overall increases in the return to human capital assets like education and experience have increased inequality in the last years in a number of developing countries in east asia and latin america in some cases expansions in education can actually lead to increases in inequality in the context of increasing returns to schooling the increase in returns to education is more important than many other factors in accounting for the rise in inequality in a number of countries over the s and s bourguignon ferreira and lustig conversely a fall in the returns to tertiary education may also help explain falling inequality figure panel a shows how between and in brazil wages did not rise as much for the more educated as they would have done if returns to education had not fallen