Social classes A and B on the rise again in Brazil

To differentiate its social classes, Brazil uses letters: from the richest, A, to the poorest E. The Getulio Vargas Foundation (FGV) has established that the number of Brazilians from classes A (rich) and B (middle well-to-do), i.e. with a monthly income per household greater than 8,159 reais, had increased in 2018, reaching 14.4% of the population or 30 million people (+1.9 million). The previous year, the number had dropped.

It is the middle class, class C – from 1,892 to 8,159 reais of income per month – which still dominates Brazilian society, with 55.3% of the population, or 115.3 million people. The most modest classes, D and E – less than 1,892 reais -, still represent 30.3% of Brazilians, or 63.2 million people.

Social classes A and B on the rise, ‘good news’

Interviewed by Valor, Marcelo Neri, an economist at the FGV, believes that the increase in the population of social classes A and B is “good news”. According to him, its members have managed to get through the crisis better thanks to their level of education, which is much higher than the rest of the population (13.2 years against 8.7 for the national average), thus avoiding layoffs. Similarly, many are entrepreneurs, businessmen or traders, better able to withstand the hard blows suffered by the country’s economic situation.

But, on the contrary, social classes D and E have also increased in one year, by one million people. Marcelo Neri is in favor of more inclusive policies to offer employment to the most modest, to encourage them to entrepreneurship and to strengthen the “Bolsa Familia”. Because, in these times of crisis, the most affected were those integrating subclass E2, i.e. extreme poverty.

Class C decreasing

For its part, class C lost members, nearly 1.3 million. For Marcelo Neri, those who came out went to the highest strata, thus helping to strengthen the ranks of classes A and B.

The study also shows that in 2018, the average monthly income per household recorded a slight jump of 4%. For 2019, “the good news is that we will have new income growth and the bad news is that it will be badly redistributed again”, concludes Marcelo Neri.