Argentina Statutory social-insurance contributions

What this value means

WHAT A PAYROLL ENGINE GETS WRONG IN ARGENTINA. 1. THE CEILING CHANGES EVERY MONTH, AND MOST ENGINES CACHE IT. DNU 274/2024 substituted art. 32 de la Ley 24.241 so that previsional movilidad is MONTHLY and follows the INDEC IPC. ANSES therefore re-fixes the bases imponibles mínima y máxima of art. 9 de la Ley 24.241 by resolution every single month: ARS 132.420,94 / 4.303.619,01 for mayo 2026 (Res. 110/2026), ARS 135.837,40 / 4.414.652,38 for junio 2026 (Res. 139/2026), ARS 141.380,42 / 4.594.798,23 for agosto 2026 (Res. 232/2026, B.O. 30 de julio de 2026). Every other country in this dataset re-fixes its ceiling annually at worst. An Argentine ceiling more than one month old is wrong. Note also that the resolution is typically published in the last days of the preceding month, so there is a short window each month in which the operative figure is already determined but not yet gazetted. 2. THE CEILING APPLIES TO THE EMPLOYEE SIDE ONLY. Art. 9 primer párrafo de la Ley 24.241, texto según Ley 26.222, caps the base "a los fines exclusivamente del cálculo de los aportes previstos en los incisos a) y c) del artículo 10" — the employee aporte and the self-employed aporte. Employer contributions have had NO maximum base since November 2008. So for a high earner the employee's 17 % stops at the ceiling while the employer's 24 % keeps running on the full salary. Engines that apply one base to both sides are wrong in one direction or the other at every salary above the cap. 3. THE MINIMUM IS A FLOOR ON THE BASE, NOT A LIABILITY THRESHOLD. Below ARS 141.380,42 the contribution is computed on 141.380,42, not on actual pay, and not waived. 4. THE EMPLOYER RATE DEPENDS ON THE EMPLOYER'S SECTOR AND SIZE. Ley 27.541 art. 19: 20,40 % where the employer's principal activity is "Servicios" or "Comercio" AND total annual sales exceed the mediana empresa tramo 2 limits; 18 % for everyone else. Two identical employees on identical pay in the same city cost their employers different amounts. The tramo 2 sales limits are sector-specific and re-fixed by SEPYME, so the classification is a moving test and must not be cached with the rate. 5. OBRA SOCIAL IS NOT INSIDE THE UNIFIED RATE. Art. 19 de la Ley 27.541 covers only SIPA, INSSJP, Fondo Nacional de Empleo, Asignaciones Familiares and RENATRE (art. 20). Obras sociales sit in a separate statute (Ley 23.660 art. 16) at 6 % employer and 3 % employee, and the ART cuota (Ley 24.557) is separate again. Reading 18 % as the whole employer charge understates it by a quarter. 6. FOUR SUPERSEDED PERCENTAGES ARE STILL PRINTED IN LIVE STATUTES. Ley 24.241 art. 11 still says the employer pays 16 %. Ley 19.032 art. 8 still says the employer pays 2 %. Neither is collected as such — both are inside the unified art. 19 rate. Similarly Decreto 814/2001, the instrument most secondary sources still cite for the 18 %/20,40 % rates, was REPEALED by art. 26 de la Ley 27.541 with effect from 23 December 2019; the rates survive because Ley 27.541 re-enacted them, not because the decree does. Cite the Law, not the decree. 7. THE 1,5 % PER EXTRA DEPENDANT ON OBRA SOCIAL. Ley 23.660 art. 16 inc. b) adds 1,5 % of remuneration for each beneficiary a cargo outside the grupo familiar primario. Employee obra social is 3 % only for an employee with no such dependants. This is a per-employee variable that a flat 17 % model cannot express. 8. THE DETRACCIÓN STILL EXISTS AND IS STILL ZERO-INDEXED. Ley 27.541 art. 22 subtracts ARS 7.003,68 per employee per month from the employer-contribution base, and art. 23 a further ARS 10.000 for employers with up to 25 employees. Neither figure has an indexation mechanism in the Law and neither has been updated since December 2019, so both are now economically negligible — but they remain legally operative and a strictly correct calculation still applies them. 9. THE 2026 LABOUR REFORM CHANGES DESTINATION, NOT AMOUNT — SO FAR. The Ley de Modernización Laboral 27.802 (B.O. 6 de marzo de 2026) created the Fondo de Asistencia Laboral, an individual per-employer account funding future severance. Its reglamentación, Decreto 408/2026 (B.O. 1 de junio de 2026), art. 24, provides that "los empleadores detraerán mensualmente la alícuota de contribución al Fondo de Asistencia Laboral … de aquella que les corresponda para … contribuciones patronales" — the FAL alícuota is DEDUCTED FROM the contribución patronal, not added to it. Total employer cost is therefore unchanged; what changes is where part of the 18 %/20,40 % goes. Model the FAL as a destination split, never as an extra charge. 