Official development aid effectiveness and economic growth in African countries: The role of the governance

This work revolves around support policies of developing countries which, in most cases, need financing and more particularly development aid. In this setting, the aim of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of development aid for a sample of African countries of which 25 are considered to have intermediate incomes and 23 achieve low incomes. To do this, we relied on a cross-sectional regression over the period 1996-2014. Our results imply that good governance is a deterministic condition of the positive effect of aid on economic growth. Indeed, international aid unaccompanied by good governance practices (control of corruption, political stability, a sound regulatory quality, a rigid state of rights, government effectiveness, voice and accountability) has adverse effects on economic activity and creates more inequalities of opportunity, especially in low-income countries. Thus, we note that the better quality of institutions allow a better allocation of international aid towards productive projects which stimulates economic growth in the two sub regions. So, in order to achieve the desired goals of international aid, countries must first ensure political stability and develop a regulatory and institutional framework to organize economic activities, second need to protect individual properties and resolve disputes between players in different markets

On measuring and decomposing inequality of opportunity in access to health services among Tunisian children: a new approach for public policy

Abstract Background The early years in children’s life are the key to physical, cognitive-language, and, socio-emotional skills development. So, it is of paramount importance in this period to be interested in different indicators that would influence the child’s health. Methods This paper measures inequality of opportunities among Tunisian children concerning access to nutritional and healthy services using Human Opportunity-Index and Shapely decomposition methods. Results Many disparities between regions have been detected since 1982 until 2012. Tunisian children face unequal opportunities to develop in terms of health, nutrition, cognitive, social, and emotional development. Likewise, we found that, parents’ education, wealth, age of household head and geographic factors as key factors determining child development outcomes. Conclusion Our findings suggested that childhood unequal opportunities in Tunisia are explained by pension funds deficiency and structural problem in the labor market. Trial registration The results of a health care intervention on human participants “retrospectively registered”

On shrinkage estimators improving the James-Stein estimator under balanced loss function

In this paper, we are interested in estimating a multivariate normal mean under the balanced loss function using the shrinkage estimators deduced from the Maximum Likelihood Estimator (MLE). First, we consider a class of estimators containing the James-Stein estimator, we then show that any estimator of this class dominates the MLE, consequently it is minimax. Secondly, we deal with shrinkage estimators which are not only minimax but also dominate the James- Stein estimator

Are structural policies in countries bordering mediterranean appropriate to economic convergence: Panel ARDL application

Our main contribution in this paper consists of analyzing long-run interactions between structural policies and economic growth accounting for possible convergence. For this purpose, we are based on a sample of eight countries bordering the Mediterranean during the period 1975-2012. In fact, we used a technique based on panel ARDL methods which deals with the stationary series problem of different orders to monitor possible convergence in the long-run horizon. This method allows us to study potential long-term effects of structural economic policies on growth as well as capture the possible links between candidate variables and the trend of convergence in terms of per capita GDP. Our empirical results support convergence processes of GDP per capita in all the bordering Mediterranean countries. Moreover, we find that the increased number of secondary schools enrollment through public expenditure on education, greater economic openness, and fluid foreign direct investments stimulates economic growth

Comparison of Risk Ratios of Shrinkage Estimators in High Dimensions

In this paper, we analyze the risk ratios of several shrinkage estimators using a balanced loss function. The James–Stein estimator is one of a group of shrinkage estimators that has been proposed in the existing literature. For these estimators, sufficient criteria for minimaxity have been established, and the James–Stein estimator’s minimaxity has been derived. We demonstrate that the James–Stein estimator’s minimaxity is still valid even when the parameter space has infinite dimension. It is shown that the positive-part version of the James–Stein estimator is substantially superior to the James–Stein estimator, and we address the asymptotic behavior of their risk ratios to the maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) when the dimensions of the parameter space are infinite. Finally, a simulation study is carried out to verify the performance evaluation of the considered estimators

Comparison of Risk Ratios of Shrinkage Estimators in High Dimensions

In this paper, we analyze the risk ratios of several shrinkage estimators using a balanced loss function. The James–Stein estimator is one of a group of shrinkage estimators that has been proposed in the existing literature. For these estimators, sufficient criteria for minimaxity have been established, and the James–Stein estimator’s minimaxity has been derived. We demonstrate that the James–Stein estimator’s minimaxity is still valid even when the parameter space has infinite dimension. It is shown that the positive-part version of the James–Stein estimator is substantially superior to the James–Stein estimator, and we address the asymptotic behavior of their risk ratios to the maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) when the dimensions of the parameter space are infinite. Finally, a simulation study is carried out to verify the performance evaluation of the considered estimators

Пределы отношений рисков оценщиков усадки при сбалансированной функции потерь

In this paper we study the estimation of a multivariate normal mean under the balanced loss function. We present here a class of shrinkage estimators which generalizes the James-Stein estimator and we are interested to establish the asymptotic behaviour of risks ratios of these estimators to the maximum likelihood estimators (MLE). Thus, in the case where the dimension of the parameter space and the sample size are large, we determine the sufficient conditions for that the estimators cited previously are minimaxВ этой статье мы изучаем оценку многомерного нормального среднего при сбалансированной функции потерь. Мы представляем здесь класс оценок усадки, который обобщает оценку Джеймса-Стейна, и мы заинтересованы в установлении асимптотического поведения отношений рисков этих оценок к оценкам максимального правдоподобия (MLE). Таким образом, в случае, когда размерность пространства параметров и размер выборки велики, мы определяем достаточные условия для того, чтобы приведенные ранее оценки были минимаксным

Об оценках решений задачи расщепления для некоторых многомерных дифференциальных уравнений в частных производных

The problem of estimating the mean of a multivariate normal distribution by different types of shrinkage estimators is investigated. We established the minimaxity of Baranchick-type estimators for identity covariance matrix and the matrix associated to the loss function is diagonal. In particular the class of James-Stein estimator is presented. The general situation for both matrices cited above is discussedИсследована проблема оценки среднего многомерного нормального распределения различными типами оценок усадки. Мы установили минимаксность оценок типа Баранчика для единичной ковариационной матрицы, а матрица, связанная с функцией потерь, является диагональной. В частности, представлен класс оценки Джеймса-Стейна. Обсуждается общая ситуация для обеих упомянутых выше матри