(Photo by Ken Walker; from Wikimedia Commons)
Argentina has reached a historic milestone in LGBTQ workplace inclusion.
Ninety-three organizations — including private companies, universities, and embassies — have implemented inclusive policies that now benefit 285,600 LGBTQ workers. This regional record stands in stark contrast to President Javier Milei’s dismantlement of public policies in this area — including the closure of the National Institute Against Discrimination, Xenophobia and Racism (INADI) and the Women, Gender, and Diversity Ministry.
The HRC Equidad Argentina 2025 report, which the Human Rights Campaign Foundation prepared with the LGBT+ Public Policy Institute, notes 60 organizations received the “Best Places to Work LGBT+” certification. This figure represents a 27 percent increase over the previous year.
In an economic context marked by inflation and recession, private companies are advancing where the state is retreating.
“At Equidad AR, we note this contradiction with concern: while the private sector is demonstrating a growing commitment to the inclusion of LGBT+ people in the workplace, the Argentine government has decided to defund, dismantle, or eliminate fundamental public policies on diversity,” said HRC Equidad AR Director Onax Cirlini. “Companies can make significant progress, but they cannot replace the role that the State should play as the guarantor of rights.”
The report comes at a time when Congress has approved an amendment to Argentina’s Basic Law that allows employers to fire their employees without cause. The measure could mean a major setback for the LGBTQ community: opening the door to terminations on discriminatory grounds and limiting financial compensation.
“This scenario, marked by the rise of hate speech and public policies that eliminate or restrict rights, has a direct impact on the working lives of LGBT+ people,” Cirlini noted. “It is not just a matter of good practices, but of active resistance to a model that weakens collective protections.”
One of the most significant developments the report noted was the addition of 16 national universities to the index, reflecting the education system’s commitment to cultural transformation. Historically absent sectors also began to support these efforts in all of Argentina’s 24 provinces.
Persistent structural inequalities, however, remain an obstacle.
María Rachid, president of the Argentine LGBT Federation, said workplace inclusion requires much more than good business practices.
“Centuries of exclusion, marginalization, and violence against the trans community cannot be resolved even with a few years of public policies,” she said. “It will require a lot of time, continuity of these policies, and affirmative action such as the trans employment quota, which is not currently being implemented at the national level, and measures that the current government is not guaranteeing.”
Milei’s administration since it took office in 2023 has dismantled key equality structures: it eliminated the Women, Gender, and Diversity Ministry; closed INADI, and cut funding for inclusion programs. Rachid said this setback is due to ideological convictions, as opposed to current socioeconomic and political circumstances.
“The government is not interested in public inclusion policies,” she warned. “They are deeply convinced that the state should not develop them. Nor are they interested in the private sector doing so. If it were up to them, the private sector would not do so either.”
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