De La Salle Araneta University

Salvador Araneta Campus, Victoneta Ave., Malabon City

10 HRD: A Focus on Education and Health

At the end of the module, students must be able to:

▪ Understand the significance of education and health as joint determinants of economic

growth and development
▪ Recognize the need to invest in human capital as they help accelerate growth through
increased productivity and reduction in dependency ratios.

In recent years, economists have come to realize the importance of human resources in stimulating
economic growth. This emphasis became more evident with the rise of new technologies in computers
telecommunications & the compilation, use & dissemination of information.

The Economics of Education

Spending on formal education has increased in many developing countries over the past several
decades

This increase in education spending is due to:

• In part, a response to an increase in the number of cohorts in the schooling age groups
• A result of higher incomes in these countries

In some developing countries, private schools have flourished. In particular, to teach specific skills like a
foreign language or computer related techniques. The risk from more private education is that the
equalizing effect of free & universal public education will be compromised. Those who can pay gets a
better education while the public educational system is starved of resources.

32
 De La Salle Araneta University
Salvador Araneta Campus, Victoneta Ave., Malabon City

Education, Labor Earnings, and Productivity

Briefly, there is a large body of evidence that suggests that education & experience explain a very large
proportion of the variation in earnings in both industrial & developing economies. There is also
evidence that discrimination is also a powerful factor in influencing earnings. When these two factors
are put together, they argue very strongly for removing discrimination as a way to raise income for the
poor segments of society. Education is seen as an important tool to lift incomes alleviate poverty &
improve income distribution.

Women’s Education

A virtuous cycle of education & economic improvement with an increase in women’s education. The
benefits of this include lowering infant mortality, raising health standards for the entire family, reducing
fertility, raising family earnings by increased female participation in the labor force.

Health and Nutrition

Health, for our purposes, means absence of illness & infirmity. As indices of health (or illness), we use
morbidity & mortality rates. Mortality is more closely monitored than morbidity & is more easily
defined. Infant mortality, life expectancy, crude birth rates & crude death rates are also terms that are
widely used.

Health Patterns

Health conditions of populations have improved gradually because of advances in the medical fields.
Life expectancy has increased infant mortality has decreased morbidity may also have fallen.
Availability of safe water, sanitation, immunization & access to medical facilities have also improved in
Asia & the world. Life expectancy rates in the poorer countries have caught up rapidly with rich
countries in the 1960s owing to advances in medical technology. Poor health has an adverse impact on
labor productivity but is this a cause or a consequence of economic growth?

Activity
Explain:
a. How can we evaluate education’s “net benefits” to society?
b. How does education enhance productivity?
c. Health and economic growth: What’s the relationship?

33