‘We spend, but we don’t produce quality education’, says Paulo Tafner (by Agência Estado)

‘We spend, but we don’t produce quality education’, says Paulo Tafner

Founder and CEO of the recently launched Institute for Mobility and Social Development (IMDS). Economist Paulo Tafner says that it is necessary to improve the quality of spending to ensure that Brazilians can compete on an equal footing in the labor market and ascend the social pyramid . Without social mobility, according to him, the country will have less potential for growth. Check out the main excerpts from the interview:

What is behind the problem?

Basically, a first observation is that there is no shortage of money. We spend more on education than many countries in the world do, and we do not produce good education for children. And education is the most potent factor for social mobility. We spend on health an average of what other countries spend as a share of GDP, but our health in general is poor. The effective result of expenditures is very precarious in Brazil. This means there is a need for major changes in public policy. In the area of education, it is necessary not only to oversee expenditures, but also to control the quality of the expenditure.’