GOVERNMENT TRANSFERS AND RURAL SOCIAL SECURITY IN THE MICRO-REGIOES OF RIO GRANDE DO NORTE, 2010 TO 2014
Rural Social Security; government transfers; Rural workers; Micro-regions.
Workers in the Brazilian countryside were historically excluded from various public policies. For decades, these workers did not receive benefits from the loss of work capacity, such as Social Security, and even the attempts to insert such benefits, if not well performed, would only help the rural worker in an incipient and partial way. Only when the Federal Constitution of 1988 was over, and with the Laws of Cost and Benefit of Social Security (Law 8,212 and 8,133 of 1991), social security benefits could be extended in a more universalistic way to rural workers. As a consequence of this "opening" of social security benefits, government spending on pensions increases, but, in addition to that, the direct impact on the lives of retirees was significant. The improvement in the quality of housing, the transition from dependent status to provider within the household, the increasing income of families of and with rural retirees and the improvement on productive capacity of establishments are just some of the benefits. Furthermore, much has been studied about the redistributive impact of rural pensions, transferring income from economically richer regions in Brazil to the North and mainly to the Northeast. As well as the impact that these transfers have on the economy of small towns, especially in this region. The state of Rio Grande do Norte has one of the highest percentages of Rural Social Security beneficiaries over the total population when compared to other states in the Northeast. Therewithal, most of the retirees of this segment in the state, are in small towns that do not exceed twenty thousand inhabitants. With this information, this study intends to investigate the extent to which rural pensions represent for the 19 micro-regions of Rio Grande do Norte between 2010 and 2014. In order to accomplish this, a quantitative approach will be used comparing data from Rural Social Security, obtained through the Law on Access to Information (12,527 / 2011), with other secondary data on micro-regions such as the Municipal Participation Fund (FPM), Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and some social and financing programs such as Bolsa Família (PBF), the Food Acquisition Program (PAA) and the National Program for Strengthening Family Agriculture (PRONAF).