Untitled Quiz

Human Capital: Education and Health in Economic Development

• Education and health are fundamental objectives of development.
• Health is central to well-being, and education is essential for a fulfilling life.
• Education is crucial for a developing country to adopt modern technology and build self-sustaining growth.
• Health is a prerequisite for increased productivity and successful education.
• Health and education are closely related, with greater health capital potentially improving the return on investments in education.
• Healthier children have better school attendance and learning outcomes.
• Deaths of school-age children increase the cost of education.
• Improved health leads to a longer lifespan and higher returns on education investments.
• Healthier individuals are more productive and can use education more effectively.
• Many health programs rely on skills learned in school.
• Schools teach basic personal hygiene and sanitation.
• Education is crucial for the training of health personnel.
• Education delays childbirth, which can improve health outcomes.

Improving Health and Education: Why Increasing Income is Not Sufficient

• Higher income allows for more spending on education and health but with increased productivity and incomes.
• Individuals tend to spend more on human capital when income is higher for both people and their countries.
• In addition to income, health status directly impacts school performance, especially in developing countries through better health, nutrition, enrolment, attendance, and more effective learning.
• There are also indirect benefits from investments in health or education for people around the individuals who benefit, with people sharing knowledge and innovations.

Investing in Education and Health: The Human Capital Approach

• Economists define human capital as education, health, and other human capacities that increase productivity when enhanced.
• The analysis of investments in education and health benefits is unified in the human capital approach.
• After initial investment, a stream of higher future incomes can be generated through education expansion and health improvements.
• This approach focuses on the indirect ability to improve well-being through increased income.

Social vs. Private Benefit-Cost

• Social costs of education include the opportunity cost to society, resulting from financing expansive and costly education.
• These funds could be more productive if used in other sectors of the economy.
• Private costs of education are those borne by students, and typically decrease more slowly (or even decline) over time as education progresses (due to time value of money, and additional educational grants).
• Expected private returns and actual private costs increase with schooling years.
• Social benefits of education rise more rapidly in earlier schooling, due to improved productivity by the individual.

Child Labor

• Child labor is a widespread issue in developing countries.
• Child labor disrupts schooling and prevents children from attending school.

Gender Gap - Discrimination in Education and Health

• Young females in low-income developing countries receive less education than young males.
• Large majorities of illiterate people and those unable to attend school are female around the developing world.
• The educational gender gap is especially high in the least-developed African countries, where female literacy rates are substantially lower than male literacy rates.

Consequences of Gender Bias

• Studies show that increased education for girls in developing countries has high rates of return on investment.
• Educating girls is cost-effective for improving local health standards.
• Access to education hinders economic incentives and supports the status quo concerning female education and cultural customs.

Educational Systems and Development

• The interaction between economically motivated demands and politically responsive supplies in education systems affects the amount and quality of education.

The Political Economy of Education Supply and Demand

• The amount of schooling an individual receives is influenced by demand and supply factors like any other commodity or service. The demand for schooling is influenced by private benefits of education and the costs of education.

Demand and Supply Side of Education

• Educational costs and private benefits of education affect the amount of schooling desired by an individual.
• School places are determined by political processes and influenced by factors like government spending levels and overall private demand.

Distribution of Education

• Overeducation analyses in developing countries should not lead to despair over the potential for boosting education to promote development.

Health Measurement and Disease Burden

• DALY (Disability-Adjusted Life Years) is used to measure the burden of a disease on health, factoring in both mortality and morbidity.
• A World Bank study notes high absentee rates among health care workers in primary health facilities in developing countries.

Developing Countries - Disease Burden

• Developing countries face greater disease burdens, especially regarding infectious diseases.
• Major problems include AIDS, malaria, and parasites.
• Absolute poverty, malnutrition, and other infectious diseases are key challenges to developing nations.

HIV/AIDS Epidemic

• Significant progress has been made in combating the HIV/AIDS epidemic, with increased access to antiretroviral therapy (ART).

Malaria Crisis

• Malaria causes a significant number of deaths and illnesses, disproportionately impacting African children and pregnant women.
• Efforts are being made to combat malaria through combined approaches like insecticide spraying, mosquito nets, and improved nutrition.

Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs)

• Many NTDs have significant negative effects on human health, economic development, and education.
• NTDs affect over 1.7 billion people worldwide. These diseases include parasitic worms, schistosomiasis, and African trypanosomiasis.

Diseases and their Impact

• Schistosomiasis causes growth stunting, poor school performance, and serious health problems.
• African Trypanosomiasis leads to sleeping sickness and loss of agricultural (farmland) land.
• Leprosy, cholera, and dengue fever are additional NTDs.

Behavioral Economics Insights for Designing Health Policies and Programmes

• Behavioral economics methods are applied to programs in education, health, and physical/mental health to promote human capital.

Health, Productivity, and Policy

• Health has a considerable effect on productivity and earnings.
• Stature is an indicator of health and general well-being of a population.
• Health in early 20th century developed countries has increased productivity.

Health System

• The WHO defines the health system as the totality of activities aimed at promoting, restoring, and maintaining human health.
• The system includes public health departments, hospitals, clinics, and doctors.
• Outside the formal system are informal networks used by poorer citizens.