South Asia/Frontier Growth Dynamics and Income-Health Relationships
39 Pages Posted: 27 Nov 2018 Last revised: 10 Jul 2019
Date Written: July 7, 2019
Abstract
South Asian (SA) countries’ growth-dynamics since 1951 is examined and compared using the annual catch-up index. Their growth is more volatile than 89 countries’ sample studied earlier. It does not experience a stable phase, is sharply divergent, and the country that grows fastest for two decades grows slowest in the following decade, and vice versa. Other than Bhutan, they experienced relative and absolute divergence from the US from the start for 29 (Nepal) to 51 (Pakistan) years. Their still-birth rates (SBR) vary as much as nine times from each other; its rate of decrease is smaller than neonatal mortality’s (NMR), both rates’ dispersion increases, and adding SBR doubles NMR’s “explanation” of life expectancy (LE). NMR and SBR decreased at a lower rate in the SA country with an initial higher rate; and better performance in income is associated with a worse performance in SBR, NMR, and LE in recent decades.
Keywords: Growth dynamics of South Asian countries, Volatility in growth and disparity in stillbirth rates, Stillbirth and neonatal mortality rates and life expectancy, Early child mortality rates and their decrease, Performance in health vis-à-vis in income
JEL Classification: O10, O47, I15
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation