Adalmir Marquetti

The Profit Rate in Brazil, 1953-2003

This paper investigates the profit rate in Brazil between 1953 and 2003. There was a tendency for the profit rate to fall during the period under study determined mainly by the declining productivity of capital. There were three phases in the behavior of the profit rate. In the first phase, between 1953 and 1973, it slowly declined; in the second, from 1973 to late 1980s, it fell sharply; in the third, from late 1989 to 2003, it increased moderately. These phases correspond to the institutional arrangements of the Brazilian economy, respectively, to the import substitution industrialization (ISI) during the golden age of capitalism, to the crisis and rupture of ISI, and to neoliberalism. JEL classification: E25, N16, O30

Productivity, Employment and Growth in European Integration

We compare the evolution of key macroeconomic indices for the European Union (EU), viewed as a unified economy, with that of the USA and Japan for the period 1950–95, report the process of convergence in the EU, and analyze the effect of its potential enlargement through the accession of 10 Central and Eastern European countries (CEEC) that are in active negotiation for EU membership. The EU has followed a path of rising labor productivity, declining capital productivity and rising capital intensity typical of advanced capitalist economies. Its productivities in the 1990s lie between those of the USA and Japan. There is evidence of convergence of EU-15 relative labor productivity and capital intensity levels to those of the USA. Relative real wages also seem to be converging. Profit rates in all three economies fell, most rapidly before 1975. There is a general pattern of convergence in the EU members in the evolution of labor productivity, capital productivity, real wage, gross profit rate, investment per worker, consumption per worker and capital intensity. The evidence for a specific membership effect on convergence is weak. The CEEC have much lower relative labor and capital productivity than any other countries that have entered the EU. The process of development in the CEEC will have to follow an atypical path of increasing or constant capital productivity and rising labor productivity in order to converge to EU norms. EU membership might have a positive impact on the prospective economic growth in the CEEC in these respects, as the vehicle for the transmission of critical changes in technology and productive organization.

Participatory Economic Democracy in Action: Participatory Budgeting in Porto Alegre, 1989-2004

This paper is a case study of a particularly important and well known experiment in participatory economic democracy, participatory budgeting (PB) in Porto Alegre under the Workers’ Party. Its intention is to draw both positive and negative lessons from this experience. There are three fundamental parts to the paper. The first part sets the frame for understanding this experiment by reviewing several relevant considerations of participatory democracy in general, and then describing the institutional structure of Porto Alegre’s PB. The second part is an empirical investigation for this case of three central issues in participatory economic democracy: participation, the nature of choices, and the resulting redistribution. A third part considers a number of limitations of the PB process as it occurred in Porto Alegre from the perspective of economic democracy. JEL classification: H72, R50

O aumento da lucratividade expande a acumulação de capital? Uma análise de causalidade de Granger para países da OCDE

The purpose of this paper is to test the classical-Marxian hypothesis of causal linkages between profit rate and the accumulation of capital for a dataset of 20 OECD countries. The procedure proposed by Toda and Yamamoto (1995) to test for the Granger non-causality hypotheses is employed in the statistical procedure. The test specification, derived from the Cambridge equation, involve three variables: profit rate, accumulation of capital and investment rate. The consideration of the investment rate allows a comparison between the classical-Marxian and the post-Keynesian traditions. For the cases of Australia, Denmark, usa, Finland and Ireland, the results provide empirical support for the classical-Marxian conception. On the other hand, in the cases of Canada, South Korea, Greece and Sweden, the results support the post-Keynesian tradition.

Distribuição e expansão em um modelo neoestruturalista: uma aplicação para o Brasil

Este artigo apresenta um modelo neo-estruturalista unisetorial de equilibrio geral para investigar os efeitos de choques em variaveis economicas sobre o desempenho da economia brasileira. A matriz de contabilidade social para 2006 foi construida empregando os dados do Sistema de Contas Nacionais (SCN). Tres experimentos sao analisados: uma desvalorizacao cambial; uma transferencia de renda aos trabalhadores; e a combinacao da desvalorizacao cambial com transferencias de renda aos trabalhadores. Os resultados indicam efeitos positivos da politica que combina a desvalorizacao cambial e a transferencia de renda governamental na economia brasileira.

