could be read as bias. I am a trial lawyer, and I have seen this happen. Because this is a bench trial, a mistrial would take a real circus breaking out. But they may be able to argue on appeal that Trump was denied a fair trial.James M. MillerSarasota, Fla.Your opinion on the “fix” for our budget problem is spot on, but lawmakers’ concern about job security exceeds their willingness to do the best job for the country. And so we languish with incidental actions that appear helpful but don’t make the real change we need.Kathy CrosbyGrand Rapids, Mich.Quote of the Day“America is ungovernable; those who have served the revolution have plowed the sea.”— Simón Bolívar, South American revolutionary leader, in 1830, as quoted by Sheldon Liss and Peggy Liss in “Man, State, and Society in Latin American History” (1972) More