“We spend more than most countries, but fail to 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: How does the discussion about meritocracy stand?

I think we must privilege meritocracy, but we must make it possible for the children of the rich and the poor, the educated and the illiterate to participate in the same race. Once I create these conditions, then merit prevails. It is clear that (total) equality is the goal, but it is a goal that will never be achieved. The son of a rich man will have access to things that the State will never be able to provide, such as social networking. But he/she will have the same content at school. If I place a poor black man and a rich white man to compete at the university on an equal footing in terms of general knowledge, mathematics, physics, chemistry, Portuguese, they will have equal conditions to do well on the entrance exams and go to college with merit, even without the need for quotas.