Inflation has even struck the informal sector. In one northern city, an extortion racket has doubled the fee of its so-called protection service over the past year, one resident said.

Salary increases have blunted inflation and fueled domestic consumption, including record sales of new cars last year. But real wages are now expected to drop, leading one prominent opposition figure to compare them to “water running through your fingers.”

Government officials are chastised by news organizations for seldom broaching the issue of high inflation. For years, the national statistics institute published a rate that few believed truthful, provoking rare censure from the International Monetary Fund. As part of a multipronged effort to repair its international image, the government recently released a revised index that put inflation at 3.7 percent for January alone. Unofficial calculations estimate an even higher rate for February.

With inflation soaring, the government has pressed ahead with a new round of price freezes on items like vegetables, meat, canned food and even some school materials. Billboards that hulk over highways and ads that adorn bus stops encourage Argentines to call a hotline to denounce stores that do not respect the freezes, or fail to stock the goods. They are subsequently fined or shut down.

“We have to monitor prices,” President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner told thousands of supporters gathered outside Congress this month. “Don’t let them rob you,” she said, referring to what she and her ministers view as a coterie of rapacious businessmen.

In the crowd, Lucía Martínez, 60, a nephrologist, said the price increases were disproportionate and equated them to an “undercover coup” against the government. Posters from a pro-government organization singled out business executives, including the head of the Argentine subsidiary of the oil giant Royal Dutch Shell, accusing them of theft.