Hire employees in Argentina using an Employer of Record

Argentina pays a mandatory 13th salary, split into two installments each year. Miss it, get the calculation wrong, or forget it exists entirely, and you're looking at back payments to a very unhappy employee, plus whatever penalties come with getting employment law wrong in a country that takes worker protections seriously.

It's not the only surprise. Employer social contributions run about 28.3% on top of gross pay, notice periods and severance calculations follow specific formulas, and getting a termination wrong can trigger legal disputes that drag on for months. If you're hiring your first person in Argentina without local HR or legal help, this is the kind of thing that trips companies up before they even realize they're exposed.

Your three options for hiring in Argentina

Option 1: Set up your own entity

• Cost: significant upfront legal and registration costs, plus ongoing annual maintenance
• Timeline: 3-6 months minimum
• Complexity: tax registration, payroll infrastructure, compliance with local labor law, HR setup from scratch
• Makes sense when: you're hiring 20+ people long-term or need a permanent legal presence in Argentina

Option 2: Hire contractors

• Cost: no upfront setup cost, but limited control over how the person works
• Timeline: immediate
• Risks: misclassification if the relationship looks like employment, back taxes, and potential legal disputes
• Makes sense when: it's a short project (under 6 months) or you need a specific skill for a defined scope
• Note: Hire with Columbus also handles compliant contractor agreements and payments if that's the route you choose

Option 3: Use an employer of record (recommended for most companies)

• Cost: starting from $179/month per employee
• Timeline: 2-3 days to get someone hired and working legally
• Complexity: none on your end. We handle contracts, payroll, the 13th salary, contributions, and compliance
• Makes sense when: you're hiring 1-50 people, testing the Argentine market, or building a team across several countries at once

Why most companies choose EOR here

If you're hiring 1-10 people in Argentina, entity setup costs will run well past what you'd spend on an EOR over several years. At $179/month per employee, that's about $2,148 a year, and hiring 3 people costs roughly $537/month total. Compare that to the legal fees, registration costs, and ongoing maintenance of running your own entity, and the math usually isn't close.

An EOR also means you're not the one figuring out the 13th salary schedule, calculating notice periods, or tracking employer contribution rates. Hire with Columbus handles the employment contract, runs payroll, manages statutory contributions, and keeps you compliant as Argentine labor law shifts. You get to hire the person you want, when you want, without becoming an expert in Argentine employment law overnight.

Ready to hire in Argentina without setting up an entity or gambling on contractor status? Get started with Hire with Columbus.

What employment types can you use?

You've got three ways to bring someone onboard in Argentina. Here's how the costs, timelines, and risks actually compare.

How can you hire in Argentina?

1. Set up your own entity

Setting up a legal entity in Argentina means registering with tax authorities, opening local bank accounts, and building payroll infrastructure from scratch. The upfront costs cover incorporation, legal fees, and registration, and they add up fast before you've hired a single person.

Timeline-wise, expect this to take months, not weeks. You're dealing with multiple government agencies and local legal requirements that don't move quickly.

• Ongoing costs: annual accounting, legal compliance, and HR infrastructure
• Employer contributions run about 28.3% of gross salary on top of wages, permanently
• When it makes sense: 20+ employees, long-term commitment, permanent market presence
• Complexity: full tax registration, local payroll system, ongoing legal compliance

2. Hire contractors/freelancers

Contractors let you start immediately. No entity, no waiting, just a signed agreement and you're working together.

The catch is misclassification risk. Argentina's labor protections are strong (the country scores 2.56 on the OECD's employment protection index, on the higher end globally), and authorities look closely at contractor relationships that function like employment. If someone works fixed hours, uses your equipment, and takes direction like an employee, you're exposed to back taxes and legal disputes.

• Speed: start same week
• Risks: misclassification exposure, potential back taxes and penalties
• Limitations: you can't manage a contractor's schedule or embed them in your team the way you would an employee
• When it makes sense: short-term projects under 6 months, specialized one-off skills
• Hire with Columbus also handles compliant contractor agreements and payments if this route fits your needs

3. Use an employer of record (recommended for most)

With an EOR, Hire with Columbus becomes the legal employer in Argentina while you manage the day-to-day work and performance. No entity, no months of setup, no guessing on compliance.

• Cost: from $179/month per employee
• Timeline: hire in 2-3 days instead of months
• We handle: employment contracts, payroll, tax compliance, benefits, and every statutory requirement
• When it makes sense: 1-50 employees, testing the Argentine market, running multi-country teams, or just avoiding entity setup entirely

Five employees through an EOR runs from $895/month total. Compare that to the entity route, where you're paying incorporation and legal costs before your first payroll run, plus ongoing compliance overhead indefinitely. For most companies under 20 employees, the math isn't close.

