Open AccessThe Role of Fiscal Policy in Human Development: The Pakistan’s Perspective
Author(s) -
Syed Ammad Ali,
Hasan Raza,
Muhammad Yousuf
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
pakistan development review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.154
H-Index - 26
ISSN - 0030-9729
DOI - 10.30541/v51i4iipp.381-396
Subject(s) - economics , human development index , human capital , life expectancy , standard of living , human development (humanity) , welfare , per capita , index (typography) , gross domestic product , labour economics , economic growth , population , demography , market economy , sociology , world wide web , computer science
Human development considered as the engine of the economicgrowth as it improves the economy’s strength and increases the standardof living of the people, increases the choices and maximises the welfareof the society that is the prime objective of any government. Thedevelopment of the human capabilities is also necessary for thesustainable growth, as there are many channels through which humandevelopment foster the economic growth. It increases the labourproductivity, labour demand, employment and output. On the other hand,human capital also attracts physical capital.1 Empirically, it is verydifficult to have an exact measure of human development and socialwelfare. Several proxies used to measure human development, e.g. GNI percapita as a measure of standard of living, Purchasing Power Parity (PPP)criterion to measure the cost of living and to measure the welfare,average year of schooling, school enrolment rate and health expendituresas a percentage of GDP to capture this composite welfare and developmentindicator. A fair index of Human Development Index (HDI) was developedby United Nations Development Programme in 1990. This index based on thestandard of living (natural logarithm of GDP PPP per capita), access toknowledge (adult literacy rate with two-third weighting and theremaining is the gross enrolment ratio) and a healthy life (lifeexpectancy at birth). The value of index varies from 0 to 1, lower theHDI, lesser would be the human development and welfare in the country orvice versa.