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Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate the role of foreign aid in the Western Balkans countries' economic growth between 2009 and 2021. Design/methodology/approach: This paper uses a panel data approach to examine the effects of foreign aid on economic growth in the region and incorporates a random-effects model to accommodate the unique cross-country variations and time-specific factors, as well as a pooled OLS and fixed-effects model for a comprehensive, comparative analysis. Findings: The in-depth regression analysis shows that foreign aid has not had a significant impact on the economic growth of the region. Further evidence suggests that trade openness exhibited a significant positive correlation with economic growth, while gross capital formation, although positively associated, did not significantly impact it, indicating the complexity of its role in the region's economies. Practical implications: The analysis presented in this study has significant practical implications, particularly for policymakers in the Western Balkans. Given the region's ambitions for European Union membership and the challenges of high unemployment and inflation, understanding the role of foreign aid is crucial. Originality/value: This research provides a unique contribution to the field of development economics by examining foreign aid effectiveness within the context of a region often overlooked in the literature. The analysis also offers fresh insights into the complex dynamics of foreign aid and its implications for policy and development strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Few empirical studies examined the relationship between life expectancy and income in India. This study aims to examine the impact of life expectancy on economic growth in India by incorporating all the major states of India. Design/methodology/approach: This study is based on secondary data and includes 16 major states of India covering the periods 2000–2014. The author used panel fixed effect model (FEM) to examine the impact of life expectancy on economic growth. Findings: Empirical analysis revealed a positive trend in life expectancy in India. In association with life expectancy, the author found continuous growth in the elderly population. The result of the FEM shows that gains in life expectancy positively affect economic growth in India. The empirical findings do not support any negative impact of life expectancy gains on economic growth. Originality/value: This study is the outcome of the independent and original research work of the authors and contributes significantly to the literature on the demography–economic relationship. The findings of this study help the author to understand that life expectancy gain is in no way a constraint, rather the skill and experience of the workforce are crucial to determining economic growth. Peer review: The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-06-2022-0422. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper explores whether data back the claim that imports of armaments are inherently bad for economic growth. Regardless of one's point of view, the production and trade of weaponry is a significant industry with serious economic implications that warrant investigation. The financial repercussions of military spending have been extensively studied, but the economic effects of arms importation remain unknown. Design/methodology/approach: This study adopts a pooled mean group approach to investigate the nexus between arms imports, military expenditure and per capita GDP for a balanced panel of twenty-five of the top arms importers in the world from 2000 to 2021. Findings: The authors find that arms imports and military spending negatively impact GDP per capita in the short run, but military spending is beneficial over the long run. The authors also used the Dumitrescu Hurlin Granger causality test, which revealed a unidirectional causation between per capita GDP and military expenditure, and a unidirectional causal relationship from military spending to arms imports. Research limitations/implications: This paper is deficient in a few aspects: first, it looks at only those countries comprising the top 70% of arms imports. Second, it omits many political, technological and legal factors that impact arms imports and military expenditures. Originality/value: This paper looks into the impact of defense spending and arms imports on economic growth for twenty-five nations with the highest share of arms imports in recent times. It is a significant addition to the literature as it resolves the debate of whether or not the military expenditure is wasteful and whether arms imports significantly harm the nation's economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The paper aims to analyse the impact of economic and governance factors on remittance inflows to India from the UK, USA and UAE. India is globally recognised as the largest recipient of remittances. Design/methodology/approach: Using a comprehensive time series data set spanning 1996 to 2022, the authors use an innovative non-linear autoregressive distributed lag model approach to examine the influence of economic growth, corruption control and employer availability in the three source countries on remittance inflows to India. Findings: The results indicate that in the UAE, changes in economic growth and corruption control directly affect remittance outflows. However, the presence of employers in the UAE has minimal impact on remittance outflows to India. Regarding the UK, fluctuations in economic growth primarily drive remittance outflows to India. The effect of corruption control and employment opportunities on remittance outflows is marginal. In the USA, economic growth does not notably impact remittance outflows, whereas corruption control and employment opportunities significantly influence the outflows to India. Originality/value: These findings have important implications for policymakers. Analysing macroeconomic factors from key remittance-sending nations offers valuable insights for Indian policymakers and their international counterparts to enhance remittance inflows. The study focuses on three countries that collectively contribute to about 50% of India's remittances, providing a unique contribution compared to the usual country-specific or regional focus in existing literature. Finally, leveraging these findings, NITI Aayog, an organisation dedicated to achieving India's sustainable development goals, can effectively monitor macroeconomic indicators related to significant remittance-sending countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Empirical studies regarding the impact of the real exchange rate (RER) on economic growth are extensively available. However, the literature as a whole appears to report varying results, while the causes of such differences have not been analyzed systematically. The present study aims to fill the gap in the literature. Design/methodology/approach: In this paper, the authors compile 543 empirical estimates from 51 studies of the exchange rate-growth nexus in order to meta-analyze its relationship. Meta-analysis allows the authors to quantitatively synthesize previous empirical studies and explain the variation in the results. This method also enables us to investigate the possibility of publication bias, as there is a tendency in research only to report results that are both statistically significant and show the expected signs. Findings: After addressing publication bias and heterogeneity in the estimates, the meta-regression results show that RER depreciation (or undervaluation) genuinely favors economic growth. On average, RER depreciation has a greater impact on economic growth in developing countries than the developed ones. The study's results imply that maintaining an undervalued RER could be favorable to spur economic growth, especially in developing countries. Originality/value: Initially predominant in the medical literature, meta-analysis has been on a rising edge in economics. This progress has produced many systematic quantitative review analyses with continuously improved statistical-econometric practices related to economic variables. However, to the authors' knowledge, no comprehensive meta-regression analysis of the relationship between exchange rate and economic growth has been conducted and published in any publicly accessible academic outlet. Therefore, this study aims to fill this gap in the literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to empirically analyze the impact of remittance inflows on sustained economic growth in India. Design/methodology/approach: This study has taken a time series dataset for the period of 1976–2021, and a nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag model technique (NARDL) has been applied to check the impact of remittance inflows along with other control variables, including broad money and service sector performance, on the sustained economic growth of India. Findings: The results of the study indicated that in both the short and long runs, any positive shock in remittance inflows has a positive impact on the economic growth of India, while negative shocks do not affect economic growth. Practical implications: The economic policymakers of India can use the findings of the study by implementing remittance-friendly policies. Moreover, NITI Aayog, the body working toward achieving sustainable development goals (SDGs) in India, can also use this study as a reference while making strategies to achieve SDG. Originality/value: Economic growth has always been an area of interest among economists, researchers and policymakers. However, achieving sustained economic growth requires an analysis of those factors that themselves have sustained performance over a long period of time and have the potential to sustain it over the upcoming years. This study has taken remittance inflows as one such factor and investigated its impact on the sustained economic growth of India. At present, there is an evident gap in the literature that very little attention has been given to sustained Indian economic growth. Moreover, there is no study available in which the nonlinear impact of different variables has been tested on the economic growth of India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, the study aims to examine the direct effect of illicit financial flows (IFF) and quality of governance (QoG) on economic growth. Second, this study seeks to examine the moderating effect of QoG on the economic consequences of IFF. Design/methodology/approach: This study collected data from nine The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries for the period of 10 years from 2008 to 2019. The study concerned an analysis of the testing of a conceptual framework which based on secondary data which may lack a comprehensive substantiation on the grounds of measurement theory. A partial least squares (PLS) modelling using the SmartPLS 3.2.8 version was used as a statistical tool to examine the measurement and structural model. Findings: Key findings provide empirical support on the effect of IFF and QoG on economic growth. It also confirmed that QoG significantly moderated the relationship between IFF and economic growth by reducing the negative impact of IFF on economic growth. Practical implications: Immediate corrective action needs to be implemented by policymakers of ASEAN countries to strengthen QoG to effectively curb IFF activities. Originality/value: This study provides current empirical evidence on the relationship of IFF, QoG and economic growth within ASEAN countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper investigates the joint relationship between economic growth, income inequality and fiscal adjustments using a panel of 47 Japanese prefectures from 1998 to 2017. Design/methodology/approach: To assess jointly fiscal adjustment impacts on growth and inequality and to take into account the interdependence between these variables, the authors use a simultaneous equation model and estimate it by using the three-stage least squares estimation method. Findings: The results show evidence of a trade-off between growth and inequality through fiscal adjustments. They reveal that first, fiscal adjustments have contractionary effects on growth. Second, they highlight the disparity between urban and rural taxpayers. Third, they provide evidence of a trade-off between fiscal adjustments and inequality through the labor market. Research limitations/implications: