Reformas e desempenho econômico no México (1990-2018)

Abstract

The present work aims to understand the persistence of underdevelopment characteristics in Mexico, also identified through the stagnation of per capita income at the middle-income level – Middle Income Trap (ARM), highlighting the development strategies implemented by Mexican governments, with emphasis on the period that includes neoliberal reforms between 1990 and 2018. The criterion for choosing the country lies in the fact that, in addition to being one of the largest and most complex economies in Latin America, the Mexican socioeconomic structure is home to serious problems of poverty and inequality. The time frame is based on the specificities of the episodes that occurred in the early 1990s, which in addition to being marked by intense macroeconomic austerity policies, was also characterized by a new international projection, marked by trade liberalization and financial deregulation. The end of the period in question, 2018, coincides with the year of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador's victory, when Mexican society began to realize that the policies implemented up until then had not been able to solve the problems of inequality and poverty, much less, it made it possible to overcome characteristics of underdevelopment. This characterizes a crisis in the political and economic arrangements in force in Mexico. Finally, the exercise of theoretical, statistical and historical exposition allows us to observe the particularities of the macroeconomic management by the government. Thus, it is possible to draw conclusions about the process of Mexican economic development, given that the political and economic strategies implemented by the government are analyzed based on the limitations and opportunities of each macroeconomic situation. It was concluded that the “outward-oriented” growth strategy did not generate sustainability and deepened external dependence - the increase in structural dependence was verified through the phenomenon of international subcontracting and the persistence of trade deficits. Thus, the Mexican reforms have been relatively successful in terms of international insertion, with an increase in the complexity of the export agenda, associated with frustration in terms of social inclusion, structural progress and absorption of socioeconomic gains by the population.