Fatores determinantes do desenvolvimento econômico em países selecionados

Abstract

From a data panel for 10 countries selected between 1982 and 2011, we sought to assess the determinants of development of such countries departing from a combination of econometric models that simulate how trade openness variables, total factor productivity, inventory capital and GDP growth affect the Human Capital Index (HCI) in subsequent periods, and what are the chances of occurring an extraordinary growth of HCI. The first modeling follows the method of two-stage least-squares (2SLS) and the second consists of a binary dependent variable model in which the goal is to determine the chance of an increase in HCI above its historical average. In this first step, the estimation results suggest that trade liberalization and the stock of capital growth are key variables in increasing HCI of the countries while the impact of economic growth is not statistically significant to explain the growth of such index in the future. For the simulations of the chance of an extraordinary growth of HCI, the increase in total factor productivity should be highlighted as a determinant of this chance. Along with that, the results indicate that investments in foreign trade and infrastructure, as well as the increase in total factor productivity, can trigger, respectively, improved HCI performance of a country and its further growth.