Human Capital and Economic Growth: Evidence from Selected Asian Countries

Abstract

Impact of human capital on economic growth of selected Asian countries was examined, in the context of a visual search task. The main aim of this study is to find the empirical relationships among human capital and economic growth by using panel data technique for the period 1990-2012. In this study Government Expenditure on Health and gross school enrolment at secondary level used as a proxy variables for measuring human capital. The results of econometric estimation and panel least squares estimates indicated, a strong positive association of government expenditure on health and gross fixed capital formation with GDP. Another result of this study is that the gross school enrollment has positive but insignificant impact on gross domestic product. The study recommends that Government should escalate the enrollment of students in primary and secondary level, incentives to the people working abroad and should also facilitate the private sector to develop the labor force. Moreover, government should increase their expenditure on different areas of health sector such as for the development of infrastructure of health sector and provision of better health care facilities to the patients.

Keywords: Human capital, Economic growth, Capital, Asian countries.