Desigualdade interpessoal de renda, progresso tecnológico e restrição de crédito: implicações sobre o crescimento econômico dos municípios brasileiros

Abstract

The process of development requires that either countries or regions be capable of sustaining their economic growth over the long run, and also of improving income and wealth distribution among their population. High inequality indexes could be caused by the absence of elements crucial for upholding intense economic growth, such as the expansion of schooling and access to credit. Individuals located at the bottom tail of income distribution tend to retain their poverty status when they have no access to human capital and financial markets, and so do their descendants. Such conditions perpetuate inequality levels over time, and they can have an adverse impact on economic growth. However, a remarkable effect was identified during the period that stretches from 1970 to 2000. Even in the presence of growth in average schooling and diminishing schooling inequality among individuals, income inequality levels have raised for European countries, the US, and also Brazil. Partly, this effect is due to education-biased technological progress, which exerted a positive impact on growth, but at the same time increased income inequality. Given all the above, this dissertations goal is to assess the adverse effect that interpersonal income inequality had on the economic development of Brazilian cities. In order to fulfill that goal, it proposes the use of age structures as instruments for inequality and schooling in the relevant cities. Specifically, the following issues have been approached: (i) to evaluate several theoretical forms proposed for the relationship between economic growth and income inequality; (ii) to discuss which elements have propelled the positive relationship between growing inequality and schooling within cities; (iii) to propose instruments for those variables influenced by technological progress; and (iv) to understand the relationship between income inequality and credit markets, as it regards the economic growth of Brazilian cities.