Labor laws in Argentina are among the most worker-protective in Latin America. The Employment Contract Law (Ley de Contrato de Trabajo No. 20,744) sets the baseline for every private-sector employment relationship, and when any provision is ambiguous, courts must interpret it in the employee’s favor.1INFOLEG. Ley 20.744 – Regimen de Contrato de Trabajo That tilt shapes everything a worker or employer needs to know: how contracts are formed, how hours and overtime are paid, how much leave accrues, and what a dismissal actually costs.
Law 20,744 sits alongside industry-specific Collective Bargaining Agreements (Convenios Colectivos de Trabajo) negotiated between unions and employer associations. The hierarchy is strict. An individual contract or a collective agreement can improve on the statutory protections but never reduce them, and when norms conflict, the more favorable rule to the worker applies.2INFOLEG. Ley 20.744 – Regimen de Contrato de Trabajo This principle, called in dubio pro operario, means a vague clause will almost certainly be read against the employer who drafted it, and judges weighing ambiguous evidence lean toward the worker’s version of events.
Employment Contracts
The default arrangement is an indefinite-term contract. Unless the parties specifically agree otherwise in writing, any hire is presumed permanent. That matters enormously at termination, because indefinite-term employees are entitled to full severance if dismissed without cause.
The Trial Period
Every new indefinite-term hire begins with a trial period. During this time the employer can end the relationship with 15 days’ notice and no severance obligation. The worker must still be fully registered and receive full social security contributions from day one. The trial period does not apply to fixed-term contracts.
Fixed-Term Contracts
Fixed-term contracts are permitted but treated with suspicion. The contract must be in writing, must be justified by the nature of the work, and cannot exceed five years. Between one and two months before expiration, the employer must formally notify the worker that the contract is ending. Skip that notice and the contract automatically converts to an indefinite one, with all the severance protections that come with it. Even when a fixed-term contract expires on schedule, the employer owes the worker a payment equal to 50% of standard severance.
Working Hours and Overtime
Law 11,544 caps the standard workweek at 48 hours and the workday at 8 hours.3Infoleg. Ley 11.544 – Jornada de Trabajo Many collective agreements set lower limits for particular industries, so the statutory ceiling is exactly that: a ceiling.
Two special regimes narrow the standard day:
- Night work between 9:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. is limited to 7 hours per shift.3Infoleg. Ley 11.544 – Jornada de Trabajo
- Unhealthy or hazardous environments are limited to 6 hours per day or 36 hours per week.3Infoleg. Ley 11.544 – Jornada de Trabajo
Any hour worked beyond the standard limits triggers an overtime surcharge of at least 50% above the normal hourly rate on regular business days. On rest days, Sundays, and national holidays the surcharge doubles to 100%.3Infoleg. Ley 11.544 – Jornada de Trabajo The calculation must reflect total monthly compensation, including regular bonuses and commissions. Hard caps limit how much overtime can be required: no more than 3 hours in a single day, 30 hours in a month, or 200 hours in a calendar year.
Pay and the Aguinaldo
No worker can legally earn less than the Minimum Living and Mobile Wage (Salario Mínimo, Vital y Móvil), which a national council adjusts periodically based on economic conditions.4Argentina.gob.ar. Consejo Nacional del Empleo, la Productividad y el Salario Minimo, Vital y Movil Because of Argentina’s inflation, the minimum changes multiple times per year. Most employees are paid monthly; some manual laborers are paid biweekly.
The feature that most often surprises foreign employers is the Sueldo Anual Complementario, universally called the Aguinaldo. This mandatory 13th-month salary is paid in two installments: the first by June 30 and the second by December 18. Each installment equals 50% of the highest monthly pay the worker received during that six-month period.5INFOLEG. Ley 27.073 – Contratos de Trabajo A worker who leaves before the payment date is owed a proportional amount based on time worked that semester.
Not every payment counts as “salary” for social security and severance purposes. Recent reforms have expanded the list of non-remunerative benefits to include meal and dining allowances, transportation and internet reimbursements, training expenses, and certain family-related benefits. Because these sit outside the remunerative base, they reduce payroll tax and lower the figure used to calculate severance.
Payroll Contributions
Both sides fund social security through payroll, and the combined burden is heavy. Employees contribute roughly 17% of gross pay, allocated across the retirement pension (SIPA), health insurance (Obra Social), and unemployment insurance.
Employers contribute on top of the worker’s gross salary at a rate of 24% for most companies, or 26.4% for larger service and trade firms whose annual sales exceed regulatory thresholds.6Worldwide Tax Summaries. Argentina – Individual – Other Taxes Combined payroll cost commonly exceeds 40% on top of gross wages, a figure that regularly surprises employers entering the market.
Leave Entitlements
Annual Vacation
Paid vacation follows a seniority scale for workers with at least six months of tenure:
- Up to 5 years of service: 14 consecutive calendar days
- 5 to 10 years: 21 consecutive calendar days
- 10 to 20 years: 28 consecutive calendar days
- Over 20 years: 35 consecutive calendar days
Employees who haven’t yet reached six months in the first year earn one day of vacation for every 20 days actually worked. Vacation must begin on a Monday, or the next working day if Monday is a holiday.
