A fair adjustment or just a few extra backward steps for the public basic education in Brazil?

Abstract

This article aims to present and discuss the report A Fair Adjustment: Efficiency and Equity of Public Spending in Brazil (2017) produced by The World Bank, in order to analyze the need for a radical fiscal adjustment aimed to solve the financial and budgetary issues of the country. The report under study presents some arguments and strategies for the implementation of a public spending adjustment, especially for sectors such as health, education, social security, and others. Through a critical approach in relation to the recommendations of the Bank directed at the Brazilian public basic education, the guidelines expressed in the document were questioned. These guidelines point to the need of budgetary contingencies and cutting as methods of improving public accounts and of balancing the investment/returns ratio. The report is grounded on an econometrics that seeks to legitimate, at all costs, the thesis that regards the contractionist fiscal policy as the best path to intervene in public basic education. Throughout the text, a discussion about the feasibility of such a policy will be presented, taking into consideration our historical context of underfunding, in which, unlike other countries that are richer and less unequal, Brazil has never reached the necessary investment level to guarantee access, permanence and quality for people in basic education.

Basic education; Fiscal adjustment; Austerity; The World Bank; Social justice