Posted on 15 June 2013. Tags: DEA, Eastern Europe, education, EU, OECD, public expenditure, technical efficiency
The article attempts to measure relative efficiency in utilizing public education expenditures in the new EU member states in comparison to the selected EU (plus Croatia) and OECD countries. As resources allocated to education are significantly limited, a special emphasis should be given to their efficient use regarding the institutional and legal constraints. By applying non-parametric methodology, i.e. Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), a relative efficiency is defined as the deviation from the efficiency frontier which represents the maximum output/outcome attainable from each input level. An analysis of (output-oriented) efficiency measures shows that among the new EU member states Hungary, Estonia and Slovenia seem to be good benchmark countries in the field of primary, secondary and tertiary education, respectively. The empirical results also suggest that, in general, new EU member states show relatively high efficiency in tertiary education efficiency measures.
Relative Efficiency of Education Expenditures in Eastern Europe: A Non-parametric Approach (906.9 KiB, 3,742 hits)
Posted in Economics, Volume III, Issue no. 3
Posted on 15 April 2013. Tags: Euro, Externalities, FDI, OECD, Panel Data Econometrics
The role of FDI inflows and outflows to host countries and from the source countries emerged in the 1980s as the major vehicle technology transfer that accelerated the globalization or international integration of 25 leading OECD economies over a period of 25 years (1983-2007). Although neoclassical and endogenous growth theories provide unequivocal support for FDI flows because they generate positive externalities or spillover effects through channels of GDP growth, capital formation and R&D, the empirical evidence in support of these claims are mixed. The panel data econometrics performed using a new multiplicatively complete index of total factor productivity provide fresh insights on the cross-border FDI generated through technology transfer and other channels. The empirical findings for the OECD countries are markedly different from the spillover effects on developing countries that are plagued by technology absorptive capacity effects due to the operation of threshold effects of underdeveloped human capital resources. The empirics on cross-border FDI flows and the spillover effects that they generate in OECD countries will provide much needed information to design and implement policies to harness the net benefits from cross-border FDI flows and shed light on the design of policies to reconcile the conflicting policies of austerity and growth that are required to prevent the sovereign debt racked euro-zone countries from imploding the single currency union based on the euro.
Perspectives on Total Factor Productivity and Foreign Direct Investment in OECD Countries based on Panel Data Econometrics (707.4 KiB, 2,832 hits)
Posted in Economics, Volume III, Issue no. 2
