MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Remittances for nearly $700 million.

Argentines living abroad send more than nearly $700 million home a year; triple the level three years ago, the Clarin newspaper reported Sunday, citing National Migration Service figures.

The money, most of which comes from the United States and countries in Western Europe, is sent by the estimated 1.05 million Argentines living abroad. The number of citizens living outside the South American nation has doubled in the past 20 years.

Official figures show that, on average, each Argentine living overseas sends home some $680 per year, or eight times the level in 1980.

Economist Andres Solimano said that remittances served several socioeconomic functions because they "increase the disposable income of the recipient, create an implicit social safety net for middle- and low-income families, aid consumption and contribute to savings, investment and even to pay debts."

Although emigration by Argentines accounts for only 0.50 percent of the world total, the money they send home represents 2 percent of remittances sent by emigrants around the world.

An average of 6,000 people a year emigrated from Argentina between 1995 and 2000.

Some 250,000 left the country after the economic meltdown of 2001 in the "largest mass emigration in the history of the country," according to the National Statistics and Census Institute.