This article presents income-based indicators using the data from the 2004 Brazilian National Household Survey regarding poverty and indigence in 2004. It refers to spatial characteristics of poverty, as well as its relation with the functioning of the labor market and the way family income is formed. The relatively sharp reduction in poverty and indigence from 2003 to 2004, the best result obtained since the Real Plan was implemented, constitutes the background for the analysis, although the impact of this reduction is spatially differentiated, more favorable in rural areas and less so in the São Paulo metropolitan area. The increase in family income is mainly due to the vigorous expansion of occupation, as the average labor income remained unchanged. Nevertheless, poor individuals benefited from the reduction in the returns to schooling, from the real increase in the minimum wage and from the wider scope of the social security net, which resulted in a more vigorous income increase at the base of distribution, thus leading to a reduction in inequality.
poverty; income; labor market
