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Life Expectancy in West African Countries: Evidence of Convergence and Catching Up with the North

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  • Yaya, OlaOluwa S
  • Oyekunrin, Oluwaseun A
  • Ogbonna, Ahamuefula E

Abstract

We investigate the possibility of convergence and catching up of life expectancy values of West African countries with those of North African countries. Following the theory of time series convergence documented in Bernard and Durlauf (1996) and Greasley and Oxley (1997), we apply more robust unit root tests, based on Fourier nonlinearity and instantaneous breaks, proposed in Furuoka (2017) in investigating the convergence of each pair, that is, a West African country with that of a particular North Africa country. As no unit root in the differences of the pair implies convergence, the results obtained by the new statistical approach quite outperform those of classical unit root tests. The results show general evidence of convergence of life expectancy values of those in West Africa to those of the North.

Suggested Citation

  • Yaya, OlaOluwa S & Oyekunrin, Oluwaseun A & Ogbonna, Ahamuefula E, 2020. "Life Expectancy in West African Countries: Evidence of Convergence and Catching Up with the North," MPRA Paper 102873, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:102873
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Perron, Pierre & Vogelsang, Timothy J., "undated". "Level Shifts and Purchasing Power Parity," Instructional Stata datasets for econometrics levshift, Boston College Department of Economics.
    2. Bernard, Andrew B. & Durlauf, Steven N., 1996. "Interpreting tests of the convergence hypothesis," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 71(1-2), pages 161-173.
    3. Chigozie Nelson Nkalu & Richardson Kojo Edeme, 2019. "Environmental Hazards and Life Expectancy in Africa: Evidence From GARCH Model," SAGE Open, , vol. 9(1), pages 21582440198, February.
    4. Perron, Pierre & Vogelsang, Timothy J, 1992. "Nonstationarity and Level Shifts with an Application to Purchasing Power Parity," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 10(3), pages 301-320, July.
    5. Cunado, J. & Perez de Gracia, F., 2006. "Real convergence in Africa in the second-half of the 20th century," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 58(2), pages 153-167.
    6. Yaya, OlaOluwa S & Ogbonna, Ahamuefula & Atoi, Ngozi V, 2019. "Are inflation rates in OECD countries actually stationary during 2011-2018? Evidence based on Fourier Nonlinear Unit root tests with Break," MPRA Paper 93937, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Pieter van Baal & Frederik Peters & Johan Mackenbach & Wilma Nusselder, 2016. "Forecasting differences in life expectancy by education," Population Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 70(2), pages 201-216, May.
    8. OlaOluwa S. Yaya & Ahamuefula E. Ogbonna & Robert Mudida, 2019. "Hysteresis of unemployment rates in Africa: new findings from Fourier ADF test," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 53(6), pages 2781-2795, November.
    9. Pascariu, Marius D. & Canudas-Romo, Vladimir & Vaupel, James W., 2018. "The double-gap life expectancy forecasting model," Insurance: Mathematics and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 339-350.
    10. Walter Enders & Junsoo Lee, 2012. "A Unit Root Test Using a Fourier Series to Approximate Smooth Breaks," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 74(4), pages 574-599, August.
    11. Greasley, David & Oxley, Les, 1997. "Time-series based tests of the convergence hypothesis: Some positive results," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 56(2), pages 143-147, October.
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Africa; Convergence; Fourier function; Life expectancy ratio; Nonlinearity; Unit root;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C22 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Time-Series Models; Dynamic Quantile Regressions; Dynamic Treatment Effect Models; Diffusion Processes
    • C5 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling

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