Como a desigualdade de renda afeta o crescimento econômico no Brasil: o que os dados estaduais dizem?

Abstract

This work, initially, was dedicated to theoretical and empirical studies that examined the relationship between income inequality and economic growth, with the purpose of knowing and understanding the theories that tried to explain the relationship between these variables. Then, considering the data for the 27 Brazilian states, including the DF, and using a more flexible functional form based on an extension of the non-parametric model proposed by Banerjee and Duflo (2003) for the case of panel data, we observe how the data manifested itself, in order to verify the effect of inequality on growth. In relation to inequality measures, we used the Gini index and the variance of the logarithm of income, with information taken from PNAD and continuous PNAD. In relation to economic growth, we used GDP per capita, with data taken from IPEAData. The time frame spanned the period from 1986 to 2021. After carrying out the tests, it was possible to observe that, in most non-parametric estimations, the data pointed to a negative relationship between income inequality and growth, that is, they indicated that Income inequality negatively affects economic growth in Brazil.