in other words a decrease in income inequality translates into a reduction in the poverty headcount index and a drop of in the extreme poverty headcount index for brazil in short all the results for both subperiods the years leading up to the real plan which were marked by spiraling inflation and the years that followed it when inflation rates were low and stable are similar and fit in with the results obtained for the study period as a whole nonetheless the income and inequality elasticities of poverty both for the poverty and extreme poverty headcount indices are lower in absolute values for the prereal plan period that for the other two periods that have been analysed