Análise dos Estudantes do Programa Bolsa Família Frente à Frequência Escolar dos Beneficiados

The Cash Transfer Programs plays an important role and effective participation as a booster agent in economic and social development. Education-oriented social programs, known as “Bolsa Escola”, aim to provide poor families with children with a monetary stipend, to enable and stimulate them to send their children to school. In Brazil, several programs of this type existed since the mid-1990s and came together under a federal program in 2001. In 2004, the Brazilian government brought Bolsa Escola together with other minimum income programs to create a comprehensive family stipend program (Bolsa Familia). This paper examines the education and equity impacts of education-oriented social programs with data provided by the Brazilian National Household Survey of 2003. The analysis shows that these programs are not well focused from an education point of view. They are better focused from a minimum income policy point of view, but with limitations. The paper concludes that these policies are not properly grounded in research and are based on wrong assumptions.