Based on the literature, the composition of fiscal adjustments is a crucial factor in analyzing fiscal adjustment impacts on economic growth and income inequality. The authors do not consider this aspect in the analysis; however, fiscal policy outcomes variables are included as a workaround for this. Practical implications: These results suggest that authorities favor expenditure-based adjustments as they are less contractionary on the economy. Moreover, they should finance public expenditures through a tax on capital in order to mitigate fiscal adjustment impacts on inequality while promoting growth. Originality/value: The paper is novel in testing the existence of a trade-off between economic growth and income inequality through fiscal adjustments at a sub-national level with an additional focus on urban and rural regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Environmental regulation is in a continuous state of intense change and modification amid the long-term tensions between environmental protection and economic growth. In this article, the authors creatively investigate how fluctuations of environmental regulation influence a nation's economic growth while also examining the mediating effect of technological innovation. Design/methodology/approach: Using sample data of 36 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries from 2013 to 2018, environmental regulation is differentiated in two aspects of formal environmental regulation (FER) and informal environmental regulation (IER) and analyzed to assess the effects of regulatory fluctuations on investment and technological innovation. Findings: The research results demonstrate that both FER fluctuation and IER fluctuation exert a significant negative impact on economic growth. These two fluctuations in environmental regulation increase uncertainty and unpredictable risks for corporations and investors, significantly stifling the willingness to contribute to innovation activities and leading to a diminished level of innovation. Technological innovation is revealed to have a mediating influence on the relationship of environmental regulation fluctuation to economic growth. Originality/value: These findings enrich the research on the impact of environmental regulation from a dynamic, multinational perspective, contributing to the literature by exploring the relationships between environmental regulation fluctuation, technological innovation and economic growth at the OECD-country level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The study attempts to establish the relationship between demographic dividend and GDP growth rate by utilising panel data from 1990 to 2017 in Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka. Design/methodology/approach: This study employs the pooled OLS model, using data from the World Bank's database for the period 1990–2017 for five selected South Asia Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries. Findings: The results reveal that demographic dividend affects economic growth in Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Pakistan, thereby supporting the demographic dividend hypothesis. For the country-specific analysis, it was also observed that demographic dividend impacts the economic growth of the five SAARC countries. In addition, growth of gross capital formation is highly significant for both aggregated and country-specific analyses. However, economic growth is unaffected by trade openness and unemployment rates. Moreover, the rate of labour force participation is negatively related to the GDP growth rate in the aggregated model. Originality/value: This paper bestows insight into the fact that the impact of demographic dividend on the economic growth of the SAARC regions cannot be fully actualised if the workforce are underutilised. This region needs to adopt appropriate policies to strengthen the considerable benefits of demographic dividend on the economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper aims to examine the impact of interest rate liberalization on economic growth and the relevance of corruption in the five selected sub-Saharan African countries. Design/methodology/approach: The study used the modified version of Driscoll and Kraay's model by Hoechle, which solved the effects of cross-sectional dependence and heteroscedasticity. Findings: The findings reveal a positive impact of the index on economic growth, and it was found that foreign direct investment (FDI) and credit to private sector by banks (CPSB) all stimulate economic growth. The interaction terms of corruption with FDI and CPSB indicate negative effects that show how corruption erodes the benefits of liberalization. Finally, the paper recommends the pursuit of appropriate policies with the sole aim of eradicating corruption and providing a conducive environment for business. Originality/value: The paper developed a composite domestic financial liberalization index to capture the timing and essential dimensions of the reform process. The study investigates the effect of interest rate liberalization on economic growth and the relevance of corruption. Most of the recent and past studies only examined the impact of interest rate reforms on growth without investigating the relevance of corruption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This study examines the long-run and short-run impact of demographic factors, i.e. life expectancy, fertility rate and young dependency ratio in determining the economic growth of South Asian countries. Design/methodology/approach: The theoretical foundation of the study relies on demographic transition theory and incorporates life expectancy, fertility rate and young dependency ratio into the production function by means of human capital component. The study uses annual panel data of four South Asian courtiers, i.e. Bangladesh, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka from 1980 to 2018 and utilizes panel ARDL model to analyze the long run and short run impact of demographic factors on economic growth. Findings: Results show that real stock of capital, fertility rate and life expectancy are positively related with economic growth, while an increase in young dependency ratio reduces economic growth in South Asian countries in the long