Irma Casal, a 53-year-old in Buenos Aires, works three shifts as a garbage recycler, cardboard collector and bricklayer, but, like many Argentines at a time of rising poverty, she still struggles to make ends meet.

Poverty in Argentina rose to affect over 52 percent of the population in the first six months of self-declared "anarcho-capitalist" Javier Milei's presidency, according to official data released Thursday.