O DÉFICIT EM CONTA CORRENTE DO BRASIL NOS ANOS NOVENTA: ALOCAÇÃO INTERTEMPORAL DO CONSUMO OU RESTRIÇÃO EXTERNA AO CRESCIMENTO?

This paper addresses the increasing current account imbalances of the Brazilian economy in the second half of the nineties based on two approaches. According to the intertemporal approach, the current account imbalance expresses the decisions of consumption-smoothing. So, a current account deficit doesn't not necessarily mean fragility or a risk of eminent crisis; on the contrary, it might be a result of optimistic expectations about the future economic growth. Studies applied to Brazil reject crucial aspects of the intertemporal approach for the current account. According to the post keynesian and structuralist models, the current account imbalance is one of the most important restrictions to the domestic growth. The evidence provided by post keynesian studies combined with the results of the econometric test presented in this paper corroborate to the hypothesis of external restriction to domestic growth, that is linked here with three structural aspects: the impact of the economic liberalization on the trade-growth relation; the technological gap expressed by the structure of exports; and the impact of the foreign direct investment on the current account. The conclusion is that the post keynesian and structuralist approaches provide the most adequate theoretical tool to assess the Brazilian current account imbalances of the nineties.