run. Short-run dynamics show that real stock of capital and life expectancy have insignificant impact on economic growth, while young dependency ratio has negative and significant as well as life expectancy has positive and significant impact on economic growth in South Asian countries. Unidirectional causality exists from young dependency ratio and fertility rate to GDP per capita in the short run. Practical implications: Government has to design policies for better health and education facilities to yield high economic growth as well as better infrastructure and macroeconomic stability to facilitate capital accumulation in the region to foster economic growth. Originality/value: This study considerably adds into the existing literature by providing better understanding of various demographic aspects and their economic inference by highlighting the demographic changes that South Asia has endured. This study is also beneficial for policymakers and growth analysts in generating effective and sustainable policies regarding population dynamics and economic development of the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of the work consists in studying social integration as a factor of economic growth. The authors focus on experience and perspectives of developing countries, as they show the highest rate of economic growth and have high potential of its acceleration. Design/methodology/approach: The authors determine the interconnection between the processes of social integration in the four distinguished manifestations with the help of regression analysis and determine the level of homogeneity of data selections for each studied indicator with the help of variation analysis. Scenario analysis of future perspectives of the change of economic growth depending on the influence of the factor of social integration in the unity of its distinguished types is performed. Monte Carlo method is used for forecasting of change of the values of indicators of social integration. Findings: It is substantiated that social integration is an important factor of economic growth. At the same time, the influence of this factor on economic growth of developing countries is ambiguous. Due to the offered proprietary classification of social integration according to the criterion of involved subjects, it is possible to establish that such types of social integration as integration of social groups, integration of business and society and integration of state and society have a positive influence. However, individual's integration into society has a negative influence. Originality/value: The research contributes to development of economics by substantiating the significance of the social integration factor for economic growth and specifies the logic of management of this factor, which should be flexible. The perspectives of developing countries in acceleration of the rate of economic growth based on managing the factor of social integration are rather wide and envisage the increase of society's inclusion and the level of consumer consciousness and more active involvement of population into state management in the digital economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - This study aims to examine the impact of external debt on economic growth in Bangladesh within a broader macroeconomic scenario. Design/methodology/approach - In the process of doing so, it assesses the empirical cointegration, long-run and short-run dynamics of the concerned variables for the period of 1980-2017 applying the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach to cointegration. First, debt-gross domestic product linkage explores the impact of external debt impact on economic growth using a set of macro and country risk variables, and then this linkage is also analyzed along with a newly formed macroeconomic policy (MEP) variable using principal component analysis. Findings - The study results reveal the negative impact of external debt on GDP growth, but the larger positive impact of MEP index indicates that this adverse effect of debt can be mitigated or even nullified by sound MEP and appropriate human resource policy. Originality/value - The dynamic effects of different shocks (external debt and macro policy variable) on economic growth by vector autoregression impulse response function also confirm our ARDL findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to analyze the influence of the green talent dividend on China's economic growth and regional differences using a theoretical derivation of the Cobb–Douglas production function. Design/methodology/approach: This study develops a measurement model with human capital based on Chinese inter-provincial panel data for 2001–2017, and analyzes the influences on economic growth of employees' education level, per capita material capital, green labor participation rate and green jobs. The study explores the impact of the green talent dividend on regional economic growth for different regions. Findings: Employees' education level, per capita material capital, green labor participation rate and green jobs promote China's economic growth. The dependency ratio hinders economic growth. The green labor participation rate impacts economic growth more than green jobs do. Furthermore, the scale of green talent in China and its dividend effect are regionally unbalanced. Therefore, to fully release the dividend of green talent, the green labor participation rate should be improved to promote the rational flow of talent among regions. Practical implications: These findings shed light on the talent dividend, provide a theoretical basis for the formulation of relevant talent policies, and show that the demographic dividend can be transformed into the green talent dividend, which has practical significance for the sustainable development of China's economy given its aging population. Originality/value: This study provides a macro perspective on the green talent dividend's impact on economic growth. The Cobb–Douglas production function in this study differs from the traditional micro perspective on green labor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to analyze the mediating effect of human capital in foreign direct investment (FDI) and growth nexus and establish the threshold of human capital in 28 sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries over the period 1999–2017. Design/methodology/approach: This study used a secondary source of data obtained from the World Development Indicator and used the system generalized method of moments and dynamic panel threshold regression (TR) to analyze the data. Findings: This study found that FDI and human capital have no significant impact on the economic growth in SSA. However, when the interactive term of FDI and human capital was introduced in the model, the economic growth effect of FDI became positive and significant, while the coefficient of the interactive term is negative and significant. This presupposes that SSA does not have a sufficient high-quality workforce that can absorb and transform the spillover benefits of FDI into economic growth. As a result, this study applied the TR to determine the minimum level of human capital and established a threshold level at 63.91%. Practical implications: It, therefore, becomes pertinent for policymakers in the SSA region to have a human capital policy to build up their absorptive capacities to fully take advantage of FDI. Originality/value: The contribution of this study lies in establishing a threshold of human capital at 63.91% for countries in the SSA region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to empirically assess the impact of remittances on the economic performance of the 16 Asian developing countries, taking account of their institutional qualities. Design/methodology/approach: A panel of 16 Asian developing countries (Central Asia, South Asia, and ASEAN) over the period of 2002–2016 is employed in the analysis. To assess the impact of remittances on economic performance in consideration of institutional quality, OLS estimates as well as GMM are used. Findings: The effect of remittances on economic growth is statistically significant. In addition, they also impact economic growth when they interact with institutional or financial development variables. For the long-run growth process of Central Asian, South Asian, and ASEAN countries, a sound and smooth institutional framework appears to be indispensable. Also, it was found that more fragile economies tend to achieve bigger growth than less fragile economies, as this kind of growth is triggered by more remittances flowing into fragile economies. However, the impact of remittances on growth does not depend on the level of ICT. FDI and financial development have positive impact on growth. Research limitations/implications: There are limitations to this research as well. Due to the unavailability of data, several countries had to be removed from this study. The cost of sending money might be an important variable for this study. However, the data on this variable from reliable sources are almost impossible to gather. Therefore, this variable is also not included in this research. The savings from remittances when intermediated through formal financial channels will, in fact, produce a positive allocation and distribution of resources that may eventually become an important source of growth. However, one precondition for larger and greater growth is that remittances need to be well and properly utilized by the financial sector. Therefore, quality institutions should be formed first, which can facilitate investment activities and make the flow of remittances more convenient. Originality/value: This paper exclusively considers the case of Asian developing countries (Central Asia, South Asia, and ASEAN) to assess the impact of remittances on the economic performance of these countries, with special consideration of the interaction effects of remittances and institutional quality in these emerging Asian economies. The previous studies on the effect of remittances on growth do not conform to one concrete conclusion. This study is undertaken in a bid to get the best possible result on the impact of remittances on the growth of the selected countries, majority of which attract substantial chunk of remittances into their economies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: At present, countries are concerned about inflation and the impact of inflation on each country's economic growth. This inflation has been said by economists that inflation is a phenomenon of currency and currency, which has caused inflation in some countries by their monetary policy. According to the economic theory of Karl Marx, Irving Fisher, Friedman, inflation is caused by a continuous increase in the money supply. Design/methodology/approach: The economic theories of Fisher, Friedman and an econometric model are applied to analyse the relationship between money supply and inflation. Besides, Vietnam's and China's research data are also collected in the period of 2012-2016. Findings: It is found out that the continuous increase in the money supply causes inflation in the long-term, but the continuous increase in the money supply growth does not cause inflation in a short time, this was analyzed based on the theory of monetary quantity. Moreover, Chia's and Vietnam's correlations of the money supply growth and inflation are 99.1 per cent. These correlations are very close. Originality/value: Research results show that money supply and inflation are closely related, and the money supply directly affects economic growth. Therefore, the government should have the relevant monetary policy to grow the economy and proposals to make monetary policy, control inflation levels and stimulate economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to reveal the economic impact of policy reversals related to market liberalization reforms in China. Design/methodology/approach: To perform the analysis, the authors hand-collect 59 financial market liberalization policy reversals from 1999 to 2017. These reversals are related to the liberalization of the stock market, bond market, derivatives market, forex market, lending market, and real estate market etc. The authors employ a stylized equilibrium interest rate model from Li et al. (2013) to deduce the impact of policy reversals on economic growth and the associated volatility after the announcement of each policy reversal. Findings: First, the authors discover that about half of reversals are related to some tradeoff between the