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Since its appearance in 2020, Brazil and Mexico have been among the most affected countries in the world by covid-19. Their respective presidents, Jair Bolsonaro and Andrés Manuel López Obrador (known as AMLO), have played a leading role in specific policies during the pandemic. Their choices were both singular and counter- intuitive. On the health front, AMLO initially underplayed the seriousness of the situation, and the Brazilian president, Bolsonaro, defended a frankly negationist attitude, with a dramatic balance sheet, without his popularity being seriously affected. On the economic front, they have chosen policies that contradict not only each other but also their own supposed ideological stances. Bolsonaro, who is ranked on the far right, has implemented an emergency transfer program on a scale comparable to those of developed countries and the most massive the country has ever seen. Conversely, AMLO, considered a progressist, provided just a minimum policy package, maintaining his previous electoral program. By adopting a comparative approach and mobilizing a unique and diversified set of data, the objective of this paper is to explore these apparent contradictions. After having established the precise diagnosis of the policies implemented to deal with the crisis and the economic and health situation in the two countries during the 2020-2022 period, we propose an original interpretation grid of the central role played by the two presidents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Having considered differing definitions of poverty for developed and developing countries, poverty in Latin America is analyzed, especially rural poverty in Brazil. Once the region's economic situation during the 1980s and 1990s and the implications of this for poverty are considered, the objective is to develop a microeconomic analysis of poverty without abandoning the macroeconomic approach. This leads to a study of the various Conditional Cash Transfer Programs implemented in Argentina, Brazil and Mexico and a discussion of the impact of monetary transfers, social costs and fiscal policies in the evolution of poverty. Finally, we conclude that the efficacy of these policies depends on the specific needs of the rural and urban poor, because what is important is reducing economic and social inequalities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]