Research and Development Expenditures and Quality of Life in European Union Countries

Adam Balcerzak () and Michal Pietrzak

No 161/2015, Working Papers from Institute of Economic Research

Abstract: The improvement of quality of life of people is currently considered as the main responsibility of every government. Due to the emergence of knowledge-based economy, it is commonly believed that investments in research and development (R&D) at a given level are the necessary condition to create growth based on innovations, thus support welfare in case of developed countries. In this context the article is devoted to the analysis of influence of R&D expenditures on quality of life in case of European Union countries. As the main measure of quality of life Human Development Index was utilized. Thus, the article can be considered as an input to the discussion on the potential of HDI index for measuring the quality of live in case of narrow group of relatively developed countries. In the empirical part of the paper, panel data mythology fulfilling the postulates of dynamic estimation was used. The research was done for EU countries for the period 2004-2010. The empirical part takes into consideration the structural diversity between “old” and “new” members of the EU. First of all, the results can be treated as a voice confirming the usefulness of HDI as a measure of quality of life also from the perspective of narrow group of highly developed countries. Then, the research confirms the positive influence of R&D on European welfare only in the case of highly developed “old member”.

Keywords: European Union; HDI; research and development expenditures; dynamic panel model (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F63 I3 I31 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015-09, Revised 2015-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cse, nep-hap and nep-ino
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pes:wpaper:2015:no161

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