A Comparative Analysis of the Public Spending Performance on Education and Health Sectors in West African Countries
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Date
2016-06
Authors
Isola, W.A.
Ogunniyi, M.B.
Journal Title
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Volume Title
Publisher
International Journal of Economics
Abstract
Health and education are critical factors that provide a solid base for growth and development in any economy. While this is an accepted fact, it is pertinent that an evaluation of the extent to which government 'spending policies have forced in ensuring the continued survival and relevance of education and health in engendering sustainable growth and development. This paper in the light of the aforementioned, seeks to evaluate the public spending performance of selected developing countries in West Africa in the health and education sectors. In achieving this, this study employs the non_parametric data envelopment analysis (DEA) in computing the efficiency of the set of nine west African countries in achieving beneficisl health and education outcomes with their respective spending profiles in the health and education sectors. The health outcome which serves health output variables in this study are:inverse of the mortality rate, life expectancy and access to improved sanitation and on the other hand the education outcomes which serve as education output variables in this study are:primary school enrollment rate(%of gross) and secondary school enrollment (%of gross). These output were combined with the health spending and education spending respectively in computing efficiency scores were also used in examining correlates between the efficiency of public spending and size of public spending.
Our findings reveals that high cross country performers like Guinea, Ghana and Senegal recorded negative correlates between spending performance and the magnitude of spending ;low cross country performers like Niger and Mali recorded positive correlates between spending performance and the magnitude of spending while some other countries like Nigeria and Chad were not only low cross country performers but unfortunately also recorded negative correlates between performance and spending.
Description
Scholarly articles
Keywords
Public Spending , Education , Health , Spending policies , Research Subject Categories::SOCIAL SCIENCES::Business and economics::Economics
Citation
Isola, W.A. and Ogunniyi, M.B. (2016): ‘A Comparative Analysis of the Public Spending Performance on Education and Health Sectors in West African Countries’. International Journal of Economics, 10(1), 2016, pp. 63-85.