Macroeconomic instability in Argentina, 1963-2003

ARZA, VALERIA

Revista de Economía Política de Buenos Aires

Facultad de Ciencias Económicas, Universidad de Buenos Aires

Año: 2009 vol. 3 p. 33 - 71

1850-6933

Macroeconomic instability discourages investment plans due to the interference it generates in anticipating the behaviour of key variables of the context. This study suggests that the Argentinean macroeconomic setting was, historically, highly unstable. During the 39 years of economic policy studied in this paper, there were 19 reversals in policy orientations. Cycles characterised by orthodox policies lasted about three years on average, while heterodox cycles hardly overcame the year. Consequently, economic cycles -calculated on the basis of GDP- were short (3 years) and volatility of macroeconomic indicators was internationally high