Berkeley Program in Law and Economics

This article presents an analysis on how the concepts of costs of rights, limitation of resources and the “reserve of the possible” clause are featured in the Brazilian Federal Supreme Court jurisprudence. By analyzing Brazilian Supreme Court’s decisions, I aim to verify, firstly, in which subjects these themes appear more frequently. Secondly, I intend to assess on how this Court leads with the referred themes in its jurisprudence and what are the criteria applied. At last, I attempt to examine if the judges` decision making process takes into consideration economic and distributive consequences. The survey on Court decisions was based on three categories of legal discussions: right to health, right to education and federal intervention for non-payment of judicial debts. Initially, I examine the treatment received by the concepts of costs of rights, limitation of resources and the “reserve of the possible” clause in each category. And, subsequently, I compare the results obtained in order to highlight the differences.