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The Guardian view on Argentina’s bailout: when Trump’s ally calls, the IMF obeys – at a cost | Editorial
The deal with Javier Milei shows how America-first dealmaking is bending global finance to serve authoritarian and extractive ends
It is famed for hard-nosed bargaining with crisis-hit countries, so why did the International Monetary Fund throw a $20bn lifeline to the serial defaulter Argentina – despite alarm on its board? The answer is that the country’s rightwing leader, Javier Milei, is Donald Trump’s “favourite president”. Amid unease over handing a third of the IMF’s global lending to its largest debtor, the deal passed with $12bn upfront. The IMF has long been intellectually compromised – promoting stability while enforcing neoliberal orthodoxy. Under Mr Trump, it is ethically compromised too.
Mr Milei’s bailout marks the second Trump-era rescue for Argentina. In 2018, the fund handed Buenos Aires a record $57bn – but cut it off when its then president, Mauricio Macri, a Trump family friend, was not re-elected. That deal now looks nakedly political. With the US holding an effective board veto, the fund’s independence was always fragile. It’s now completely subordinated. A US takeover of the IMF threatens deeper instability than any Argentinian default.
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Bank of England backs scheme to put more economics teachers into state schools
Initial training to be offered in north-west England, as report shows disparities in access to the subject
The Bank of England is backing a drive to put more economics teachers into state schools, as a report has revealed young people from disadvantaged backgrounds are the least likely to study the subject.
Targeting students in the north-west of England in its first year, the scheme will aim to overcome huge shortages of teachers across the state sector with the skills to teach economics.