IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/ilrrev/v58y2004i1p94-111.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Education and Changes in Brazilian Wage Inequality, 1976–2001

Author

Listed:
  • Orlando J. Sotomayor

Abstract

In countries with high levels of inequality, progress in education has often been placed high in the list of policy proposals designed to change the unequal state of affairs. This study uses Brazilian annual data to chart the trends in wage inequality and a decomposition procedure to ascertain how wage distribution was affected by advances in education that doubled the median schooling level of prime-age men during the sample period. The results show that while falling returns to education were an equalizing factor across the wage distribution, changes in the educational composition of the work force exerted a disequalizing influence that was strongest at the top of the distribution. The net result was a fall in wage dispersion that was not as dramatic as might have been hoped.

Suggested Citation

  • Orlando J. Sotomayor, 2004. "Education and Changes in Brazilian Wage Inequality, 1976–2001," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 58(1), pages 94-111, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:ilrrev:v:58:y:2004:i:1:p:94-111
    DOI: 10.1177/001979390405800105
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/001979390405800105
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/001979390405800105?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. George Psacharopoulos & Samuel Morley & Ariel Fiszbein & Haeduck Lee & William C. Wood, 1995. "POVERTY AND INCOME INEQUALITY IN LATIN AMERICA DURING THE 1980s," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 41(3), pages 245-264, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sotomayor, Orlando, 2008. "The Distribution of Household Income in Brazil: Unequal and Immutable?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(7), pages 1280-1293, July.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Baer, Werner & Maloney, William, 1997. "Neoliberalism and income distribution in Latin America," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 25(3), pages 311-327, March.
    2. Richardson Kojo Edeme & Evelyn Osaretin Ogbeide & A. Ifelunini Innocent & Sam Ugwu, 2017. "Exam nat on of the Dynam c Relationship Between Poverty and Inequal ty: Ev dence from N ger a M cro Data," International Journal of Economics and Financial Issues, Econjournals, vol. 7(2), pages 518-523.
    3. Vachaspati Shukla & Udaya S. Mishra, 2020. "Expansion in Education and Its Impact on Income Inequality: Cross-sectional Evidence from India," The Indian Journal of Labour Economics, Springer;The Indian Society of Labour Economics (ISLE), vol. 63(2), pages 331-362, June.
    4. Manuel Fernández & Gabriela Serrano, 2022. "New Perspectives on Inequality in Latin America," Documentos CEDE 20295, Universidad de los Andes, Facultad de Economía, CEDE.
    5. Francisco Henríquez & Alejandra Mizala & Andrea Repetto, 2009. "Effective Schools for Low Income Children: a Study of Chile’s Sociedad de Instrucción Primaria," Documentos de Trabajo 258, Centro de Economía Aplicada, Universidad de Chile.
    6. Narayan Sastry, 2002. "Trends in Socioeconomic Inequalities in Under-Five Mortality Evidence from Sao Paulo, Brazil, 1970-1991," Working Papers DRU-2934-NICHD, RAND Corporation.
    7. David E. Sahn & Stephen D. Younger, 2006. "Changes in Inequality and Poverty in Latin America: Looking Beyond Income to Health and Education," Journal of Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 9(2), pages 215-233, November.
    8. de Janvry, Alain & Sadoulet, Elisabeth, 1996. "Growth, Inequality, And Poverty In Latin America: A Causal Analysis, 1970-94," CUDARE Working Papers 25097, University of California, Berkeley, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics.
    9. Ivan Gachet & Diego F. Grijalva & Paúl A. Ponce & Damián Rodríguez, 2019. "Vertical and Horizontal Inequality in Ecuador: The Lack of Sustainability," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 145(3), pages 861-900, October.
    10. Manoel Bittencourt, 2014. "Economic Growth and Inequality: Evidence from the Young Democracies of South America," International Symposia in Economic Theory and Econometrics, in: Macroeconomic Analysis and International Finance, volume 23, pages 37-58, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    11. Vachaspati Shukla & Udaya S. Mishra, 0. "Expansion in Education and Its Impact on Income Inequality: Cross-sectional Evidence from India," The Indian Journal of Labour Economics, Springer;The Indian Society of Labour Economics (ISLE), vol. 0, pages 1-32.
    12. Narayan Sastry, 2002. "Trends in Socioeconomic Inequalities in Under-Five Mortality: Evidence from Sao Paulo, Brazil, 1970-1991," Working Papers 02-15, RAND Corporation.
    13. Roy Cerqueti & Marcel Ausloos, 2015. "Statistical assessment of regional wealth inequalities: the Italian case," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 49(6), pages 2307-2323, November.
    14. Jaideep Oberoi & Syed Ahsan, 2003. "Inequality, Well-being and Institutions in Latin America and the Caribbean," CESifo Working Paper Series 846, CESifo.
    15. Ivan Gachet & Diego F. Grijalva & Paúl A. Ponce & Damián Rodríguez, 2019. "Vertical and Horizontal Inequality in Ecuador: The Lack of Sustainability," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 145(3), pages 861-900, October.
    16. Molefi Solomon Mohautse, 2014. "The Economic and Political Ramifications of Inequality in Post-Apartheid South Africa," Journal of Economics and Behavioral Studies, AMH International, vol. 6(9), pages 690-699.
    17. Peng Jia & Yang Du & Meiyan Wang, 2017. "Rural Labor Migration and Poverty Reduction in China," China & World Economy, Institute of World Economics and Politics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, vol. 25(6), pages 45-64, November.
    18. Roy Cerqueti & Marcel Ausloos, 2014. "Assessing the Inequalities of Wealth in Regions: the Italian Case," Papers 1410.4922, arXiv.org.
    19. Narayan Sastry, 2004. "Trends in socioeconomic inequalities in mortality in developing countries: The case of child Survival in São Paulo, Brazil," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 41(3), pages 443-464, August.
    20. Morley, Samuel A., 2001. "Distribution and growth in Latin America in an era of structural reform," TMD discussion papers 66, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:ilrrev:v:58:y:2004:i:1:p:94-111. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.ilr.cornell.edu .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.