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 The September 11 edition of Brazil's daily O Globo carried a surprising piece of information: "The mortality rate of African-Americans (for this read 'poor people') is greater than that of the state of Kerala." Kerala is a small state in southern India with a per capita income very close to the average for all of India, US$ 450.
In Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, the per capita income is greater than the U.S. average of US$ 35,000.
Why does Kerala have the per capita income of India and some social indicators of Europe? And why does the U.S. have the per capita income of Europe while some of its social classes have indicators below those of India?
Why does Brazil exhibit such a shameful position in the classification of human development, and why is it among the eight countries with the worse income concentration? Why is our Human Development Index (HDI) less than that of Latin American countries that are smaller, poorer and more prone to crises?
The answer lies in the economy. Not in its size because the American economy is the world's largest and Brazil is an economic power. It lies, rather, in the emphasis given to the economy as the solution to social problems.
For two centuries the world believed that economic growth would bring equality and better social conditions. In the capitalist vision, private property and the market would augment productivity and distribute income, and democracy would spread social benefits; for socialism, state ownership and planning would do the same even more rapidly.
Both were wrong. In addition to demonstrating inefficient production, socialism sacrificed individual liberties and ultimately concentrated benefits upon the management classes. In its global phase, capitalism is demonstrating that the success of the economy augments wealth but does not reduce poverty, even aggravating inequality.
Likewise, we read that "a male baby born to the 5% richest in the United States lives 25% longer than a boy born to the 5% poorest." The potential to pay for health services is provoking a difference in life expectancy, depending upon social class, at levels unseen in the past among nobles and plebeians.
The economy has been the instrument of income concentration and of quality of life, separating an international First World of the rich, as we see in Brazil, from the social archipelago of the poor spread all over the world, even in the rich countries, as shown by Hurricane Katrina.
What promotes social justice is not economic growth but universally distributed social policies. This was what happened in Europe and in Kerala, two economies of radically different sizes, but both with social policies, principally educational and universal.
What is necessary for this is an economy capable of generating fiscal surplus for the public sector, a public sector with sufficient revenue, and creative, efficient public policies that will change the social reality. These conditions are present in the United States and Brazil.
Why then is the United States lagging behind Kerala, and Brazil, behind 62 countries, many of them poorer? Because both countries have chosen to confront social needs with market measures, at the most with some government-assistance policies, like the U.S. Food Stamp Program and its Brazilian version, the Bolsa Família.
Their situations would be different if the Food Stamp Program had been accompanied by the universalization of social services and if the Bolsa Família had maintained the objective of the Bolsa-Escola, money for the families with quality education for their children.
The problem is not one of resources. It is the lack of understanding that the economy does not resolve social problems and the lack of political will to apply the resources of the public budget to the construction of a society with social justice.
It is a shame that the intellectuals of these two countries would rather remain silent than build a new model of social understanding, and that the politicians would rather dedicate themselves to immediate intrigues and not to the long-term interests of the people.
Even though the United States may from time to time confront a Hurricane Katrina and Brazil may experience the permanent shame of its education, a continuous hurricane upon the heads of our children, an eternal Katrina.
Cristovam Buarque has a Ph.D. in economics. He is a senator for the Federal District and was Governor of the Federal District (1995-98) and Minister of Education (2003-04). You can visit his homepage - www.cristovam.com.br - and write to him at cristovam@senador.gov.br.
Translated from the Portuguese by Linda Jerome - LinJerome@cs.com.
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because Lula fired your ass?