In exchange for "firm and solid support" and a $10 billion line of credit from the IMF to pay loans, de la Rúa agreed to press forward measures that will fall most heavily on the shoulders of working people in the South American country.

Argentina’s economy contracted 3.1 percent last year, pushing official unemployment up from 14.5 to 16 percent. One of the demands of the imperialists was to urgently "reduce deficits of the larger provinces" and ensure tax collection, as stated by an IMF report, which added that the government will have to make "difficult policy choices."

In addition to the economic slump, working people in Argentina have been hit by massive layoffs as a result of the sales of state enterprises under the previous regime of Carlos Menem. These conditions have spurred protests against unemployment and for relief from high consumer prices.

Truckers in the capital city Buenos Aires stopped deliveries at the beginning of October demanding lower prices for diesel fuel and highway toll fees. In Salta, northern Argentina, a protest of 100 unemployed workers was attacked by the police who killed Aníbal Verón, a 37 year-old driver and mechanic who had been fired from his job a year ago. Verón, along with others, was demanding jobs, food, and better living conditions when 400 police harassed them ordering them to leave.

The police killing of Verón prompted the Argentine Workers Federation (CTA) to call a nationwide strike. The Confederation of General Workers announced other protests while the transportation union called for an immediate work stoppage for several hours.

When De la Rúa took office 11 months ago, his popularity was high. As head of the Alliance Party, a coalition of the traditional liberal Radical Party and another bourgeois outfit called FREPASO, he won the elections as a new face and lesser evil, although there were no major policy differences with former president Carlos Menem of the Peronist Party.

Since it assumed office, de la Rúa’s administration has been "rewarded" with new loans from the IMF for steps that have chipped away at previous social conquests of working people in Argentina. In his first month in office, de la Rúa adopted budget cuts, imposed consumer tax hikes, and restricted funding for the most depressed provinces. Last January the president decreed that health care plans for workers would fall under the jurisdiction of the health ministry and not the unions.

But these measures failed to compensate for falling tax revenues and falling prices for export commodities such as wheat and soya, leading to a crisis in how to pay interest coming due on the enormous foreign debt. Earlier this month the government issued a new round of one-year treasury bills and had to pay a 16 percent interest rate, almost double that paid in July. The additional interest alone amounts to $40 million a year.

De la Rúa’s most recent austerity package includes a pension plan "reform." This reportedly will eliminate the government retirement plan, forcing workers to seek pension plans with private companies. The retirement age for women workers was increased from 60 to 65 years old.

The package includes tax cuts to enterprises and capitalist investors as well a halt to increases in government funding to the provinces for the next five years.

At the center of de la Rúa’s moves is an attack on labor law. A bill approved last February by the lower house of Congress would end industry-wide contract bargaining, won through battles to organize unions following World War II, and allow bosses to negotiate agreements plant by plant. It erodes the protection of workers on the job by extending the probation period for new employees from one month to six, with the right of the boss to extend it another six months. The bill also ends automatic extension of union contracts during negotiations once the current contract expires.

The Senate’s approval of this antilabor law has been the center of a recent government scandal. Eleven senators allegedly accepted bribes to vote for the law, placing de la Rúa’s government on the spot. The adoption of this measure is required for his austerity package to receive the blessing of the IMF.

The scandal has already led to the resignation of Vice President Carlos Alvarez. The vice president called for a more sweeping investigation, noting the government "will further weaken itself if it does not take decisive action into what happened in the Senate."  
 
 
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