Mudança cíclica versus mudança estrutural: uma análise da produtividade da mão-de-obra na indústria brasileira

Abstract

This article studies two differents explanations about the recent evolution of Brazilian labor productivity. While the first states that the increase of productivity in the early 90’s comes from cyclical factors, the second propose that this increase comes from an structural shock: the trade liberalization. Thus, we develop a new econometric approach to appraise the matching of these explanations using endogenous structural change tests. The results suggest that the total industry and 14 of its 16 sectors experienced a structural change, whose date varies between May-1987 and April-1995. Therefore, we do not reject the hypothesis that trade liberalization had a crucial impact on the Brazilian productivity evolution.