A cross-country non parametric estimation of the returns to factors of production and the elasticity of scale

This paper employs local regression to estimate the output elasticity with respect to labor, human capital, physical capital and the elasticity of scale for 90 countries in 1985 and 1995. The results support the hypotheses of constant returns to scale to factors and decreasing returns to accumulable factors. The low capital-labor ratio countries have important differences in factor elasticities in relation to other countries. The augmentation of the production function by human capital did not reduce the elasticity of physical capital as suggested by Mankiw, Romer and Weil (1992). Moreover, it is investigated if the factors shares are really equal to their output elasticity. The wage share raises with the capital labor ratio and the sum of the output elasticity of labor and human capital is below the wage share for high capital labor ratio countries, happening the inverse for low capital labor ratio countries. It indicates the presence of externalities, or imperfect competition or that the marginal theory of distribution is inaccurate.

Measuring the Profit Rate in an Inflationary Context: The Case of Brazil, 1955–2008

A debate in Marxist literature concerns the methodology for measuring the profit rate. This paper investigates this question computing the rate of profit at historical cost, current cost, constant prices, and constant GDP price for Brazil in the 1955–2008 period. Like many developing countries, Brazil experienced medium to high inflation during this period. Inflation determined the trend and cyclical movements of the profit rate at historical cost. It increased in years of rising, and declined in years of falling, inflation. The profit rate at historical cost was at odds with Brazilian economic history. The profit rate at current costs remained unaffected by the inflation rate, and its movements correspond to the historical phases of the Brazilian economy. The same is true for the profit rate at constant prices and at constant GDP price. However, the profit rate at constant prices does not account for changes in relative prices, while the profit rate at constant GDP price is computed using a weighted average of the current and past relative prices. JEL Classification: E01, B51

Patrones de crecimiento y cambio técnico en la producción de un producto bueno y otro malo

En este trabajo investigamos las regularidades del crecimiento economico, considerando queel proceso de produccion involucra un producto bueno y otro malo. El bueno es el productointerno bruto (PIB) y el malo son las emisiones de dioxido de carbono (CO2) ocasionadas por eluso de combustibles de origen fosil. Es posible resumir los resultados en cuatro regularidades:1) la produccion del producto bueno y la del producto malo se incrementan con el proceso decrecimiento economico; la del primero se incrementa con el uso de los insumos trabajo y capital,mientras que la del segundo se acrecienta con el uso del insumo capital; 2) la productividad deltrabajo y la razon capital-trabajo se incrementan, mientras que la productividad del capital declinaen el proceso de crecimiento economico; 3) las emisiones tanto por unidad de producto comopor unidad de trabajo se incrementan durante las primeras etapas del crecimiento economico,para declinar despues de alcanzar cierto umbral, este, resultado es consistente con la hipotesisde la curva ambiental de Kuznets; 4) hay grandes diferencias entre paises tanto en los nivelescomo en las tasas de crecimiento del producto malo y del producto bueno, de la productividaddel trabajo y de la eficiencia de generacion de CO2.

EFEITOS FISCAIS DA DEMOCRACIA DIRETA NOS MUNICÍPIOS GAÚCHOS: 1997-2004

This paper investigates the fiscal effects of the Participatory Budgeting (PB) in the municipalities with population above 30.000 inhabitants in Rio Grande do Sul in the 1997-2000 and 2001-2004 administrative terms. In the first term, there were six municipalities with PB, number that rose to 10 in the second one, corresponding to 23.6% and 34.7% of the state population. The econometric results revealed differences between the municipalities with and without PB. In relation to the allocative function, the municipalities with PB offered public services in a quantity closer to the citizens preferences. In relation to the distributive function, the results showed higher expenses in education and housing in municipalities with PB.

EVOLUÇÃO SETORIAL DO ECONOMIA BRASILEIRA ENTRE 2002 E 2020: DO PASSADO AO FUTURO COM O MÉTODO DELPHI

Neste trabalho, utilizou-se o Metodo Delphi a fim de investigar os rumos da mudanca estrutural no Brasil. Partindo de uma visao da estrutura setorial da economia brasileira em 2002, tratou-se de vislumbrar os contornos da mudanca. Aplicando um questionario detalhado sobre as perspectivas setoriais do emprego, valor adicionado, demanda final e valor da producao a 18 observadores da cena brasileira, pode-se construir as matrizes de insumo-produto de 2010 e 2020. Em media, a opiniao dos entrevistados sinalizou para importantes modificacoes nas estruturas setoriais do emprego e da producao. Sua visao do futuro, contudo, apontou para modestas transformacoes na distribuicao primaria da renda, na participacao do governo e na estrutura do consumo familiar. Os resultados sugerem que a mudanca estrutural do pais nos proximos 15 ou 20 anos precisa ser mais arrojada, de sorte a dar lugar a construcao de uma sociedade dinâmica e igualitaria.