Hope for Argentina

So what is the difference between a madman and a genius? Success. The following is a conversation with Javier Milei, the president of Argentina. He is a libertarian, anarcho-capitalist, and economist, who campaigned with a chainsaw that symbolized his promise to slash the corrupt bureaucracy of the state. He stepped into the presidency one year ago, with a country on the brink of hyperinflation, deepened debt and suffering from mass unemployment and poverty. He took this crisis head on, transforming one of Latin America's largest economies through pure free market principles. In just a few months in office, he already achieved Argentina's first fiscal surplus in 16 years, and not just avoided the hyperinflation but brought inflation down to its lowest in three years.

When did you first understand the value of freedom, especially economic freedom? Well, actually, I came to understand the ideas of freedom as an economic growth specialist back in the years of 2013 to 2014. I could see that per capita GDP statistics over the last 2,000 years of the Christian era essentially looked like a hockey stick, indicating that per capita GDP remained almost constant until around 1800, after which it accelerated sharply. In the same context of that phenomenal increase in productivity and per capita GDP, the population had multiplied sevenfold over the preceding 200 years.

So from that, what is now, today, and maybe you can talk about the evolution, is your philosophy, economics philosophy. You've described yourself as an anarcho-capitalist, market anarchists, libertarian. That's the ideal, and then maybe in practice and reality, you've said that you're more of a minarchist. So lay it all out. What's your economics philosophy today? Strictly speaking, I am an anarcho-capitalist. I despise the state government. I despise violence. Let us suppose we take the definition of liberalism. I usually use the definition of liberalism given by Alberto Benegas Lynch [foreign language 00:09:37], which is very much in line with the definition of John Locke, which essentially matches the definition by Alberto Benegas Lynch, Jr., who said that liberalism is the unrestricted respect for the life project of others based on the principle of non-aggression and in defense of the right to life, liberty, and property. So I frame all of the discussions within those terms. And the fact is that when you get to that notion, I would dare say that you become an anarcho-capitalist de facto. And what that describes, it is an idea which represents my ideal world. I mean, that is the ideal world.

So you became president 11 months ago. Can you, again, describe some of the actions you took? For example, you cut half the number of government ministries, layoffs, removed price controls. It'll be interesting to lay out the first steps and what's next. If you allow me, I will first give you a description of the situation we received, and based on that, I will tell you each of the things we did. When we first took office, basically what we found was that in the first week of December, inflation was rising at the rate of 1% per day, which means 3,700% annually. In the first half of December, it had accelerated to 7,500% annually. When you look at wholesale inflation in December of last year, it was 54%, which if annualized would equate to an inflation rate of 17,000% per year. And in addition, Argentina for the previous 10 years had not been growing, with a drop in GDP per capita of approximately 15%. And the reality was that nearly 50% were living in poverty.

Maybe you can explain to me the metrics of poverty and unemployment. As you said, unemployment went down, real unemployment went down, real poverty went down. But even that aside, what have been the most painful impacts of these radical reforms and how many of them are required in the short term to have a big positive impact in the long term? Let's take it step by step, all right? That is in fact, we started to do things right, therefore we did not create poverty. The poverty was an inherited poverty. The point is that what we did was to reveal it.

You've spoken about the caste, the corrupt political establishment. So there's a lot of powerful people and groups that are against your ideas. What does it take to fight when so much power is against you? Look, we have fought against corruption like never before in Argentina. In fact, when we took office for example, there were about 900 roadblocks per year. That is people who made a habit of blocking the streets. They prevented free movement. And besides, they were given social plans and they were given a lot of money. If you remember when I started by explaining the cuts, one of the things I said was that we removed the middlemen of poverty. In other words, the managers of poverty, those who lived by stealing from the poor. Well, that is a huge source of corruption.

So you're not only fighting for economic freedom, you're fighting for freedom of speech? Exactly. I fight for freedom in all aspects of life. That is to say, one of the things that seems most interesting to me is that when the Berlin Wall fell, it's true that officially it fell in the year 1989. But the reality is that the wall or socialism fell in the year 1961 when they had to build the wall. I mean, they built it because people were leaving Communist Germany for capitalist Germany. They realized that those on the western side were much better off. And of course, to prevent people from leaving. They put what a wonderful system, right? So I mean, they had to trap people. They couldn't let them go. I mean, these are such wonderful ideas that they had to apply them at gunpoint.

Another guy who fights for freedom, freedom of speech in this case, is your new friend, Elon Musk. What do you admire and what have you learned from your interactions with Elon? I have a huge admiration for Elon Musk. He is an absolutely unconventional person. He's a great fighter for the ideas of freedom. What he has done on Twitter, now known as X, and how he is helping the world nowadays to wake up once and for all and become aware of the socialist virus, the woke virus, that in itself makes him a hero in the history of humanity. But it's not just that.

