Economic Impacts of the Vale-Cultura (Culture Voucher): a Computable General Equilibrium Model
Restricted access to consumption of cultural goods and services is one of the major problems faced by this sector in Brazil. To address this issue, the federal government created the Vale-Cultura, a voucher in which individuals receive an income transfer to be used exclusively for purchasing cultural goods and services. The aim of this study is to analyze the impacts of the Vale-Cultura in the cultural sector and in the economy in general. The methodology applied is the Brazilian Recursive Dynamic General Equilibrium model (BRIDGE). Our simulations found that GDP growth is driven mainly by the increase in household consumption. There is a positive variation in welfare, assessed by the equivalent and compensating variations in income for beneficiaries of the vouchers. Finally, a positive growth is projected at the level of activity of cultural sectors and negative growth in others, showing a reallocation of productive factors.
