Series: The Productivity Trap in Brazil – Part 3
Introduction
Productivity cannot be imposed by decree, nor can it be resolved with government slogans. It is built — and depends on a solid foundation: quality education, efficient infrastructure, and institutions that encourage innovation and investment. Brazil, unfortunately, fails in all three pillars.
While emerging countries such as Chile, Mexico and Vietnam are moving forward with structural reforms, Brazil is still improvising. The results are predictable: uncompetitive companies, expensive and inefficient public services, and an environment that turns entrepreneurs into heroes of bureaucratic resistance.
1. Education: the root of unproductivity
The biggest obstacle to Brazilian productivity is perhaps where it all begins: in the classroom. The country is living with a silent tragedy — 3 out of 10 Brazilians are functionally illiterate, unable to interpret a simple text or perform basic operations, as shown by recent research published by G1.
It's not just about schooling, it's about real human capital. There is a lack of solid foundations in reading, mathematics and logical reasoning. Technical training is fragile, outdated and disconnected from the market. The result: a workforce poorly prepared to deal with technology, innovation and more complex processes — essential for productivity.
2. Infrastructure: the country stuck in traffic
Brazil's precarious logistics are another obvious obstacle. Trucks stuck in queues at ports, potholed roads, bottlenecks at airports and abandoned railways make transportation more expensive, hinder production chains and undermine the competitiveness of national companies.
According to the World Bank, the lack of consistent investment in infrastructure directly compromises Brazil's productivity and competitiveness. Companies spend more to produce and distribute — and the consumer pays the price.
Worse still: infrastructure programs, such as the new PAC, follow an outdated model, based on public works, bloated contracts and endless deadlines. There is no real incentive for efficiency or private investment.
3. Bureaucracy: the invisible cost of entrepreneurship
In addition to low qualifications and poor infrastructure, Brazil imposes on its productive sector one of the most costly and complex bureaucracies in the world. Opening, maintaining and expanding a business requires a disproportionate effort — not because of the entrepreneur's incompetence, but because of a system that punishes formality.
The institutional environment is hostile: excessive regulations, legal uncertainty, slow processes and political interference. This is the “Brazil Cost” in its most concrete form. It is no wonder that productivity grows more in the informal economy than in the formal economy — a serious symptom of institutional distortion.
Conclusion
While productivity depends on structure, Brazil still relies on propaganda. Without basic education, without functional infrastructure and with a state apparatus that stifles free initiative, the country will continue to be trapped in the trap of productive underdevelopment.
Change requires more than good intentions: it requires real reforms, political courage and the willingness to break with the historical vices that have transformed progress into a privilege and efficiency into an exception.
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📚 Read also:
- 👉 What is productivity and why does it matter?
- 👉 Brazil works hard and produces little: a portrait of stagnation
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