SciELO - Scientific Electronic Library Online

 
vol.13 número1The South African business cycle: What has changed?On merger simulation and its potential role in South African merger control índice de autoresíndice de assuntospesquisa de artigos
Home Pagelista alfabética de periódicos  

Serviços Personalizados

Artigo

Indicadores

Links relacionados

  • Em processo de indexaçãoCitado por Google
  • Em processo de indexaçãoSimilares em Google

Compartilhar


South African Journal of Economic and Management Sciences

versão On-line ISSN 2222-3436
versão impressa ISSN 1015-8812

S. Afr. j. econ. manag. sci. vol.13 no.1 Pretoria Jan. 2010

 

ECONOMICS

 

The determinants of public expenditure and expenditure on education in particular in a selection of African countries1

 

 

Olusegun A Akanbi; Niek J Schoeman

Department of Economics, University of Pretoria

 

 


ABSTRACT

This study reports on research aimed at measuring the drivers behind public expenditure with specific reference to education expenditure in Africa. The empirical estimations are carried out using a public choice model on a panel of 15 selected African countries over the period 1995-2004. The results show that government expenditure on education is resilient to shocks and the education sector is not seriously affected by allocative changes that favour corruption. Expenditure on education in the countries included in the study generally complies with the guidelines set by the IMF in terms of their fiscal adjustment programmes.

JEL: H52


 

 

“Full text available only in PDF format”

 

 

References

ABED, G. & OTHERS, 1998. Fiscal reforms in low-income countries: experience under IMF-supported programs. Washington: International Monetary Fund.         [ Links ]

ANON. Not dated. United Nation Development Programme (UNDP): Millennium development goals.         [ Links ] [Online] Available from: http://www.undp.org/mdg/basics.shtml [Accessed: 2007-2-20].

BARRO, R.J. 1991. Economic growth in a cross section of countries. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 106(2): 407-43.         [ Links ]

CHU, KE-YOUNG & OTHERS, 1995. Unproductive public expenditures: a pragmatic approach to policy analysis. IMF Pamphlet Series, No. 48. Washington: International Monetary Fund.         [ Links ]

COMMANDER, S., DAVOODI, H.R. & LEE, U.J.1997. The causes of government and the consequences for growth and well-being. Policy Discussion Paper, No. 1785. Washington: World Bank.         [ Links ]

DAVOODI, H., CLEMENTS, B., SCHIFF J. & DEBAERE, P. 2001. Military spending, peace dividend, and fiscal adjustment. IMF Staff Papers, 48(2): 290-316.         [ Links ]

DE MASI, P. & LORIE, H. 1989. How resilient are military expenditures? IMF Staff Papers, 36(3): 130-65.         [ Links ]

EASTERLY, W. & REBELO, S. 1993. Fiscal policy and economic growth: an empirical investigation. Journal of Monetary Economics, 32(3): 417-58.         [ Links ]

GUPTA, S., MCDONALD, C. & RUGGIERO, E. 1998. Worldwide military expenditures appears to have leveled off. IMF Survey, May: 149-50.         [ Links ]

HEELER, P.S. 2005. Understanding fiscal space. IMF Policy Discussion Paper, 05/4.         [ Links ]

HELLER, P.S. & DIAMOND, J. 1990. International comparisons of government expenditure revisited: the developing countries. 1975-86. Washington: International Monetary Fund.         [ Links ]

HEWITT, D.P. 1991. Military expenditure: econometric testing of economic and political influences. IMF Working Paper, WP/91/53 (Washington: International Monetary Fund).         [ Links ]

_____ 1992. Military expenditure worldwide: determinants and trends Journal of Public Policy. 12(2):105-52.         [ Links ]

_____ 1993. Military expenditure 1972-1990: the reasons behind the post-1985 fall in world military spending. IMF Working Paper, WP/93/18. Washington: International Monetary Fund.         [ Links ]

HEWITT, D.P. & VAN RIJCKEGHEM, C. 1995. Wage expenditures of central governments. IMF Working Paper. WP/95/11. Washington: International Monetary Fund.         [ Links ]

INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND. 2007. Regional economic outlook: sub-Saharan Africa. Washington D.C.         [ Links ]

INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND. 2002. Fiscal adjustment in IMF-supported programs. Draft Issues Paper, March 28.         [ Links ]

INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND. 1997. Reducing unproductive expenditures is important for fiscal adjustment. IMF Survey, February 24, pp.49-51.         [ Links ]

LUCAS, R.E. 1988. On the mechanics of economic development, Journal of Monetary Economics, 22: 3-42.         [ Links ]

MAURO, P. 1998. Corruption and the composition of government expenditure. Journal of Public Economics, 69: 263-79.         [ Links ]

MAURO, P. 1997. Why worry about corruption? International Monetary Fund.         [ Links ] [Online] Available from: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/issues6/index.htm.

RODRIK & DANI. 1996. Why do more open economies have bigger government? NBER Working Paper, No. 5537, Cambridge, Massachusetts: National Bureau of Economic Research.         [ Links ]

SCHIFF, J., GUPTA, S. & CLEMENTS, B. 1998. Worldwide military spending 1990-95. Defense and Peace Economics, 9(3): 237-81.         [ Links ]

 

 

Accepted July 2009

 

 

Endnotes

1 We are thankful to Dr E Nyamongo for his assistance in obtaining data for this study and also his constructive suggestions and comments.
2 Note: Figure 1 depicts the trend of the two variables and is calculated using a Hodrick-Prescott Filter.
3 The solution for the optimal choice of E and G is shown in Appendix 1.
4 List of the countries included in the estimations is shown in Appendix 2.
5 List of countries excluded from the estimations is also shown in Appendix 2.
6 Most corrupt (-2.5) and Least corrupt (+2.5)
7 Appendix 3 present the results of the countries that are excluded from the sample.

 

 

Appendices

 

 

 

 

 

 

Creative Commons License Todo o conteúdo deste periódico, exceto onde está identificado, está licenciado sob uma Licença Creative Commons