Rousseff Increases Brazilian Women’s Property Rights in Divorces

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Carla Simoes and Andre Soliani – Bloomberg – Tuesday, 13 March 2012 (originally published 08 Mar)

Brazil’s President Dilma Rousseff, the first woman to head the world’s sixth-biggest economy, plans to increase women’s property rights in cases of divorce to mark International Women’s Day.

Women who earn as much as 1,866 reais ($1,060) a month and are enrolled under the government’s homebuilding program will be entitled to ownership of the house in divorce settlements, according to a decree published in an extraordinary edition of the Official Gazette. The measure will require congressional approval, Rousseff’s spokesman, Thomas Traumann, told reporters yesterday.

In her first speech following her Oct. 31, 2010, election victory, Rousseff pledged “to honor Brazil’s women” and to bridge the gender gap in the country. Rousseff in a nationally televised speech yesterday said that 40 percent of Brazilian families are headed by women, up from 25 percent a decade earlier . . .

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