Disease and Development Revisited

David E. Bloom, David Canning () and Günther Fink

No 15137, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: In a recent paper, Acemoglu and Johnson (2007) argue that the large increases in population health witnessed in the 20th century may have lowered income levels. We argue that this result depends crucially on their assumption that initial health and income do not affect subsequent economic growth. Using their data we reject this assumption in favor of a model of conditional convergence, with income adjusting to its steady state over time. We show that, allowing for conditional convergence, exogenous improvements in health due to technical advances associated with the epidemiological transition appear to have increased income levels.

JEL-codes: I10 J11 O40 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dev and nep-hea
Date: 2009-07
Note: HE

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