economic growth and the volatility associated with growth. Second, the authors also find that about a quarter of the reversals are detrimental to both the growth and the stability. These reversals, if known to policymakers, should be entirely avoided or corrected. Third, using a simple diagnostic test, the authors can identify detrimental reversals at the intra-day frequency by computing the change of the term spread and the volatility before and after the reversals. Practical implications: The findings are useful for identifying effective policymaking in developing countries where mature democratic and rigorous policymaking processes are often lacking and formulating economic policies is challenging. The findings suggest that policy reversals serve China well by improving the quality of the policy made without posing destructive consequences to the existing economic infrastructure. This empirical evidence is important for a better understanding of the benefits of policy reversals on economic growth. Social implications: The empirical procedure provides a timely and objective evaluation of policy shifts, allowing for the general public to discern the rationale behind the policy decisions. Consequently, stakeholders' trust and confidence in policymakers is enhanced so that the probability of the successful implementation of structural reforms may increase in these developing countries. Originality/value: First, the results reveal some successful examples of Chinese policymaking in the path of liberalizing financial market. The authors find that the Chinese liberalization policy flip-flops have resulted in a more balanced growth on some occasions with reduced growth rate and volatility. Second, the proposed methodology provides an objective evaluation of policy shifts, allowing for the public to infer the general direction of the impact generated by policy shifts. Subsequently, stakeholders' trust and confidence in policymakers can be enhanced and/or restored if the process of finding a successful path of structural reforms is unambiguous. Finally, the interest rate model also provides a timely method to evaluate the impact of policy shifts at an intra-day frequency, whereas most macroeconomic indicators are available at longer frequencies such as monthly or quarterly. The timeliness in understanding the economic consequences of policy reversals can be critical to prevent the destructive consequences of bad ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between government expenditure and economic growth in Botswana over the period 1985‒2016. The study employed the auto-regressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach in investigating the nexus. The study makes the argument that the effectiveness of public spending should be assessed not only against the amount of the expenditure but also by the type of the expenditure. The empirical findings showed that aggregate expenditure has a negative short-run and positive long-run effect on economic growth. When expenditure is disaggregated, both forms of expenditures have a positive short-run effect on economic growth, whereas only a long-run positive impact of recurrent expenditure is observed. The study suggests the need to prioritize scarce resources in productive recurrent and development spending that enables increased productivity. Design/methodology/approach: This study examined the effectiveness of government spending in Botswana, within an ARDL framework from 1985 to 2016. To achieve this, the analysis is carried out on both an aggregate and disaggregated level. Government spending is divided into recurrent and development expenditures. Findings: This study examined the effectiveness of government spending in Botswana, within an ARDL framework from 1985 to 2016. To achieve this, the analysis hinged on both the aggregate and disaggregated levels. The results of the aggregate analysis suggest that total public expenditure has a negative impact on economic growth in the short run; however, its impact becomes positive over the long run. On disaggregating government spending, the results show that both recurrent and development expenditures have a significant positive short-run impact on growth; however, in the long run, the significant positive impact is only observed for recurrent expenditure. Practical implications: The results provide evidence of the diverse effects of government expenditure in the country. In the period under investigation, 73 percent of total government expenditure in Botswana was recurrent in nature, whereas 23 percent was related to development. From the results, it can be observed that although the recurrent expenditure has contributed to increased growth and must be encouraged, it is also pertinent for the Botswana Government to endeavor to place more emphasis on productive development expenditure in order to enhance short- and long-term growth. Further, there is a need to strengthen the growth-enhancing structures and to prioritize the scarce economic resources toward productive spending and ensuring continued proper governance over such expenditures. Originality/value: The study provides empirical evidence on the effectiveness of government spending in a small open, resource-reliant middle-income SSA economy and argues that the effectiveness of public spending must be assessed not only against the amount of the expenditure but also on the type or composition of the expenditure. The study contributes to the scant empirical literature on Botswana by employing the ARDL approach to cointegration technique in estimating the long- and short-run impact of government expenditure on economic growth between 1985 and 2016. