It is well know that inequality in Colombia has been really high for several years, but when we wanted to compare ourselves with the rest of Latin America, Brazil was always there to make Colombians feel “better”. The most recent Statistical yearbook published by ECLAC shows that Colombia is now the country in Latin America with highest level of income inequality, measured using Gini coefficient. Brazil has been implementing several policies to fight succesfully against inequality. Some of the policies are very similar to those already being implemented in Colombia, such as the programs to increase acces toi education, reductions in household size and conditional cash transfers. So, if we are implementing similar policies why are we getting so different results?
There are some studies pointing out that programs aimed to increase access to secondary education are very successful in decreasing inequality. Meanwhile, increasing access to tertiary school works in the opposite direction. The past few days I have been analyzing a program of couchers to increase coverage of secondary education and I had the impression that we were going in the right direction, but apparently it is not enough. There are other studies that explain the importance of early childhood development. In that regard I think Familias en Accion is doing a good job.
So maybe what is underlying the high inequality in Colombia is that social prefereces and policies are tolerant with increasing efficiency at the expense of inequality. In the most recent political debate the former minister of agriculture explained to the country why giving subsidies to the rich instead of giving them to the farmers helps to reduce inequality. Also various experimental exercises showed that people prefer efficiency over equality even if the efficiency gains are small. So at the end, what is very important is not anly to copy some isolated programs but to teach people the importance and the value of a more equal society.
