2 to 3% GDP growth in Argentina projected for 2009. (after six years growing at 7-8%).
Jobs at car manufacturing plants (which had been growing at record rates in the last 5 years, including conquering new markets for exports like Mexico, Israel and Africa, and now all those exports have stalled) are going to be maintained with a reduction of work hours.
There's several incentive programs to keep the internal market alive via credit to renew your car, fridges, stoves, etc all stuff that is manufactured locally. To keep speculators at bay, you have to give your old one to be scrapped when buying the new, but the 12-month financing makes it all very affordable, and the interest rate is almost negative ie the government is putting money in people's pockets, so they can keep the local economy alive even if some export markets have fallen.
Subsidies for utilities -which benefit the high and middle class more than the poor- have been eliminated in order to sustain a healthy superavit of the public finances. All debt payments for 2009 are secured.
Not too bad considering the mess we read from the Northern Hemisphere.
FC