Employment contract types in Argentina

Once you've picked how you'll employ someone, you still need to choose the right contract type. Argentina's labor law recognizes a few distinct categories, and picking the wrong one creates real problems later.

Permanent (indefinite) contracts

Most companies hiring in Argentina use permanent contracts because they're the legal default. If a contract doesn't specify a fixed term, it's automatically considered indefinite. This is the standard choice for core, ongoing roles.

Permanent employees get full statutory protections: notice periods, severance entitlements, and mandatory benefits like the thirteenth salary (aguinaldo), which is required by law. Termination without cause triggers notice of 7.2 weeks and severance of 23.1 weeks on average, so this isn't a decision to make lightly.

Fixed-term contracts

Fixed-term contracts are allowed but restricted. Argentine law requires a genuine, justified reason tied to the nature of the work, not just a preference for flexibility. Courts and labor authorities scrutinize these closely, and a fixed-term contract that runs on repeat renewals without real justification risks being reclassified as permanent, along with all the back-pay and severance obligations that come with that.

If you're hiring for project-based or seasonal work with a clear end date, a fixed-term contract can work. If you're hiring for an ongoing role and just want an easy exit, it's the wrong tool and probably won't hold up.

Part-time contracts

Part-time employees in Argentina are entitled to the same core protections as full-time staff, just prorated by hours worked. That includes leave entitlements, the thirteenth salary, and social security contributions. There's no shortcut around statutory obligations just because someone works fewer hours.

How Hire with Columbus handles this

We draft locally compliant contracts for whichever type fits your hiring need, permanent, fixed-term, or part-time. You tell us the role and the arrangement, and we make sure the paperwork holds up under Argentine labor law from day one, so you're not the one finding out six months in that a contract was structured wrong.

How does payroll and taxation work?

Most companies budget salary only. Then payroll hits and employer contributions add 28.29% on top of gross pay, and that's before you've even touched the mandatory 13th salary.

Income tax on employees

Argentina taxes personal income progressively, and the top rate sits at 35%. The verified data we work from doesn't give a full bracket breakdown, so treat 35% as the ceiling rather than a flat rate everyone pays. Lower earners pay less, but you'll want a local payroll provider (or an EOR) to apply the right bracket for each employee rather than guessing.

Minimum wage and average wage

The monthly minimum wage in Argentina is ARS 372,400. The average monthly wage sits much higher, at about ARS 1,006,900. If you're hiring for a skilled role, expect salary expectations closer to the average than the floor, especially in Buenos Aires.

Social security contributions

Both employer and employee pay into Argentina's social security system, and the split isn't even. Employers carry the bigger share.

The employee's 17% comes out of gross pay before it hits their bank account. The employer's 28.29% is an extra cost on top of gross salary, not a deduction from it.

The 13th salary

Argentina requires a mandatory 13th salary, known locally as the SAC (Sueldo Anual Complementario). It's not optional and it's not a bonus you can skip in a slow year. Budget it as a real cost, paid in installments across the year rather than as one December lump sum.

What a real payroll cost looks like

Say you hire someone at ARS 1,000,000 gross per month, close to the national average wage. Here's the actual math:

• Gross salary: ARS 1,000,000/month
• Employer contributions (28.29%): ARS 282,900/month
• Total monthly cost: ARS 1,282,900

Multiply that by 12 months and you're at roughly ARS 15,394,800 for base employer cost, before the mandatory 13th salary adds close to another month's worth of pay and contributions on top. Plan for something closer to 13 months of cost when you're modeling the annual budget, not 12.

Common payroll mistakes

• Ignoring collective bargaining agreements. About 49.4% of Argentine workers are covered by a CBA, and CBAs often set pay scales and adjustments that override what you'd assume from a standard employment contract.
• Forgetting the 13th salary in cash flow planning. It's a legal obligation, not a discretionary bonus, and skipping it or paying it late creates real compliance exposure.
• Underestimating employer contributions. Companies quote a salary number to finance and forget the 28.29% sits on top, which throws off budgets fast.
• Not adjusting for high historical inflation. Argentina's inflation has run extremely high in recent years, and wages tied to CBAs or informal agreements often need more frequent revisiting than companies expect from other markets.

Self-managed payroll vs. an EOR

Running Argentine payroll yourself usually means engaging a local accounting firm, licensing payroll software that handles peso calculations and CBA rules, and building in-house HR capacity to track contribution changes and SAC timing. The compliance exposure sits with you the whole time.

With Hire with Columbus: from $179/month per employee (USD), fully compliant. We calculate the contributions, handle the 13th salary, and apply the right CBA rates so you're not the one finding out about a miscalculation six months in.

What benefits and leave are required?

You'll pay salary 14 times a year in Argentina, not 12. That's because of the mandatory thirteenth salary (called SAC, Sueldo Anual Complementario), split into two installments during the year on top of your regular monthly pay. Miss it and you're not just annoying your team, you're breaking the law.

