(task) LatinAmerican Post - Brazil: Another big decline in GDP

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Economy, economic decline

> http://www.latinamericanpost.com:8080/article/brazil-another-big-decline-in-gdp/ <http://www.latinamericanpost.com:8080/article/brazil-another-big-decline-in-gdp/>
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> Brazil: Another big decline in GDP
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> BRAZIL’S GDP shrank by 1.9% in the second quarter of 2015 compared with the previous quarter, the biggest decline by that measure since 2009. Compared with the same quarter last year, the economy contracted by 2.6%. This continues a sequence of dismal numbers. The unemployment rate rose to 7.5% in July, from 4.9% a year earlier—the fastest annual rise on record. Inflation remains high. GDP will continue shrinking in 2016, economists forecast.
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> Despite the gloom, Dilma Rousseff, Brazil’s beleaguered president, has scored a few political victories. She pushed curbs on payroll-tax breaks through Congress, which will help cut the fiscal deficit; the government also said it would close ten of its 39 ministries. And a powerful foe was isolated when the chief prosecutor charged the speaker of Congress’s lower house with corruption. Even protests this month, which drew nearly 1m people angry about graft in Ms Rousseff’s Workers’ Party, were smaller than she had feared.
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> But the respite could be brief. Analysts are worried by recent reports that her vice-president, Michel Temer, a member of the PMDB, is giving up the job of co-ordinating the government’s dealings with Congress. They fear that his successor will be a less effective backer of fiscal austerity. And as the economy sinks, the ranks of disgruntled Brazilians will grow.
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> Analysis: by BBC's Daniel Gallas
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> Most people have already been feeling the economic downturn long before today's figures were out.
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> Unemployment has risen rapidly, while inflation over 12 months is running above 9% - twice the government's target.
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> More worryingly, analysts believe growth might not return until 2017.
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> Brazilian authorities are trying to fix the economy with austerity measures, but the government is facing a political crisis and a rebellion of allied MPs who want to increase spending, rather than reform the economy.
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> A corruption scandal has also hurt state oil giant Petrobras, responsible for a huge chunk of public investment.
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> Now, as if things could not get any worse, there is uncertainty about how changes in the Chinese economy might affect commodity prices, which are vital to Brazil's exports.
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> LatinAmerican Post
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> Sources:
> The Economist
> BBC News