How Useful Are Benefit Incidence Analyses of Public Education and Health Spending

By Erwin H Tiongson, Hamid R Davoodi, Sawitree S. Asawanuchit

November 1, 2003

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Erwin H Tiongson, Hamid R Davoodi, and Sawitree S. Asawanuchit How Useful Are Benefit Incidence Analyses of Public Education and Health Spending, (USA: International Monetary Fund, 2003) accessed November 23, 2024

Disclaimer: This Working Paper should not be reported as representing the views of the IMF.The views expressed in this Working Paper are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of the IMF or IMF policy. Working Papers describe research in progress by the author(s) and are published to elicit comments and to further debate

Summary

This paper provides a primer on benefit incidence analysis (BIA) for macroeconomists and a new data set on the benefit incidence of education and health spending covering 56 countries over 1960-2000, representing a significant improvement in quality and coverage over existing compilations. The paper demonstrates the usefulness of BIA in two dimensions. First, the paper finds, among other things, that overall education and health spending are poorly targeted; benefits from primary education and primary health care go disproportionately to the middle class, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, HIPCs and transition economies; but targeting has improved in the 1990s. Second, simple measures of association show that countries with a more propoor incidence of education and health spending tend to have better education and health outcomes, good governance, high per capita income, and wider accessibility to information. The paper explores policy implications of these findings.

Subject: Education, Education spending, Expenditure, Health, Health care spending

Keywords: Benefit incidence, Benefit incidence analysis, Benefit incidence data, Benefit incidence of public spending, BIA methodology, BIA study, Correlation coefficient, East Africa, Education spending, Government spending data, Health care spending, Health spending, Incidence of public spending, Middle East, North Africa, Progressivity, Propoor incidence, Public spending on education and health, Secondary education, Sub-Saharan Africa, Targeting, Western Hemisphere, WP

Publication Details

Pages:

48
Volume:

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DOI:

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Issue:

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Series:

Working Paper No. 2003/227
Stock No:

WPIEA2272003
ISBN:

9781451875430
ISSN:

1018-5941

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