Chapter 5 Inequality evolution in Brazil: The role of cash transfer programs and other income sources

Luiz Scorzafave and Érica Marina Carvalho de Lima

A chapter in Studies in Applied Welfare Analysis: Papers from the Third ECINEQ Meeting, 2010, pp 107-129 from Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Abstract: This chapter provides a detailed analysis of the recent evolution (1993–2007) of Brazilian income inequality. Particularly, we assess the contribution of different income sources to inequality, using three different decomposition techniques: Shorrocks (1982), Lerman and Yitzhaki (1985), and Gini decomposition. We exploit a recent dataset (PNAD, 2004) that allows the identification of different governmental transfer programs (Bolsa-Família, PETI, and BPC) and their impacts into inequality. While informal labor income and self-employment income reduces inequality in almost every measure, the opposite is true for public sector wages. Private formal labor income is becoming less important in explaining Brazilian inequality over time, but its behavior is still important, as it represents more than 40% of the total income. We find that social transfer programs have a limited, but positive impact on equality. On the other hand, dynamics of pensions attenuate the recent path of decreasing inequality in Brazil.

Date: 2010
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (text/html)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (application/pdf)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... 2585(2010)0000018008
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eme:reinzz:s1049-2585(2010)0000018008

DOI: 10.1108/S1049-2585(2010)0000018008

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Research on Economic Inequality from Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Emerald Support ().