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| 1982–88 |
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| De la Madrid prosecuted a number of López Portillo's appointees, including PEMEX director Jorge Díaz Serrano. He was also forced to implement unpopular fiscal measures. Between 1982 and 1985, real wages fell by 40 percent as the peso continued its fall and Mexico's foreign debt grew to over $100 billion. By the late 1980s it was estimated that the dismal economic conditions in Mexico had driven between 4 million and 6 million workers over the border into the U.S. to work illegally. | 1 |
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| 1985, Sept. 19 |
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| An earthquake measuring higher than 8 on the Richter scale hit Mexico City, leading to over 20,000 deaths and $4 billion in damage. In the midst of recession, the massive problems created by the earthquake made regular debt payments impossible. | 2 |
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| 1988, July 6 |
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| CARLOS SALINAS DE GORTARI (b. 1948), PRI candidate, was elected president with a reported 50.1 percent of the vote. Many believed that the election was actually won by Cuauhtemoc Cárdenas, an ex-PRI official who had formed the National Democratic Front (FDN), calling for renegotiation of the debt and more government help to the lower classes. | 3 |
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| Dec. 1 |
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| Salinas took office as president. A Harvard-trained economist, Salinas embarked on a neoliberal program of privatization of Mexico's 600 state-owned industries and trade liberalization. One important result of these policies was the explosive growth of maquiladoras, plants established mostly by foreign-owned firms in the border towns of northern Mexico because of the lure of low wages and the reduction of tariff barriers. By Nov. 1989 there were over 1,700 maquiladoras in northern Mexico employing nearly 500,000 mostly female workers. | 4 |
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