The Impacts of Defense, Health and Education Expenditures on Economic Growth in Turkey

Abstract

The controversial relationship between public expenditures and economic growth has become one of the famous matters of interest, especially following the Great Depression that began in the US in 1929. As well as other economic variables, an increase in the public expenditure of the countries is expected to have significant impacts on those countries' economic growth performance. Therefore, an annual data set covering the period between the years 1981-2016 is used to determine the relationship of defense, health and education expenditures in the Turkish economy with economic growth. The Fourier unit root test results of the series indicate that economic growth and education expenditure series are stationary in the level, and defense and health expenditure series are stationary in the first difference. The estimation results of ARDL bound test, which is conducted to detect the longterm relationships, indicate that defense, health, and education expenditures are positively related to economic growth at the values of 0.33, 0.17 and 1.33, respectively. In other words, it is determined that economic growth be mostly affected by education expenditures followed by defense and health expenditures, respectively.

Determining the Relationship between Education, Health and R&D Expenditures with Economic Growth Using ARDL Boundary Test

“…Ayrıca, eğitim harcamalarındaki %1'lik bir artışa karşılık ekonomik büyümede kısa dönemde %0,23'lük bir artış ve uzun dönemde ise %0,86'lık bir artışın meydana gelebileceği belirlenmiştir. Alper (2017Alper ( , s. 59), 1981Alper ( -2016 dönemi yıllık verilerini kapsayan bir veri seti kullanarak eğitim, sağlık ve savunma harcamaları ile ekonomik büyüme arasındaki ilişkileri ARDL sınır testi ile araştırmıştır. Eğitim, sağlık ve savunma harcamaları ile ekonomik büyüme arasında pozitif yönlü bir ilişki belirlenmiştir.…”

“…For this reason, there are many studies in the literature to determine the relationship between these variables and economic growth. Some studies in this field in Turkey; Erdoğan and Bozkurt (2008), Eriçok and Yılancı (2013), Pamuk and Bektas (2014), Akıncı (2017), Başar et al (2016), Alper (2017), Köprücü and Sarıtaş (2017), Tarı and Alabaş (2017), Kızıl and Ceylan (2018), Uçak et al (2018) and İğdeli (2019).…”