Sorting out the impact of public investments on regional growth in the Philippines
Date
2004-03
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Abstract
The main objective of this paper is to determine which public investments the government should prioritize in providing each region to attain economic growth. A modified production function based on several growth models is used as the basis for formulating an empirical model.
The empirical findings, using data of Philippine regions for the years 1992-2001, lead to the conclusion that public investments in the form of infrastructure positively affect income or output growth. Moreover, the results suggest that the Philippine government should prioritize investing on education, transportation and communication facilities, specifically, schools, roads and bridges as well as telephone lines, in order to promote balanced regional growth. The study also finds that contrary to earlier results, investment in social infrastructure (education, in particular) positively affects growth. However, at least for the time frame considered, health facilities in the Philippines showed positive but insignificant effects on regional income growth.
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Keywords
Public investment, Rural growth, Government investment, Economic growth, Regional growth, Development economics