Department Chair

Theodore F. Byrley, Ph.D., CFA, Professor of Economics

Date of Award

5-2015

Access Control

Open Access

Degree Name

Applied Economics, M.A.

Department

Economics and Finance Department

Advisor

Victor Kasper, Jr, Ph. D., Associate Professor of Economics

Department Home page

http://economics.buffalostate.edu/

First Reader

Frederick Floss, Ph. D., Professor of Economics and Finance

Second Reader

Theodore F. Byrley, Ph.D., CFA, Professor of Economics

Abstract

My thesis is that human capital has been important to growth, but has had differential impact in three areas: Sub-Sahara Africa; Asia; and Latin America. I estimated three regional models to determine the impact of human capital on the growth of gross domestic product (GDP) per capita. Each model was estimated using the pooled OLS approach with a sample of 10 countries within each region. I make use of data from the Penn World Table- international comparisons of production data bank. I found that only the African region had statistically significant coefficients for both physical and human capital. For the Asian and the Latin American regions, only the coefficient for physical capital was significant. In addition, I tested three pairs of regions for differences. The result was that all three coefficients differ significantly between the African and Asian regions and between the African and the Latin American regions. However, there were differences in the intercepts and slopes for physical capital between Asia and Latin America but no significant difference for the slope of human capital. I also tested the African model for returns to scale and found as expected evidence supporting increasing returns to scale.

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