10. RIFL IS A NEW-HIRE INCENTIVE, NOT THE ORDINARY RATE. The Régimen de Incentivo a la Formalización Laboral under the same reform lets employers pay a reduced contribución patronal on employment relationships newly registered in a defined window, for a defined number of years. It applies to qualifying NEW hires only and is not the rate for an ordinary existing employee. Serving it as the general rate would understate employer cost by most of the charge. 11. ARGENTINA HAS NO EMPLOYEE UNEMPLOYMENT CONTRIBUTION. The Fondo Nacional de Empleo (Ley 24.013) is funded entirely from the employer's unified contribution. There is no employee line for it, unlike Chile's seguro de cesantía or Ecuador's 2 %. Total for an ordinary private-sector employee: employee 17 % (11 SIPA + 3 INSSJP + 3 obra social) of remuneration capped at ARS 4.594.798,23/month, plus 1,5 % per additional dependant; employer 24 % uncapped (18 % unified + 6 % obra social), or 26,40 % for a large services or commerce employer, PLUS the ART cuota and the SCVO premium, neither of which has a national rate. SUB-NATIONAL VARIATION: the CONTRIBUTION RATES are national and identical in all 23 provinces and the Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires. But Argentina does have a genuine geographic dimension that other countries in this dataset do not: art. 21 de la Ley 27.541 lets the employer take a stated number of PERCENTAGE POINTS of the contribución patronal actually paid as a fiscal credit against VAT, and the number of points is set jurisdiction by jurisdiction in the Anexo to that article. The gross rate is the same everywhere; the NET employer cost after the VAT credit is not. Model that as a credit against VAT, never as a reduction of the payroll rate — it does not change what is declared or remitted to ARCA on the F.931. Separately, aportes and contribuciones convencionales under collective agreements vary by union and activity, and the base for calculating them was itself changed by Decreto 612/2026 (B.O. 20 de julio de 2026); those are collective-agreement obligations, not statutory social insurance, and are outside this record. WHAT WE DO NOT PUT A NUMBER ON: 1. The ART cuota — rate_total and rate_employer null. It is a contract premium with a private insurer, graded by activity, accident experience and headcount, with a fixed per-worker component and a variable percentage. There is no statutory rate to serve. Circulating ranges of roughly one to three and a half per cent of payroll describe the market, not the law, and are not carried as values. 2. The SCVO premium — a flat peso amount per head fixed by Superintendencia de Seguros de la Nación resolution, not a percentage. The obligation is served; the amount is not, because it belongs in a currency field and would have to be re-read from the current SSN resolution. 3. The mediana empresa tramo 2 sales thresholds that decide whether an employer pays 18 % or 20,40 %. Sector-specific, re-fixed by SEPYME resolution, and a table in their own right; the selection rule is served instead. 4. The FAL alícuota. Ley 27.802 Título II and Decreto 408/2026 make it employer-borne, calculated on the nómina salarial, and expressly deducted from contribuciones patronales, and the reglamentación defers the minimum coverage to a joint resolution of the Ministerio de Capital Humano and the Ministerio de Economía. Commentary reports a band of roughly 1 % to 2,5 % of payroll varying with company size. Because it is a carve-out from a rate already served in full, omitting the number costs an engine nothing in total employer cost — and the joint resolution fixing it was not read. 5. The RIFL reduced rate and the proportion of the unified contribution allocated to each subsystem under art. 20 de la Ley 27.541. Both are set by Executive act rather than in the Law, and neither changes what an ordinary employer remits in total. 