Dinâmica do emprego industrial no Brasil entre 2007 e 2018: centralização ou descentralização industrial?

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate possible structural changes in Brazilian industrial employment in recent years, according to a regional perspective, considering the spatial distribution of formal labour – territorial centralisation or decentralisation of the industry –, as well as to identify and categorise the productive factor more intensively used in industrial activities. The used data are from Relação Annual de Informações Sociais, of the Ministry of Labour and Employment, from 2007 to 2018. The classification of the different industrial branches was based on the taxonomy of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (1987), which categorizes the different types of industry according to their main competitive factor. While applying the Adapted Locational Quotient and the Hischman-Herfindahl Index, within a context of loss of industry participation, as argued by Cruz and Santos (2011) and Monteiro and Silva (2018), it was observed that the configuration of industrial activity is dynamic, sometimes due to quantitative expansion, sometimes due to qualitative expansion, but with no signs of significant structural changes: the gain in industrial relevance in the North and Northeast seems to be conditioned by a higher volume of employment in less technologically advanced industrial sectors, showing that, despite the loss of industrial importance in some areas of the South and Southeast, they continue to lead the country when considering its technological content.