Argentina loses 127,000 jobs in recession: government

Nearly 130,000 people lost their jobs in recession-hit Argentina from January to September this year, the government said Thursday.

Companies reported a total of 127,595 job cuts -- a 1.5 percent fall in employment overall -- the Federal Public Revenues Administration said.

Just under eight million of the country's 41 million people were formally employed.

Conservative President Mauricio Macri has introduced spending cuts and tariff hikes.

He was elected a year ago after 12 years of leftist rule by Cristina Fernandez and her late husband Nestor Kirchner.

Macri says the measures are crucial to strengthen Argentina's economy over the medium term.

But they have sparked angry protests by Argentines who say the reforms are hitting the poor hardest.

Annual inflation is very high at about 43 percent, authorities say.

Argentina is Latin America's third-biggest economy.

The national statistics institute INDEC calculated the unemployment rate at 9.3 percent in the first half of this year -- three percent points higher than a year earlier.