6. The Fondo Solidario de Redistribución share of the obra social money. It changes where the 9 % goes, never how much is withheld or paid. ALREADY LEGISLATED, NOT YET IN FORCE: 1. Ley 23.660 art. 16 inc. a) is SUBSTITUTED by the Ley de Modernización Laboral 27.802 "con efecto para las contribuciones que se devenguen a partir del 1° de enero de 2027". The replacement keeps the six per cent (6 %) and adds a Superintendencia de Servicios de Salud power to audit where the contributions go. The rate does not move; the quoted text does. RE-VERIFY FROM 2026-12-15. 2. Further provisions of Ley 27.802 touching social-security financing and employer contributions are reported to take effect on 1 January 2027. RE-VERIFY FROM 2026-12-15 against the Law itself, not commentary. 3. The FAL becomes payable per employer from the month following the opening of that employer's account (Decreto 408/2026 art. 15), so its start date is employer-specific rather than a single national date, and the joint ministerial resolution fixing the minimum coverage may still be issued. Since it is deducted from contribuciones patronales, no total changes when it lands. 4. The bases imponibles will be re-fixed for septiembre 2026 by a fresh ANSES resolution, expected in the last days of August 2026. RE-VERIFY MONTHLY — this record's ceiling and floor are the agosto 2026 values only. SOURCING CAVEATS: The percentage rates and the base rules are read from the texto actualizado of each Law on InfoLeg — Ley 24.241 arts. 9, 10 and 11; Ley 27.541 arts. 19 to 26 including the ARS 7.003,68 and ARS 10.000 detracción figures; Ley 23.660 art. 16 incs. a) and b) with its full amendment notes, which is where the Ley 25.239 cut to 5 %, the Ley 25.565 restoration to 6 % and the Ley 27.802 substitution effective 1 January 2027 were confirmed; and Decreto 408/2026 art. 24 for the FAL deduction mechanism, read from the Boletín Oficial. The Ley 19.032 art. 8 percentages (3 % employee, 2 % employer) are taken from consistent reproductions of that article rather than from the InfoLeg consolidated text, which was not opened. The agosto 2026 bases imponibles and the Resolución ANSES 232/2026 number and Boletín Oficial date are taken from specialist practitioner reporting of that resolution, cross-checked against the same source's reporting of the mayo and junio 2026 resolutions, and are consistent with the monthly IPC-linked mechanism of DNU 274/2024; the resolution itself was not opened in the Boletín Oficial. Ley 27.802's structure, the FAL band and the RIFL parameters are commentary-sourced; nothing served as a value depends on them, and the one primary point taken from that reform — that the FAL is deducted from, not added to, contribuciones patronales — comes from the operative text of Decreto 408/2026 art. 24. Employee and employer shares are stated separately: the employee figure is what leaves the payslip, the employer figure is cost of employment and is not a deduction.

Get it programmatically

curl https://latamref.dev/v1/ar/social-contributions
# $0.005 per call — x402 on Base (USDC). No key, no signup.
# History:    curl https://latamref.dev/v1/ar/social-contributions/history?from=2020-01-01
# Provenance: curl https://latamref.dev/provenance/ar/social-contributions

Other Argentina series: BCRA monetary policy rate (abolished — endogenous-rate regime) · VAT standard rate (IVA alícuota general) · VAT registration threshold · Salario Mínimo, Vital y Móvil (SMVM), monthly · Public holidays (feriados nacionales) · CPI inflation (year-on-year) · Corporate income tax rate · Withholding tax rates · Statutory default interest (intereses moratorios) · Personal income tax brackets

The same figure elsewhere: Barbados · Belize · Bolivia · Brazil · Chile · all 22