Like you said, Elon and Vivek Ramaswamy are heading the DOGE, Department of Government Efficiency. So from your experience this year as president of Argentina and every chainsaw economic policies that you've implemented, what advice would you give to Elon and Vivek about how to do it in the United States? Just cut to the chase. Cut to the chase. Simple as that. I'll tell you a story and you're going to love it. Currently in Argentina, due to the political balance we've achieved, we have had certain powers delegated from Congress to the executive branch, and therefore we can resolve it by decree that the deregulation minister, Federico Sturzenegger, in his ministry shows a counter that displays in front of everyone there. He displays the number of days, all right, during which the delegated powers will continue to be valid. Therefore, he has a whole deregulation division, also a public spending cut division, and government structure reduction division, and he also has an elite corps that's cleaning up all of the laws that hinder the economic system and progress. And every day, he removes between one and five economic restrictions.

You've spoken with Donald Trump, allegedly he called you his favorite president. What did you discuss? And maybe, again, what do you admire about President Trump and what do you learn from him? There are several things that I admire about President Trump. The first is that he probably... I think he's provided ample proof of this in his first presidency. He understands the nature of the cultural battle. He has openly confronted socialism, his speeches openly target socialism, he perfectly understands the woke virus, and that is of great value because it means understanding what it's all about.

Why is it important to you that Argentina has a close relationship with the United States? Well, to us, that is truly important, okay? Because we've decided to be geopolitical allies of the United States ever since our campaign, we have decided that our allies will be the United States and Israel because they basically represent the ideas of the western world, they represent the free world. That is to say, what we would call today, let's say, a liberal democracy by confronting the autocrats. And in that sense, that is the geopolitical alignment.

Let me ask you a very important, difficult question. I'm a huge fan, have been my whole life, of Diego Maradona and Messi. So who, to you, is the greatest football player of all time? The way I see it, I have seen Maradona play, all right? I saw Maradona play in the past, I used to watch him, and I saw him during his last year at Argentinos Juniors before Boca Juniors in the year 1980, and I saw him in '81. Playing for Boca, I saw him play in the youth selection in Japan in 1979. I truly have immensely enjoyed the talent of Maradona, but without a doubt, the best soccer player of all time, not just from Argentina, of all time, even better than Pelé, is Messi, of course.

How hard is it? What's been the personal toll of carrying the hope of a nation on your shoulders? Well, being defamed, insulted, and attacked every single day, but again, there's no point in life if it's not with freedom. So, like Sylvester Stallone once said, "The secret to life is to carry on in spite of the blows you get, the punches you take." And fortunately, we have been able to carry on in spite of the blows, both coming at us from in front and from behind our backs, because it have been more honest if we had been attacked directly. But well, in Argentina politics and the mass media, they do love to attack behind your back.

Well enough. Again, going back to your youth, you were a lead singer in a rock band. Who's the greatest rock star of all time? Okay. Well, the way I see it, the most amazing rock singer in history of mankind was definitely Elvis Presley. And my favorite band is the Rolling Stones. So I also greatly admire Mick Jagger, and I still have this dream of getting to meet him in person.

Let me ask you about the market. It's so interesting, from your view of the world, how powerful the market is at figuring out what's best for society. Why do you think the market works so well as a guide for humanity? One must first understand what the market is. Simply put, the market is a process of voluntary exchange, where individuals cooperate through the transfer of property rights, in which private property is upheld. This is the system that drives the allocation of resources. In essence, socialism, and this is what Mises condemns in his book, Socialism, shows that without private property, prices cease to exist and therefore resources are diverted. Why don't you think it's the same to make a road of asphalt or gold? Why not make it of gold? Because you have an understanding of economic calculation, you have an idea of prices in your mind. So, in this context, if there is no private property, there are no prices, and as a result, the free market capitalism is the best mechanism ever developed by humankind for resource allocation.

You mentioned your four-legged children. What have you learned about life from your dogs? Well, from my four-legged children, I have learned unconditional love. In fact, well, my name in Hebrew means loyal friend, faithful friend, and on the Chinese horoscope, I am dog. And if there's one thing that defines me is loyalty, being decent. And those virtues, you can find them in those wonderful beings that dogs are, who love unconditionally. In fact, they are superior beings, spiritually speaking in my case, because I don't forget or forgive those who have harmed me. That is to say, all those who have insulted, defamed me, and criticized me, I remember each one of them, but I don't have the greatness needed to forgive them.

There are a lot of people who admire your revolutionary spirit. What advice would you give them, maybe young people, on how to live a life like yours and have an impact on the world, like you have begun to do? I didn't do this thinking about having an impact on the world. I have defined what makes me happy and I live according to that. I live consistently by that. And most importantly, I would say never give up. Moreover, and above all, never be half-hearted. I would rather cry because I failed, rather than not crying because I never tried. I'm a perfectionist, so when I do err, of course, I have a bad time. But still, I prefer to go and get things done. If it goes wrong, it's part of life, but I will never have to regret not having done what I thought needed to be done at that moment.