Death and development
By: Peter Lorentzen, John McMillan, Romain Wacziarg.
Contributors: McMillan, John, 1951-; Wacziarg, Romain.; National Bureau of Economic Research.
Series: NBER working paper paper series -- no. 11620.; Working paper series (National Bureau of Economic Research) -- working paper no. 11620.
Publisher: National Bureau of Economic Research
Published: 2005
Place of publication: Cambridge, Mass
Language: eng
Number of pages: 65
Subjects: Mortality -- Economic aspects -- Developing countries; Mortality -- Economic aspects -- Africa; AIDS (Disease) -- Economic aspects -- Africa
Description: "Analyzing a variety of cross-national and sub-national data, we argue that high adult mortality reduces economic growth by shortening time horizons.  Higher adult mortality is associated with increased levels of risky behavior, higher fertility, and lower investment in physical and human capital.  Furthermore, the feedback effect from economic prosperity to better health care implies that mortality could be the source of a poverty trap.  In our regressions, adult mortality explains almost all of Africa's growth tragedy.  Our analysis also underscores grim forecasts of the long-run economic costs of the ongoing AIDS epidemic"--National Bureau of Economic Research web site.
Notes: "September 2005."

Includes bibliographical references (p. 39-44).

Also available in PDF from the NBER world wide web site (www.nber.org).