The Long-Term Impact of Health on Economic Growth in Latin America

Growth regressions adapted as Granger-type causality tests give strong evidence of 30-year causality from health to income in 18 Latin American countries. The health indicator is probability of survival by age and gender groups for 1950–90. A permanent increment of between 0.8% and 1.5% annual income is associated with typical adult and, surprisingly, old age health improvements. The channels of causation from health to income are diverse and need to be identified in microeconomic studies that should, however, include a wide variety long-term phenomena to account for the economic effects of health.