Source: Jornal do Commercio Brasil - RJ, 20/04/2009

From the point of view of middle class consumption, Brazil is a country at the same level of development as the United States and the European Union. Brazilians have access to the most modern equipment, use the same airplanes and automobiles as the populations of the most advanced countries, the same electronic devices, including computers, cell phones and DVDs, the same food, clothing and housing standards.

So, where is underdevelopment?

Underdevelopment is found in some rural areas, in the slums of large urban centers, in the unevenness of the educational system and in the precarious health care of the poorest sections of the population. Underdevelopment lies in the inequality in the distribution of National Income.

The middle class in Brazil has the same standards of living as Americans and Europeans.

Also in the United States and Europe, there are millions of poor people, mainly among African, Asian and Latino immigrants, who are as poor as the poor in Brazil.

The basic concern of the development policy is the growth of the GDP above 5% per year. For what and for whom? To consume more cars, more televisions and more trips to the United States? Even if the excluded remain excluded? It is important to link economic to social development and view development as improving social inequality. This may be difficult to achieve in sub-Saharan Africa, in some Caribbean and South American countries, for the sake of cultural atavism. But in Brazil, it must be possible.

For the admirers and followers of Keynes, it is good to remember what the master said in his “General Theory”, a classic work published in 1936: “In the phases of prosperity, the remedy is not to adopt high interest rates, to inhibit investments and reduce the propensity to consume, but rather to adopt drastic measures to promote the redistribution of income ”(pag.321).

Seen from this angle, it is not a matter of adopting a neoliberal pseudo policy. Where is Brazil's economic backwardness? In what sectors and in which social classes does it manifest itself?

Brazil has a modern, high-productivity agriculture, perhaps one of the most efficient and competitive in the world. Brazilian industry is technically comparable to foreign industries, as is trade. The banking system, likewise, uses the best technology and has no solvency or liquidity problems. The Brazilian economy is highly competitive up to the gate of the farms and the door of the factories. But, undeniably, there is a great logistical delay in ports and road transport and, in general, in public services. There is no point in blaming the isoteric Washington Consensus, the IMF or neoliberal economic policy. Because, in Brazil, the delay is mainly due to the exaggerated dimension of public administration, bureaucracy, the tax system, the tax burden.

These are the most visible causes of economic, political and social underdevelopment. The rest are literary digressions.