IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/hlthec/v20y2011i3p306-322.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The relationship between health and GDP in OECD countries in the very long run

Author

Listed:
  • Robyn Swift

Abstract

This paper uses Johansen multivariate cointegration analysis to examine the relationship between health and GDP for 13 OECD countries over the last two centuries, for periods ranging from 1820–2001 to 1921–2001. A similar, long run, cointegrating relationship between life expectancy and both total GDP and GDP per capita was found for all the countries estimated. The relationships have a significant influence on both total GDP and GPD per capita in most of the countries estimated, with 1% increase in life expectancy resulting in an average 6% increase in total GDP in the long run, and 5% increase in GDP per capita. Total GDP and GDP per capita also have a significant influence on life expectancy for most countries. There is no evidence of changes in the relationships for any country over the periods estimated, indicating that shifts in the major causes of illness and death over time do not appear to have influenced the link between health and economic growth. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Suggested Citation

  • Robyn Swift, 2011. "The relationship between health and GDP in OECD countries in the very long run," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(3), pages 306-322, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:hlthec:v:20:y:2011:i:3:p:306-322
    DOI: 10.1002/hec.1590
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1002/hec.1590
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1002/hec.1590?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. John Strauss & Duncan Thomas, 1998. "Health, Nutrition, and Economic Development," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 36(2), pages 766-817, June.
    2. Alok Bhargava & Dean T. Jamison & Lawrence J. Lau & Christopher J. L. Murray, 2006. "Modeling the effects of health on economic growth," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Econometrics, Statistics And Computational Approaches In Food And Health Sciences, chapter 20, pages 269-286, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    3. Daron Acemoglu & Simon Johnson, 2007. "Disease and Development: The Effect of Life Expectancy on Economic Growth," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 115(6), pages 925-985, December.
    4. Johansen, Soren, 1992. "Determination of Cointegration Rank in the Presence of a Linear Trend," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 54(3), pages 383-397, August.
    5. Johansen, Soren & Juselius, Katarina, 1990. "Maximum Likelihood Estimation and Inference on Cointegration--With Applications to the Demand for Money," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 52(2), pages 169-210, May.
    6. David N. Weil, 2005. "Accounting for the Effect of Health on Economic Growth," NBER Working Papers 11455, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Henrik Hansen & Søren Johansen, 1999. "Some tests for parameter constancy in cointegrated VAR-models," Econometrics Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 2(2), pages 306-333.
    8. Marc Suhrcke & Dieter Urban, 2010. "Are cardiovascular diseases bad for economic growth?," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 19(12), pages 1478-1496, December.
    9. Bloom, David E. & Canning, David & Sevilla, Jaypee, 2004. "The Effect of Health on Economic Growth: A Production Function Approach," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 1-13, January.
    10. Johansen, Soren, 1995. "Likelihood-Based Inference in Cointegrated Vector Autoregressive Models," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198774501, Decembrie.
    11. James P. Smith, 1999. "Healthy Bodies and Thick Wallets: The Dual Relation between Health and Economic Status," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 13(2), pages 145-166, Spring.
    12. Ross Guest & Robyn Swift, 2008. "Fertility, income inequality, and labour productivity," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 60(4), pages 597-618, October.
    13. Seema Jayachandran & Adriana Lleras-Muney, 2009. "Life Expectancy and Human Capital Investments: Evidence from Maternal Mortality Declines," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(1), pages 349-397.
    14. Sergio Beraldo & Daniel Montolio Estivill & Gilberto Turati, 2005. "Healthy, Educated and Wealthy: Is the Welfare State Really Harmful for Growth?," Working Papers in Economics 127, Universitat de Barcelona. Espai de Recerca en Economia.
    15. Hoyt Bleakley, 2007. "Disease and Development: Evidence from Hookworm Eradication in the American South," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 122(1), pages 73-117.
    16. Johansen, Soren, 1991. "Estimation and Hypothesis Testing of Cointegration Vectors in Gaussian Vector Autoregressive Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 59(6), pages 1551-1580, November.
