Employability and Pentecostal cult communities in three major Brazilian capitals: São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Belo Horizonte

Abstract

In the trail of studies on the mechanisms of insertion in the labor market, we inquired whether Pentecostal cult communities operate as crowbars that improve the employability of their members. For this purpose, a survey, with a sample of 900 questionnaires, was carried out in the first semester of 2021 in the three main capitals of Brazil: São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, and Belo Horizonte. The data were modeled through a logistic regression where the dependent variable was the fact of to have or not to have wages obtained from formal or informal jobs. It was found that Pentecostal affiliation brings a double attenuation, raising the chances of obtaining labor income for both blacks-browns and women, which is no small thing in a social structure where poverty has color and inequality has gender.