Productive structure and income distribution: The Brazilian case

Abstract

The objective of the paper is to assess the impacts of some of the important changes occurred in the Brazilian economy in the 90s on income distribution. A Pure Leontief Model and a Leontief-Miazawa Model were utilized to portray the structure of the economy in both years, and to perform counterfactual simulations on some important changes occurring during the period. The methodology allowed for the identification of the high- and low-inequality sectors in both years, and to assess their contribution to the increasing inequality during the period. It is interesting to notice that some sectors with low internal inequality ended-up provoking increased global inequality through their interaction pattern with other sectors in the economy, and through the consumption structure. The results also indicate that the change in sectoral shares in the period contributed to diminishing inequality. Therefore, the causes for increasing inequality remain within the distribution of wages within the sectors.