Income inequality among Brazil’s public-sector workers exceeded the national rate in 2023, according to a study by Sergio Guedes-Reis, an auditor at the country’s comptroller general’s office (CGU). The research used data from Rais, the Labor Ministry’s Annual Social Information Report, and covered public employees across all levels of government except state-owned companies.
The public-sector Gini coefficient reached 0.527, compared with 0.517 for Brazil’s population as a whole. The index ranges from zero to one: lower figures indicate a more equal distribution of income, while higher figures indicate greater concentration. The sample included about 8.5 million employment records.
The study’s author said he had expected inequality to be higher in the private sector, where low-paid workers coexist with a small group of very high earners. Instead, concentration within government employment is also driven by a narrow elite.
The Top 1 Percent
About 80,000 public servants make up the richest 1% of the public workforce. More than half belong to elite legal careers, including judges, prosecutors, government attorneys and public defenders.
A review published by the Brazilian Institute of Economics at the Getulio Vargas Foundation (Ibre) found an even sharper concentration at the very top. Among the richest 0.1% of public servants, 65% are judges or members of the Public Prosecutor’s Office.
The Ibre publication said public-sector payrolls account for about 10% of the income inequality measured across Brazil. Guedes-Reis also said the richest 1% of public servants receive all their income from work, unlike patterns identified in studies of broader income distributions, where capital and property income become more important at the top.
“It is an accumulation of money being transferred to a very specific segment and to labor income, completely detached from the country’s actual fiscal situation,” Guedes-Reis said, according to Folha de S.Paulo.
The findings may understate the concentration. Rais does not include indemnity payments and other allowances known in Brazil as “penduricalhos”—benefits paid outside base salaries that can push total compensation above the constitutional cap.
Payments Above the Cap
Brazil’s public sector paid at least R$24.3 billion above the constitutional salary ceiling in 2025—roughly USD 4.4 billion at recent exchange rates, an approximate conversion—according to a survey cited in the debate over “supersalaries.” The ceiling is tied to the monthly pay of a justice on Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court (STF), currently R$46,366, or approximately USD 8,400.
Of the excess payments, R$22.8 billion went to members of the four elite legal careers. The group included 48,600 active and retired employees, as well as pensioners.
Isadora Modesto, executive director of República.org, said the ceiling has become ineffective because Brazilian law does not clearly distinguish between remuneration, which should be capped, and indemnity payments, which can be excluded.
Calls for External Oversight
Researchers cited behavioral, professional and institutional reasons for the persistence of above-cap payments. High earners may compare themselves with similarly well-paid peers, while career groups can treat restraint as a disadvantage when colleagues pursue new benefits.
They also pointed to oversight bodies such as the National Council of Justice (CNJ) and the National Council of the Public Prosecutor’s Office (CNMP), whose rules are shaped largely by members of the careers they oversee. Manoel Pires of Ibre said one branch of government would not effectively control itself.
The researchers and Modesto proposed stricter national rules and an independent body to recommend pay policies, citing similar arrangements in Chile and the United Kingdom. This report is based on single-source reporting from Folha de S.Paulo.