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose Nowadays, foreign capital inflow (FCI) is considered as a catalyst for economic development and an important source of transferring technology and foreign exchange earnings from developed to developing countries. The purpose of this paper is to study, first, the impact of different forms of FCIs, namely, foreign direct investment (FDI), personal remittances (PR) and official development assistant (ODA) on economic growth on 26 top African countries; and, second, which of them is more effective on economic growth of the studied countries. The results of this paper are very important for host governments’ policy and help them to design their economic plans to absorb the suitable foreign inflow.Design/methodology/approach The paper uses Pooled Mean Group (PMG) econometric technique to estimate the heterogeneous panels over the period 1992–2016.Findings The results of the study show that all three forms of FCIs have positive and significant effects on economic growth in the long and short run. However, the PR had the most effect on economic growth in the long and short run. The study suggests that the governments should design and implement appropriate fiscal, monetary and trade policies in order to create and improve an enabling environment to attract FCIs as a supplementary source of domestic investment.Research limitations/implications The research limitations of this paper are as follows: data sets of FDI, PR and ODA were available not for all African countries; and, data sets that were available were of before the year 1992. Thus, the research is done for the African countries which had the data sets after the year 1992.Practical implications The result of this paper indicates the impact of each FDI, PR and ODA in economic growth. So, countries can take more attentions to each of them on economic planning.Social implications FCIs are one of the important external source of exchange for each country. So, the study of importance of each of them is necessary for economic planning.Originality/value Most of the previous studies have examined the impact of three different forms of FCIs on economic growth separately, on different countries and regions and using various models and econometric techniques. One of the contributions of this paper is focused on the impacts of FDI, PR and ODA on economic growth separately and simultaneously in 26 top recipient African countries and using the PMG technique which is an advanced econometrical estimation and studied less about it. The other contribution of this research is the comparison of the impact of different FCIs on economic growth, and it is very important for governments’ economic policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyze the direct and indirect impacts of social organization in promoting Chinese economic growth. It adopts empirical research to test the correlated hypotheses, and tries to put forward some policy suggestions.Design/methodology/approach Social organizations are measured by four indicators in this paper. It proposes five hypotheses about the impact of social organization on economic growth and builds an economic growth model including social organization. The ordinary least squares and stepwise regression methods are conducted to estimate the economic growth model with the data from 1999 to 2015.Findings Through the empirical analysis, it finds that the added value of social organization, human capital, investment and government budget expenditure affect economic growth significantly. The number of social organization at the end of each year has a positive significant effect on entrepreneurship, while the added value and growth rate of it have a negative effect on it. The numbers of social organization and full-time employee have significant effect on number to workers in the labor force. Only the number of social organization has positive significant effect on public education.Originality/value This paper conducts an empirical study on the impact of social organization on economic growth in China and fills a gap of the role of social organization on the economy in developing countries. The results provide referenced information for public policy-making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The paper aims to examine the relationship between broadband availability and firm establishment growth rates by employment size and by industry to assess the impact of broadband on small business growth in Kentucky. Design/methodology/approach – The paper uses a modified growth model as the theoretical foundation for empirical analysis. Findings – Broadband availability does increase growth in small and medium-sized businesses. While broadband does tend to affect specific industries differently, the scope of the affects is limited to only a few industries: broadband encourages growth in small manufacturing firms, but discourages growth in financial services. Research limitations/implications – The scope of analysis is limited to the period of 2003-2005, while some of the counties in Kentucky did not have sizable broadband deployment until 2005. Owing to the lack of data availability, the current research does not consider demand-side factors, though several industries considered are likely to be demand-driven rather than cost-driven. Originality/value – Utilizing unique broadband saturation data for Kentucky counties, this study presents ex-post analysis of the effect of broadband deployment on local economies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between growth, investment and military expenditure in the case of the European Union-15. Design/methodology/approach - The paper uses fixed panel models, random coefficient models and a trivariate VAR model to examine empirically the relationship between these three macroeconomic variables. Findings - The results obtained and reported herein show a significant positive effect of the growth rate on the share of military expenditure and on the share of investment. However, on the whole, the findings do not seem to point to any consistent quantitative relation between defence spending and either growth or investment. Thus, they appear to be in line with the findings of other studies. Originality/value - The economic effects of military spending have drawn considerable attention. Demand side effects on capacity utilisation are one possible channel through which the economy can be positively affected by such expenditure. On the other hand however, reduced investment and capital stock have been reported as a possible negative economic impact of defence outlays that can more than offset any growth inducing effective demand stimulation. The paper attempts a simultaneous assessment of the impact of defence expenditure on both growth and investment for the EU-15, something that has not been tried before. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]