Special Paid Leaves
The law guarantees additional paid leaves for life events: 10 days for marriage, 2 days for fathers on the birth of a child, 3 days for the death of a spouse, parent, or child, and 1 day for the death of a sibling.
Sick Leave
Paid sick leave for non-work illness scales with seniority and family status, and the employer bears the full cost, without government or insurance reimbursement:
- Under 5 years of service, no dependents: 3 months
- Under 5 years, with dependents: 6 months
- Over 5 years, no dependents: 6 months
- Over 5 years, with dependents: 12 months
The 12-month tier is significant financial exposure for smaller employers.
Public Holidays
National holidays are mandatory rest days. An employee who works one must be paid double the normal daily rate.
Maternity Protections
Pregnant employees are entitled to 90 days of maternity leave, typically 45 days before the expected birth date and 45 days after. The mother can shorten the pre-birth period to as few as 30 days and add the difference to her post-birth leave. Full salary continues throughout.
The real teeth of the protection lie in the dismissal rules. Firing a worker within the window from seven and a half months before the due date through seven and a half months after delivery raises a legal presumption that the dismissal was discriminatory. That shifts the burden of proof onto the employer and adds compensation on top of standard severance.
After returning to work, breastfeeding mothers are entitled to two daily half-hour breaks during working hours for up to one year after the birth, without any pay reduction.7Library of Congress. Breast-Feeding and the Workplace: Laws of Selected Foreign Nations Many collective agreements convert these into a single hour, allowing the mother to arrive late or leave early.
Telework
Argentina enacted a dedicated Telework Law (Ley 27,555) in 2020. Its headline provision is the right to disconnect: remote workers may ignore all work communications outside their scheduled hours and during leave, and employers cannot penalize the unreachable or reward those who stay online past quitting time.8INFOLEG. Regimen Legal del Contrato de Teletrabajo
Any shift to remote work must be voluntary and documented in writing. An employee who previously worked on-site and agreed to switch to remote can revoke that consent at any time and demand to return to the office. Refusal can be treated as constructive dismissal. Employers must provide all equipment, software, and connectivity tools; if the worker uses personal equipment, the employer must compensate for associated costs, treated as non-remunerative reimbursements.8INFOLEG. Regimen Legal del Contrato de Teletrabajo A pending labor modernization bill would repeal or substantially modify these rules, so anyone relying on them should track legislative developments.
Termination and Severance
Ending an employment relationship in Argentina is expensive by design. The system stacks obligations, and missing any single one exposes the employer to additional fines.
Notice Periods
Written advance notice (preaviso) is required before termination:
- During the trial period: 15 days
- Up to 5 years of service: 1 month
- Over 5 years of service: 2 months
Skipping notice creates an indemnity equal to the wages the worker would have earned during the notice period. If the dismissal doesn’t land on the last day of the month, the employer also owes a pro-rated payment covering the remaining days of that month.
Severance for Dismissal Without Cause
Article 245 of Law 20,744 sets the formula: one month’s salary for every year of service, or for any fraction of a year exceeding three months.2INFOLEG. Ley 20.744 – Regimen de Contrato de Trabajo The base for the calculation is the highest regular monthly pay received in the prior year.
The base is capped at three times the average wage under the applicable collective agreement, but the Supreme Court has held that this cap cannot reduce the calculation base by more than 33% of the worker’s actual highest salary. There is also a floor: severance for any year of service cannot fall below one month’s gross pay. For a long-tenured employee at a high salary, the total bill can easily exceed a year’s pay once notice indemnity, unpaid vacation, and the proportional Aguinaldo are added in.
How Termination Must Be Communicated
Resignations and dismissals must be sent by registered telegram (telegrama colacionado) to be legally valid. Workers can send these for free from any national post office under Law 23,789.9Infoleg. Ley 23.789 – Servicio de Telegrama y Carta Documento Gratuito The telegram creates a dated, verifiable record. After termination, the employer must deliver a certificate of services and social security records within 30 days, and must pay severance within four business days of the final workday. Missing either deadline triggers additional fines.
Unregistered Employees
Employers who fail to properly register workers face severe consequences. An unregistered employee who formally requests registration and is then dismissed within the following two years is entitled to double the standard severance, provided the worker also notified the tax authority of the registration request. The penalty is designed to discourage off-the-books employment, which remains persistent in some sectors.
Recent Reforms
The labor framework is not static. A modernization initiative has introduced or proposed several changes that reshape employer obligations:
- Certain benefits, including employer-provided health insurance, stock options, cellphone and internet reimbursements, and tips, are now excluded from the legal definition of remuneration, reducing the base for severance and social security.
- Salaries may be paid in foreign currency, a departure from the historical requirement to pay in pesos.
- The traditional payroll journal and overtime registry have been replaced by online registration with the federal tax authority.
- Vacation may be split into blocks of no fewer than seven days by agreement, rather than taken consecutively.
- Employers must contribute 3% of gross wages to a dedicated severance fund, modeled on Brazil’s FGTS.
- Non-recurring payments such as the proportional Aguinaldo, unused vacation pay, and performance bonuses are excluded from the severance calculation.
Some changes are already in effect, others are being phased in, and some remain subject to regulatory implementation. Verify the current status of any provision before relying on it in an employment decision.