Does the structure of production affect demand for schooling in Peru?

The author uses the regional structure of the economy, proxied by the shares of services and industry in regional gross domestic product (GDP), as an indicator of the demand for educated workers. By examining whether the level of schooling as a function of shares of services and industry differs for men and women, a gender biascan be detected in the demand for schooling. The author estimates schooling demand functions for males and females using data for Peru in the 1980s. His primary findings are : 1) as services and industry increase their shares of GDP, relative to the share of agriculture, the demand for schooling of both males and females increases, 2) as the share of services in GDP increases compared to agriculture, the demand for schooling by women increases more than the demand for schooling by men, 3) and increase in the share of industry relative to agriculture is associated with an increase in the demand for schooling of men rather than of women, 4) a decrease in the supply price of schooling increases the level of schooling attained by both sexes, but the gain is larger for women, and 5) increases in wealth are associated with increases in the demand of both sexes for schooling.Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Teaching and Learning,Economic Theory&Research,Population&Development,Environmental Economics&Policies

Public debt in developing countries : has the market-based model worked?

Over the past 25 years, significant levels of public debt and external finance are more likely to have enhanced macroeconomic vulnerability than economic growth in developing countries. This applies not just to countries with a history of high inflation and past default, but also to those in East Asia, with a long tradition of prudent macroeconomic policies and rapid growth. The authors examine why with the help of a conceptual framework drawn from the growth, capital flows, and crisis literature for developing countries with access to the international capital markets (market access countries or MACs). They find that, while the chances of another generalized debt crisis have receded since the turbulence of the late 1990s, sovereign debt is indeed constraining growth in MACs, especially those with debt sustainability problems. Several prominent MACs have sought to address the debt and external finance problem by generating large primary fiscal surpluses, switching to flexible exchange rates, and reforming fiscal and financial institutions. Such country-led initiatives completely dominate attempts to overhaul the international financial architecture or launch new lending instruments, which have so far met with little success. While the initial results of the countries'initiatives have been encouraging, serious questions remain about the viability of the model of market-based external development finance. Beyond crisis resolution, which has received attention in the form of the sovereign debt restructuring mechanism, the international financial institutions may need to ramp up their role as providers of stable long-run development finance to MACs instead of exiting from them.

How structure of production determines the demand for human capital

On the issue of women's status, the objectives of this paper are twofold. First, it attempts to make precise some of the claims and allegations regarding the existence of bias against females in the allocation of resources within the household. The idea is to formulate these questions explicitly, so that it is possible to identify whether and to what degree there is evidence of this bias. Second, it identifies causes of this bias with the objective of isolating key factors that can be used for policy. In contrast to earlier studies that attemptto account for male-female differences in human capital, the authors do not assume any discrimination against females either at home (in the parent's utility function) or in the market (in the returns to human capital). It is assumed, however, that women have a comparative advantage in working in some sectors of the economy. Thus, increases in the shares of these sectors will increase the demand for female human capital. This explicit attention to factors that can be used as policy instruments -- and the relative neglect of factors reflecting gender bias in tastes -- is the point of departure from earlier literature. This paper develops the theory, tests the hypotheses, and concludes with a discussion of the policy implications.Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Economic Theory&Research,Agricultural Knowledge&Information Systems,Housing&Human Habitats,Environmental Economics&Policies

Financing of International Collective Action for Epidemic and Pandemic Preparedness.

The global pandemic response has typically followed cycles of panic followed by neglect. We are now, once again, in a phase of neglect, leaving the world highly vulnerable to massive loss of life and economic shocks from natural or human-made epidemics and pandemics. Quantifying the size of the losses caused by large-scale outbreaks is challenging because the epidemiological and economic research in this field is still at an early stage. Research on the 1918 influenza H1N1 pandemic and recent epidemics and pandemics has shown a range of estimated losses (panel).1; 2; 3; 4; 5; 6 ; 7 A limitation in assessing the economic costs of outbreaks is that they only capture the impact on income. Fan and colleagues8 recently addressed this limitation by estimating the “inclusive” cost of pandemics: the sum of the cost in lost income and a dollar valuation of the cost of early death. They found that for Ebola and severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), the true (“inclusive”) costs are two to three times the income loss. For extremely serious pandemics such as that of influenza in 1918, the inclusive costs are over five times income loss. The inclusive costs of the next severe influenza pandemic could be US$570 billion each year or 0·7$1 billion over 5 years, is developing vaccines against known emerging infectious diseases as well as platforms for rapid development of vaccines against outbreaks of unknown origin. The WHO R&D Blueprint for Action to Prevent Epidemics12 is a new mechanism for coordinating and prioritising the development of drugs and diagnostics for emerging infectious diseases. Consolidating and enhancing donor support for these new initiatives would be an efficient way to channel resources aimed at improving global outbreak preparedness and response. Crucial components of the global and regional system for outbreak control include surge capacity (eg, the ability to urgently deploy human resources); providing technical guidance to countries in the event of an outbreak; and establishing a coordinated, interlinked global, regional, and national surveillance system. These activities are the remit of several essential WHO financing envelopes that all face major funding shortfalls. The Contingency Fund for Emergencies finances surge outbreak response for up to 3 months. The fund has a capitalisation target of $100 million of flexible voluntary contributions, which needs to be replenished with about$25–50 million annually, depending on the extent of the outbreak in any given year. However, as of April 30, 2017, only $37·65 million had been contributed, with an additional$4 million in pledges.13 The WHO Health Emergencies and Health Systems Preparedness Programmes face an annual shortfall of $225 million in funding their epidemic and pandemic prevention and control activities.14 Previous health emergencies have shown that it can take time to organise global collective action and provide financing to the national and local level. In such situations, a global mechanism should offer a rapid injection of liquidity to affected countries. The World Bank\u27s Pandemic Emergency Financing Facility (PEF) is a proposed global insurance mechanism for pandemic emergencies.15 It aims to provide surge funding for response efforts to help respond to rare, high-burden disease outbreaks, preventing them from becoming more deadly and costly pandemics. The PEF currently proposes a coverage of$500 million for the insurance window; increasing the current coverage will require additional donor commitments. In addition, the PEF has a $50–100 million replenishable cash window. As the world\u27s health ministers meet this month for the World Health Assembly, we propose five key ways to help prevent mortality and economic shocks from disease outbreaks. First, to accelerate development of new technologies to control outbreaks, donors should expand their financing for CEPI and support the WHO R&D Blueprint for Action to Prevent Epidemics. Second, funding gaps in the WHO Contingency Fund for Emergencies and the WHO Health Emergencies Programme should be urgently filled and the PEF should be fully financed. Third, all nations should support their own and other countries\u27 national preparedness efforts, including committing to the JEE process. Fourth, we believe it would be valuable to create and maintain a regional and country-level pandemic risk and preparedness index. This index could potentially be used as a way to review preparedness in International Monetary Fund article IV consultations (regular country reports by staff to its Board). Finally, we call for a new global effort to develop long-term national, regional, and global investment plans to create a world secure from the threat of devastation from outbreaks. This article summarises the recommendations of a workshop held at the National Academy of Medicine, Washington, DC, USA, co-hosted by the Center for Policy Impact in Global Health at Duke University, Durham, NC, USA and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, Oslo, Norway. Participants\u27 travel and accommodation were supported by the Center for Policy Impact in Global Health. BO is a consultant to Metabiota, a private company engaged in infectious disease risk modelling and analytical services. In this capacity, he has led the development of an index measuring national capacity to respond to epidemic and pandemic disease outbreaks