    17. Juselius, Katarina, 2006. "The Cointegrated VAR Model: Methodology and Applications," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199285679, Decembrie.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. McNamara, Paul E. & Ulimwengu, John M. & Leonard, Kenneth L., 2010. "Do health investments improve agricultural productivity? Lessons from agricultural household and health research," IFPRI discussion papers 1012, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    2. Schünemann, Johannes & Bloom, David E. & Canning, David & Kotschy, Rainer & Prettner, Klaus, 2018. "Health and Economic Growth: Reconciling the Micro and Macro Evidence," VfS Annual Conference 2018 (Freiburg, Breisgau): Digital Economy 181554, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    3. Husain, Muhammad Jami, 2010. "Contribution of health to economic development: A survey and overview," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 4, pages 1-52.
    4. Oliver Fritz & Peter Mayerhofer & Reinhard Haller & Gerhard Streicher & Florian Bachner & Herwig Ostermann, 2013. "Die regionalwirtschaftlichen Effekte der österreichischen Krankenanstalten," WIFO Studies, WIFO, number 46672, Juni.
    5. Bloom, David E. & Kuhn, Michael & Prettner, Klaus, 2018. "Health and Economic Growth," IZA Discussion Papers 11939, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Alberto Bucci & Lorenzo Carbonari & Monia Ranalli & Giovanni Trovato, 2019. "Health and Development," CEIS Research Paper 470, Tor Vergata University, CEIS, revised 24 Mar 2021.
    7. David E. Bloom & Michael Kuhn & Klaus Prettner, 2022. "Modern Infectious Diseases: Macroeconomic Impacts and Policy Responses," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 60(1), pages 85-131, March.
    8. Tompsett, Anna, 2020. "The Lazarus drug: the impact of antiretroviral therapy on economic growth," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    9. Giorgio Canarella & Stephen Miller & Stephen Pollard, 2014. "Purchasing Power Parity Between the UK and Germany: The Euro Era," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 25(4), pages 677-699, September.
    10. David H. Bernstein & Bent Nielsen, 2019. "Asymptotic Theory for Cointegration Analysis When the Cointegration Rank Is Deficient," Econometrics, MDPI, vol. 7(1), pages 1-24, January.
    11. Eleni Constantinou & Avo Kazandjian & Georgios P. Kouretas & Vera Tahmazian, 2008. "Common Stochastic Trends Among The Cyprus Stock Exchange And The Ase, Lse And Nyse," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(4), pages 327-349, October.
    12. Giorgio Canarella & Stephen M. Miller & Stephen K. Pollard, 2012. "Purchasing Power Parity between the UK and the Euro Area," Working Papers 1208, University of Nevada, Las Vegas , Department of Economics.
    13. Dora L. Costa, 2015. "Health and the Economy in the United States from 1750 to the Present," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 53(3), pages 503-570, September.
    14. Giorgio Canarella & Stephen M. Miller & Stephen K. Pollard, 2008. "Dynamic Stock Market Interactions between the Canadian, Mexican, and the United States Markets: The NAFTA Experience," Working papers 2008-49, University of Connecticut, Department of Economics.
    15. Noriega Antonio E. & Ramos Francia Manuel & Rodríguez-Pérez Cid Alonso, 2015. "Money Demand Estimations in Mexico and of its Stability 1986-2010, as well as Some Examples of its Uses," Working Papers 2015-13, Banco de México.
    16. Rodríguez-Caballero, Carlos Vladimir & Ventosa-Santaulària, Daniel, 2017. "Energy-growth long-term relationship under structural breaks. Evidence from Canada, 17 Latin American economies and the USA," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 121-134.
    17. MESSAILI, Moussa & KAID TLILANE, Nouara, 2018. "Essai d’évaluation de la contribution de la santé à la croissance économique en Algérie [An assessment of the contribution of health to economic growth in Algeria]," MPRA Paper 88013, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 18 Jul 2018.
    18. Hüseyin Sen & Ayse Kaya & Baris Alpaslan, 2015. "Education, Health, and Economic Growth Nexus: A Bootstrap Panel Granger Causality Analysis for Developing Countries," Economics Discussion Paper Series 1502, Economics, The University of Manchester.
    19. Ansgar Belke & Robert Czudaj, 2010. "Is Euro Area Money Demand (Still) Stable? Cointegrated VAR Versus Single Equation Techniques," Applied Economics Quarterly (formerly: Konjunkturpolitik), Duncker & Humblot, Berlin, vol. 56(4), pages 285-315.
    20. Ericsson, Neil R & Hendry, David F & Mizon, Grayham E, 1998. "Exogeneity, Cointegration, and Economic Policy Analysis," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 16(4), pages 370-387, October.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wly:hlthec:v:20:y:2011:i:3:p:306-322. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/jhome/5749 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.