Annual vacation

Employees get a minimum of 14 days of paid annual leave. This is a statutory floor, not a suggestion, and it typically scales up with tenure under Argentine labor law.

Vacation generally needs to be used within the year it's earned. Argentina's system leans toward "use it," and employers who let leave pile up indefinitely risk disputes down the line.

If someone leaves the company before taking earned vacation, you owe them a payout for the unused days. Don't try to skip this at termination, it's one of the first things labor inspectors check.

Sick leave

Employers in Argentina keep paying salary during sick leave themselves, rather than shifting the cost to social security like you might expect. How long someone can be out while still getting paid depends on their tenure and family situation, and it's set by the employment contract and underlying statute rather than one flat number.

Ask for a doctor's note once an absence stretches past a short window. It protects you if there's ever a dispute about whether the time off was legitimate.

Parental leave

Maternity leave runs about 12.9 weeks, fully paid, and it's a legal entitlement you can't negotiate down.

Paternity leave is a different story: around 0.3 weeks, or roughly 2 days. That gap is real, so it's worth setting expectations early with new fathers on your team.

Argentina doesn't have a broader shared parental leave scheme on top of these two. Want to offer more? That's a competitive perk you add voluntarily, not something the law requires.

Public holidays in 2026

Argentina has 16 public holidays in 2026. Employees who work on these days generally get premium pay, so plan your staffing around that if you need coverage.

Heads up: Jun 20 falls on a Saturday in 2026, which affects how you handle observance for staff who'd normally have that day off anyway.

Mandatory benefits and who pays

Both employers and employees fund social security in Argentina, and the split is specific enough that getting it wrong on payroll is an easy way to underpay (or overpay) the government.

Employer contributions add up to about 28.3% of gross salary:

Employee contributions total about 17% of gross salary:

None of this is optional, it's baked into every payroll run. And that mandatory thirteenth salary? It adds a real chunk to your annual cost, one that a lot of foreign employers forget to budget for when they first run the numbers on hiring in Argentina.

Optional benefits worth offering

Beyond the legal minimums, companies hiring in Argentina commonly compete on:

• Private health insurance upgrades beyond the mandatory coverage
• Meal vouchers or food allowances
• Additional vacation days beyond the 14-day statutory minimum
• Extended paternity leave, given how short the legal 0.3 weeks actually is
• Remote work stipends for home office setup
• Wellness or gym allowances

None of these are required. But in a competitive hiring market, they're often what separates an offer someone accepts from one they pass on.

Common benefit mistakes

The biggest one: treating vacation payout at termination as optional. It's not, and skipping it is a fast track to a labor dispute.

Second: miscalculating the thirteenth salary, or forgetting it entirely when budgeting for a new hire's total cost. It's not a bonus, it's mandatory pay.

Third: assuming sick leave works like it does back home. Argentina puts the cost on the employer directly for standard illness, and that catches companies off guard when they're used to social-insurance-funded sick pay elsewhere.

The real cost of getting this right

Doing Argentine benefits correctly usually means a local HR or payroll specialist, ongoing legal review as labor rules shift, and software to track accruals, holiday pay, and the thirteenth salary schedule. Get any piece wrong and you're looking at back pay, penalties, or a labor inspection you didn't need.

Hire with Columbus handles all of this for you: vacation accrual, sick leave, the thirteenth salary split, holiday pay premiums, and social security contributions, all for $179/month per employee. You get compliant payroll without hiring a local specialist just to keep up with Argentina's leave calendar.

What are the compliance requirements?

Get the firing process wrong in Argentina and it'll cost you. Average notice runs 7.2 weeks and average severance runs 23.1 weeks of pay. Mess up the process and you're looking at legal fees, maybe even a reinstatement fight on top of everything else.

Here's what you actually need to have in place.

Employment contract requirements

Written contracts are standard in Argentina. Verbal-only arrangements leave you exposed if a dispute ever reaches a labor court.

Contracts are typically drafted in Spanish. They should spell out job title, salary, working hours, start date, and which collective bargaining agreement (CBA) applies, if any.

That last point matters more than most companies realize. Around 49.4% of Argentina's workforce is covered by a CBA, and if your employee's industry or role falls under one, its terms override anything less favorable in the individual contract.

You'll also need to register the employment relationship with the tax and social security authorities. Skip registration and you're not just risking fines, you could end up with an "employee" treated as undeclared labor, which comes with its own penalties and back-payment obligations.

Probation periods

Argentine law builds a standard probationary period into open-ended employment contracts. During this window, either side can end things with reduced formalities and without triggering the full severance calculation.

Once probation ends, full termination protections kick in, including standard notice and severance rules. The length of probation is set by statute, not by what you write into the contract, so don't try to extend it yourself.

Working time regulations

Argentina's average workweek sits at 48 hours, though actual hours worked average 36.9 per week across the workforce. Hours beyond the standard schedule trigger overtime pay, and any applicable CBA can stack its own premium on top of the statutory baseline.

You need to keep accurate time records. If a wage or overtime dispute lands in front of a labor inspector or judge, the burden often falls on you to prove hours worked, not the other way around.

Notice periods

Argentina's notice rules scale with seniority under the Ley de Contrato de Trabajo. A longer-tenured employee is entitled to more notice than someone who just cleared probation.

The 7.2-week figure above reflects the country-wide average, useful for budgeting. The exact notice for a specific employee depends on their start date and contract terms.

Termination process

There's no government pre-approval step for a standard dismissal in Argentina, but don't mistake that for a rubber stamp. For a "just cause" termination, you need documented evidence of misconduct or performance failure that would hold up in labor court, and plenty of employees challenge it.

Argentina scores 2.6 out of 6 on the OECD's employment protection index for regular contracts, above the global average. In practice, that means courts lean toward protecting the employee unless your paper trail is solid.

Dismiss without documented just cause, and you owe severance plus notice. Dismiss with weak documentation claiming "just cause," and you can end up owing the same severance anyway, plus legal costs for a case you were likely to lose.

Severance pay

Final settlements also need to include anything already owed and unpaid, like accrued vacation and a proportional share of the mandatory 13th-month salary (aguinaldo). Miss those line items and you've got an underpayment claim waiting to happen, even if the core severance math was right.

Data protection

Argentina has its own personal data protection framework, separate from the EU's rules, overseen by the national data protection authority. Employee records, including salary history, health information, and performance reviews, count as personal data. They need to be collected, stored, and shared only for legitimate employment purposes.

Cross-border data transfers, like sending employee files to a parent company abroad, come with their own restrictions. If you're centralizing HR data in another country, check that the transfer mechanism is compliant before you build the pipeline, not after.

Common compliance mistakes

• Verbal or informal agreements: leaves both sides guessing on terms and weakens your position in any dispute.
• Ignoring an applicable CBA: a contract that undercuts CBA terms can get challenged and rewritten in the employee's favor.
• Skipping social security registration: creates undeclared labor exposure, and regulators treat this seriously.
• Underestimating severance: forget to fold in accrued vacation or the proportional 13th salary and you'll owe more later, with interest.
• Weak just-cause documentation: courts routinely convert a "for cause" firing into a paid severance case when the paper trail is thin.

What happens if you get it wrong

• No written contract or missing registration: exposes you to back-pay claims and potential reclassification penalties from labor authorities.
• Improper "just cause" dismissal: courts can order the standard severance and notice anyway, plus legal costs, and in some cases order reinstatement.
• Incomplete final settlement: the employee can claim the shortfall (unpaid vacation, aguinaldo, etc.) well after the termination date.
• Data mishandling: can trigger regulatory action from Argentina's data protection authority, separate from any employment claim.

Hire with Columbus manages the contract, probation tracking, and termination process for you. You won't be the one trying to interpret Argentine labor law from scratch when an employee needs to be let go. That coverage starts at $179/month per employee, whether you're hiring one person or building out a full team.

What has changed recently?

If you last looked at Argentina's employment rules a year or two ago, a few numbers on your spreadsheet are now out of date. Here's what actually moved in 2026.

Tax rates confirmed for mid-2026

As of June 2026, Argentina's corporate tax rate sits at 35%, the top personal income tax rate matches it at 35%, and VAT holds at 21%. None of these are new concepts, but the government reconfirmed these rates in the middle of the year, so if you were budgeting off older figures, it's worth double-checking your numbers against these.

Leave entitlements reset for the new year

Starting January 2026, employees are entitled to 14 days of annual leave and 16 public holidays. Argentina also confirmed the thirteenth salary as a mandatory payment for 2026, split across two installments during the year. If you're building a total cost of employment model, all three of these need to be in it, not treated as optional extras.

Family leave numbers updated

As of February 2026, maternity leave runs 12.9 weeks and paternity leave sits at 0.3 weeks. That paternity figure looks tiny because it is: Argentina's statutory paternity leave is genuinely just a couple of days, not a typo. If your company policy offers more generous parental leave elsewhere, you'll want to decide whether to extend that same benefit to your Argentine hires, since the legal minimum here is thin.

What this means for you right now

None of these changes are dramatic overnight shifts, but they add up. A hiring plan built on last year's leave days or tax assumptions will underestimate your real cost per employee.

This is the exact kind of detail that's easy to miss when you're managing hires across five countries and Argentina is just one line on a spreadsheet. Hire with Columbus tracks these updates as part of running payroll and compliance for you, so when a rate or entitlement changes, it's already reflected in what you're paying and what your contracts say, not something you find out about after the fact.