Javier Milei spoke before business leaders and promised to bring the opening of the economy to 90%

Javier Milei: "The natural state of man throughout his existence was poverty" President Javier Milei spoke before business leaders at the Endeavor Argentina 2026 Gala, held this Thursday at the Rut Haus in the city of Buenos Aires, following the release of October's inflation figures. There, he sent a message to entrepreneurs, defended the use of technology, and reiterated that he seeks to open the economy to 90%. It was the first speech delivered by the president after Pope Leo XIV's visit to Argentina, in which he reiterated the achievements of his administration in improving conditions for entrepreneurship in the country. Milei structured his presentation around three questions: what technology has given throughout history, what men do with it, and where it is headed. To answer the first, he drew on historical data on global economic growth. He cited the studies of economist Angus Maddison to point out that, from the Christian era until 1800, global per capita income grew by only 40%, and stated: "To double GDP before the Industrial Revolution, we would have needed 3,500 years." From that framework, Milei argued that the historical question is not why poverty exists, but why wealth exists. "The natural state of man throughout his existence until the Industrial Revolution was poverty," he asserted, noting that before that process, 90% of humanity lived in extreme destitution. According to the president, the advancement of technology not only transformed production, but was accompanied by a set of ideas that, in his view, proved equally decisive: freedom, private property, and respect for contracts. Javier Milei presented his economic opening goals before business leaders at the Endeavor Argentina 2026 Gala With that background, the head of state linked technological progress to improved living conditions for the most vulnerable sectors. "Technology multiplies what a man produces in an hour of work. That productivity translates into higher wages, cheaper products, and things that were once a luxury," he declared. He also noted that this productive growth "ends up reaching everyone, and especially the poorest, who benefit the most when everything becomes cheaper." Before the audience, the president devoted a central part of his speech to recognizing the journey of those who start businesses under adverse conditions. "You built amid currency controls, inflation, and rules that change every day, when anyone else would have stood still without investing time or capital," he said. He then argued that current conditions represent an opportunity that, in his words, comes along "once per generation." In that vein, he defined the role of the State with a concise formula: "Our job is to set clear rules and then get out of the way." To support that opening, Milei turned to Adam Smith and the concept that the division of labor is limited by the size of the market. Starting from that premise, he detailed his administration's progress in commercial integration: when he took office, Argentina reached less than 10% of the world's population; today, after opening up more than 500 markets, that percentage has climbed to 30%. The goal set for 2031 is to reach 90% of the planet. "Argentina has an openness coefficient of 30% and should have one of ninety," he stated, attributing to the Ministry of Deregulation the task of expanding that margin to boost increasing returns. The national government projects achieving commercial openness with ninety percent of the planet by the year 2031 In the final stretch, the president addressed the role of artificial intelligence as the technological phenomenon that, in his view, cuts across all sectors of the economy. He identified two channels of impact: the demand generated by the construction of data centers—with supply chains in cement, steel, copper, energy, and engineering—and productivity, which he called "the most important." He listed the sectors that, in his view, will be transformed and pointed out: "We have already seen what happens when productivity rises: the size of the economy grows, poverty falls, and everyone's lives improve." Milei listed the resources Argentina has to position itself in this process: energy through Vaca Muerta and nuclear generation, critical minerals such as copper, lithium, and uranium, Patagonia's cold climate as an advantage for cooling data centers, and local human capital. To take advantage of these conditions, he mentioned ongoing regulatory changes: the amendment of the glaciers law to provide legal certainty to mining, the elimination of the exchange rate gap and the reduction of export taxes for the agricultural sector, and the Large Investment Incentive Regime (RIGI), which guarantees fiscal, currency, and legal stability for 30 years. According to the president, the RIGI has accumulated accession requests totaling more than USD 210 billion, of which USD 76 billion have already been approved.