Fernando Alcoforado *
The Brazilian people are constituted not only by the rural and urban workers (from the most miserable to the middle class) who suffer a continuous and very hard process of exploiting their labor force, are confronted with growing social inequality and mass unemployment which affects 13 million workers and are condemned with the withdrawal of fundamental and essential rights, due to the cut in investments in health, education, labor and social security rights, but also by the great majority of Brazilian entrepreneurs (industrialists, traders, service providers, farmers and micro entrepreneurs) many of whom are facing the economic recession and the threat of bankruptcy that force them to sell their factories and land at low prices, while others are daily forced to close shops, businesses and other establishments that completely withdraw their capacity of political, social and economic resistance, since the productive forces have been appropriated by national and international monopoly capital.
It can be affirmed that the main aspiration of the Brazilian people is the existence of a government that promotes the economic growth of the country benefiting workers and entrepreneurs in general and makes it possible to increase income and employment, as well as combat social inequality and guarantee social investments their labor and social security rights. The most serious problem that affects the Brazilian people is social inequality. Only 0.05% of the Brazilian population: about 70,000 people, who are the Brazilian super-rich class, earn around R$ 350,000 monthly and pay only 6.5% of taxes, while wage earners who receive R$ 5 thousand per month pay 27.5%. There are twice as many men who receive more than 10 minimum wages compared to women. And there are four times as many whites as blacks earning more than 10 minimum wages. Following the current pace of inclusion, women will match their income to men in 2047 and blacks to whites in 2089, according to the Oxfam Brazil report. To reduce this murky picture of social inequality, there needs to be a Tax Reform with social justice that would be more important for the quality of life in the country than the Labor Reform, the Law of Comprehensive Outsourcing or the Government Expenditure Ceiling of Michel Temer government.
The Tax Reform with social justice should contemplate the Income Tax on professionals who earn more than R$ 20 thousand per month with a new 35% rate and the taxation of dividends received from companies by individuals that should correspond from 12 to 15%. According to the Oxfam Brazil report, Brazil is one of the only developed or developing countries where this does not happen, making the higher layers that live on profits proportionally pay less taxes than the poorest. Contrary to the solution to social inequalities, the parliamentarians unhesitatingly approved the Michel Temer government spending ceiling of Budget, which limits spending for the next two decades on spending, such as education, health, and reducing the quality of life of the poor who depends on public services. They also approved a Law of Comprehensive Outsourcing, which should precarious the labor market, and a Labor Reform that removes protection for the health and safety of the most vulnerable. And they approved a rosary of laws that hurt the dignity of indigenous populations, riverside, quilombolas, among other groups. Not to mention that the federal government still tried to approve the increase of 15 to 25 years of minimum contribution to achieve retirement, which directly affects the poorest.
The Brazilian economic elite is represented by the six largest billionaires who have the same wealth and equity as the poorest 100 million. The Brazilian economic elite correspond to the richest 5% that owns the same income as the other 95%. In Brazil, the rich pay proportionately less taxes than the middle class and the poorest, either because the dividends they receive as members of companies are not taxed, either because there is no progressivity in the income tax rates and / or because there are more taxes on consumption than on wealth and equity. The wealthiest strata usually have other sources of income, such as interest on financial investments, rents and dividends, often not correctly informed to the interviewers. It can be affirmed that the main aspiration of the Brazilian economic elite is the existence of a government that does not affect its fundamental interests. It wants the maintenance of the anti-popular and anti-national reforms approved by the government Michel Temer that contribute to the increase of its income and wealth. The Brazilian economic elite does not seem to have the capacity to understand that the ongoing political and economic project, blindly supported by it, is withdrawing from itself the capacity for political control built up over centuries in Brazil. This political and economic project aims to serve interests that are located outside Brazil to which the Brazilian economic elite is subordinated.
In order to respond to the anti-national and anti-popular political project, the Brazilian economic elite is conniving with the destruction of the entire industrial complex of Brazil and the denationalization of the Brazilian economy with the scrapping of national science and technology and Brazilian engineering that suffers with the withdrawal of Brazilian companies of the huge public works market in Brazil now handed over to foreign companies, which consequently used the labor force from other countries. In addition, the equipment and inputs required for the productive activities of Brazil started to be bought outside the country, bringing even greater difficulties to the Brazilian companies connected in some way with that productive chain. The same is true in allowing Petrobras to dismantle with the ongoing divestitures. Foreign oil companies will exclusively control the exploitation of our oil, which will only benefit them, which will not even have to pay any taxes, according to the law approved by the current government and the National Congress. The Brazilian countryside has been dominated by foreigners, who buy our land cheaply and use foreign labor and machinery, technology and agricultural inputs produced in their respective countries. The same has occurred in the field of education, in which schools and universities, before being owned by Brazilians, are today under the control of foreign investment funds and institutions, also taking care of the segments of health, security, social communication, private pension, finance, transport, infrastructure, computers, bookstores, etc.
We are experiencing the largest denationalization process ever seen in Brazilian history, from which the Brazilian economic elite is subordinated with international capital. Thus, through the exclusive fault of its economic elite, Brazil is subjected to the harshest colonial subservience, which can condemn us forever to a position of subalternity. From the foregoing, it is quite clear that the future president of the Republic will have to adopt an economic and social policy that corresponds to the interests of the Brazilian people or those of the economic elite who are diametrically opposed. Marina Silva (Rede), Ciro Gomes (PDT), Aldo Rebelo (Solidariedade), Manuela D’Ávila (PC do B), Guilherme Boulos (PSOL), João Goulart Filho (PPL) and Vera Lúcia (PSTU) are candidates identified to a greater or lesser extent with the interests of the Brazilian people. Jair Bolsonaro (PSL), Geraldo Alckmin (PSDB), Rodrigo Maia (DEM), Henrique Meirelles (PMDB), Levy Fidelix (PRTB), Josué Alencar (PR), Álvaro Dias (Podemos), Flávio de Castro (PSC), João Amoêdo (Novo), Guilherme Afif (PSD) and José Maria Eymael (PDC) are the preferred candidates of the Brazilian economic elite. In order to prevent the interests of the Brazilian economic elite from prevailing, it is incumbent on the Brazilian people to elect a President of the Republic and a parliament that will contribute to the country’s economic growth, benefiting workers and entrepreneurs in general and increasing income and employment, as well as combat social inequality and guarantee social investments and their labor and social security rights, as well as defend the interests of Brazil.
* Fernando Alcoforado, 78, member of the Bahia Academy of Education, engineer and doctor in Territorial Planning and Regional Development by the University of Barcelona, university professor and consultant in the areas of strategic planning, business planning, regional planning and planning of energy systems, is the author of 13 books addressing issues such as Globalization and Development, Brazilian Economy, Global Warming and Climate Change, The Factors that Condition Economic and Social Development, Energy in the world and The Great Scientific, Economic, and Social Revolutions that Changed the World.
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