Brazil: in the middle of the second wave of the coronavirus, the country generated nearly a million jobs – economic, financial and economic news

Despite the second wave tragedy, the brazilian economy seems to have held up better than expected: In April alone, nearly 121,000 jobs formal, who raised nearly a million new jobs generated during the first four months of the year.

While the numbers for work market seem to be starting to slow down – April was the second worst month in almost a year, just before last December – the Minister of Economy, Paulo Guedessays this compared to last year, when the first wave destroyed nearly a million jobs, the outlook was positive.

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In April, 1.38 million jobs were created, but an additional 1.26 million were also cut. the service sector (which represents around 60% of Brazilian GDP) was the biggest contributor with 57,610 new jobs, about half of the total. They are followed by construction (22.224) and industry (19,884) in third place.

“The solution is to move forward with the Economic reforms and the vaccination massive, in order to ensure a safe return to work, ”Guedes said at an online press conference. employment growth rate to make sure that there is no economic derailment“, aggregate.

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Guedes is optimistic: at the time, the minister believes that IThe economy could grow between 4.5% and 5% this year, well above the latest projections of the IMF (3.7%) and world Bank (3%). In a virtual event, the head of the economic portfolio announced that the government is studying a negative income tax and elaborates a package of measures in order to reduce unemploymentO.

But the strategy of Guedes it depends on several factors. One of the most important is coronavirus vaccination campaign, which continues to present several obstacles. Until now around 24% of the target population (less than half of the total population Brazil) is completely vaccinated and the The government cut its stock forecast for June by 12 million, after the Instituto Carioca Fiocruz I should have to temporarily stop production vaccine AstraZeneca for lack of inputs.

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During, number of Covid-19 contagions accelerated again in recent days – reported 80,486 new cases in the last 24 hours and the the average number of infections on mobile increased by 10% since early May– and the country already exceeds 450,000 deaths by Covid-19.

Guedes also depends on the brazilian congress unlock the tax reform which the minister has been promoting since last year. The presidents of the Chamber of Deputies, Arthur Lira, and of Senate, Rodrigo Pacheco, agreed this week to speed up the approval of the project (divided into five parts) which, among other things, changes income tax Yes merge two federal taxes into a new 12% VAT.

With the presidential elections Closer and closer, the government is pushing for the reform to be adopted, at least partially this year.