The second official debate of Mexico’s presidential candidates focused on economic issues, so promises about salary and employment, as well as macroeconomic and public finance figures dominated the exchanges.

These are the main data that marked the meeting of the three presidential candidates, the ruling party Claudia Sheinbaum, and the opponents Xóchitl Gálvez and Jorge Álvarez Máynez:

Álvarez Máynez, of the opposition Movimiento Ciudadano (MC), promised to raise the minimum wage to 10,000 pesos per month (about 583 dollars), above the current 7,467 pesos (435.4 dollars), while Sheinbaum asserted that it will rise to an equivalent of 2.5 basic baskets.

“(There are) better salaries. Remember that they did not increase wages for 36 years in the country and for the first time (under the government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador) they increased by 110%. We are going to take salaries to 2.5 basic baskets,” said the former head of Government of Mexico City (2018-2023).

Sheinbaum promised to build 100 new industrial parks to take advantage of the phenomenon of chain relocation or ‘nearshoring’.

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“We are going to develop another 10 welfare poles throughout the country to take advantage of the relocation that is taking place at the moment. Among other things, we are going to make 100 industrial parks linked to regional vocations, with education and development for well-being,” he said.

Gálvez denounced that the growth of per capita debt is equivalent to 54% during López Obrador’s six-year term (2018-2024).

“Yes, they got the country into debt. Today, every Mexican owes 128,000 pesos (7,463.5 dollars). (That is) 45,000 pesos ($2,623.9) more than when they arrived. That’s why I tell them that (Sheinbaum) tells lies. That’s why she is the candidate of lies,” said the candidate of the Alliance Fuerza y Corazón por México.

The opposition candidate promised that “everyone who earns less than 15,000 pesos ($874.6) a month will not pay taxes,” which “benefits 20 million Mexicans.”

The candidate of Fuerza y Corazón por México assured that the López Obrador Administration has granted Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex) a tax support of 2 billion pesos (116,618 million dollars), which is equivalent to building 8 million homes and giving 50,000 pesos ($2,915.5 dollars) to each of those people.

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“Pemex is a robbed,” he said.

The ruling party candidate cited that the Government of López Obrador brought 5.1 million people out of poverty, based on the National Council for the Evaluation of Social Development Policy (Coneval).

“For the first time since 1982 we are below 40% of the poor population, and at the same time inequality decreased,” Sheinbaum said. But Gálvez argued that there are still 47 million people in poverty.

Sheinbaum accused his main rival, Gálvez, of representing the “neoliberalism” of his parties, National Action (PAN), the Institutional Revolutionary (PRI) and the Democratic Revolution (PRD).

“At the time of (Felipe) Calderón (president from 2006 to 2012, the inequality between rich and poor of the PAN), reached 35 times. With the transformation, inequality has decreased to 17 times, that is, it is a different model, before it was supported by those at the top, now it supports those at the bottom,” he argued.

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Álvarez Máynez stressed that Movimiento Ciudadano supports the reduction of the working day from 48 hours to 40 hours per week, in addition to accusing the parties of Gálvez and Sheinbaum of not supporting the proposal in Congress.

“She (Sheinbaum) is a candidate of the party that today has a majority in Congress. With your votes we could approve the decent workday with two days of rest a week, we could approve that this country has a universal minimum income,” he said.