Using multiple factor analysis, this paper describes the path of agricultural modernization followed by the Brazilian states between 1985 and 1995/6. It also tries to identify the relations between this path and the evolution of employment in the Brazilian agricultural sector. Multiple factor analysis is a technique that provides a description of a complex phenomenon by weighing the different groups of variables in a uniform way, thus avoiding the error of allowing a particular group to alone determine the first principal direction of the global analysis. The results indicate that there are five different modernization paths, and all have a verylimitedcapacitytoimprovethelevelofemploymentinBrazilian agriculture.