The Pakistan Development Review
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Gender Gaps in Child Nutritional Status in Punjab, Pakistan
Full text linkChild nutritional status has improved over the period 2008 to
2014 in Punjab, Pakistan's largest province with a population of over
100 million, as rates of severe stunting have declined by 8.6 percentage
points and average height-for-age (HFA) has increased by 0.19 standard
deviations. However, the nutritional status of children in Punjab is
still quite poor in comparison to many Sub-Saharan African countries.
Recent research from India suggests eldest son preference and son-biased
fertility stopping patterns negatively impacts the nutritional status of
other children in the household, especially daughters. In order to test
for latent gender discrimination in Punjab, Pakistan, a culturally
similar neighbour, we apply a finite mixture model to a sample of
couples with at least one child of each gender, though we do not find
any. We do find, however, that when there is a larger share of children
without an elder brother, that is, there is no son or a son is born
after several daughters, that the incidence of stunting is higher and
average HFA z-score of a couple’s children is lower, using an OLS
analysis. This suggests that some families might be increasing their
fertility beyond the number of children they can support in pursuit of
sons. In this way, couples’ preferences regarding the gender composition
of their children can have subsequent effects on the long- term
nutritional status of their children. JEL Classification: I2, I14, I15
Keywords: Pakistan, Height-for-Age, Gender, Finite Mixture
Mode
Creativity in Schools: A 21st Century Need
Full text linkCreativity is a skill that the labour market in the coming
decade will demand (Csikszentmihalyi, 2006). Students in the 21st
century need to be educated in a way that they can tackle the challenges
of today’s ill-defined lives; to this end, creativity is the epitome
resource and an attribute to address individual, social, and global
problems. Though discipline and content may differ, creativity is
required everywhere (Beghetto, 2010)
Intergenerational Mobility in Educational Attainments
Full text linkThis paper investigates intergenerational educational
mobility, a non-monetary measure of socioeconomic status in Pakistan.
Data from the Pakistan Social and Living Standards Measurements
(PSLM-2012-13) are used for empirical analysis. Contingency tables and
multinomial logit model are utilised. Results indicate strong evidence
of intergenerational linkages in educational attainments between fathers
and their sons. Although findings reveal some degree of upward mobility,
opportunities are not equal for all. Chances for attainment of higher
education for sons of fathers with education up to the secondary level
only, are not as prevalent as for sons of highly educated fathers.
Further, urban areas show higher mobility as compared to rural areas.
Results also reveal that the affluent are more likely to attain higher
levels of education than the financially disadvantaged. In addition,
sons of affluent families in rural areas are less likely to attain
higher levels of education compared to the sons of the affluent in urban
areas. Our findings also support evidence in favour of the child
quality- quantity trade-off as shown by negative impacts of family size
on attainment of higher levels of education. JEL Classification: C24,
J24, L86, O43, O47 Keywords: Inequality of Opportunity, Education,
Intergenerational Mobilit
Strengthening Pakistan’s Trade Linkages: A Case Study of Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP)
No full textThis paper explores Pakistan’s trade potential because of
Pakistan’s possible inclusion in the proposed Regional Comprehensive
Economic Partnership (RCEP). Using a variety of analytical tools
including the trade-cost augmented gravity model, indices of trade
complementarity and revealed comparative advantage, the paper
demonstrates that FTA between Pakistan and the proposed RCEP will
increase bilateral trade, on average, by a factor of 1.84. Trade
complementarity indices reveal that Pakistan’s import pattern tends to
match over time with the export pattern of RCEP countries indicating
that Pakistan can benefit from sourcing its imports from the RCEP
countries. Moreover, there exists significant potential for Pakistan’s
trade expansion with ASEAN members as well as other potential trading
partners in RCEP. Whereas Pakistan can export cotton, made-up textiles
and clothing, fish, cereals, leather products, pharmaceutical products,
sugar and sugar confectionary, and light engineering manufactures, the
proposed RCEP countries can export basic raw materials, machinery and
equipment, steel products, and miscellaneous manufactured goods, to
Pakistan. The study recommends that Pakistan should pursue its FTA
arrangements actively with the ASEAN, as it is a prerequisite to get
membership in the proposed RCEP. Greater integration with the proposed
RCEP region will help Pakistan boost trade and investment and promote
sustainable growth
Daniel H. Pink. Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us. Riverhead Books, U.S. 2009. 256 page. (Hardbound).
Full text linkDaniel Pink points out that Encarta was developed by a of
well-paid team by Microsoft as a flagship project, but it lost out to
Wikipedia that was developed by people without payment. Modern human
resource management (HRM) emerged in the industrial revolution and was
based on extrinsic motivations—“carrots and sticks” such as “if you do
this, you get that consequence”. Thus, promotions in a hierarchy were
offered as were bonuses and salary increase and some non-cash advantages
for work well done. In the opposite case, instruments were reprimands,
denial of promotions, bonuses and benefits and in the worst case “fired
from the job”. He calls these extrinsic motives because they are defined
by the system with little involvement of the individual
Demographic Changes and Economic Growth in Pakistan: The Role of Capital Stock
Full text linkPakistan has experienced a decrease in population growth since
the early 1990s leading to an increase in the ratio of working age
population, known as demographic dividend. The demographic dividend may
lead to higher savings and investments, which spurs economic growth.
Given this postulation, the study is the first of its kind to analyse
the impact of demographic variables on economic growth through physical
capital for Pakistan from 1960 to 2014. In this regard, the demographic
change is captured by taking four alternate measures, namely population
growth, young age dependency ratio, old age dependency ratio and working
age population ratio. In order to examine the channel effect, first the
direct impact of demographic changes on physical capital is estimated.
Later, the impact of demographically induced capital stock on economic
growth is estimated. By using the FMOLS technique, the study concludes
that the total negative impact is highest in the case of old age
dependency, which means that higher old age dependency is the most
threatening demographic change for economic growth. The least harmful
demographic change is young age dependency. Moreover, the empirical
findings highlight the importance of capital stock as the mediating
channel in the demographic change and economic growth relationship. The
study recommends effective long- term policies to increase youth
employment and to enhance savings for maximising the benefits of
demographic dividend. JEL Classification: J11; O47 Keywords: Direct and
Indirect Impact, Demographic Transition, Demographic Age Structure,
Capital Stock, FMOL
Assessing the Role of Money versus Interest Rate in Pakistan
Full text linkWe have empirically examined the role of monetary aggregate(s)
vis-à-vis short-term interest rate as monetary policy instruments, and
the impact of State Bank of Pakistan’s transformation into the latter on
their relative effectiveness in terms of inflation in Pakistan. Using
indicators of ‘persistent changes’ in the underlying behaviours of
variables of interest, we found that broad money consistently explains
inflation in (i) monetary (ii) transitory and (iii) interest rate
regimes. Though its role has receded while moving from the transition to
the interest rate regime, the interest rate instrument seems to be
positively related to inflation, a phenomenon commonly known as price
puzzle. In light of these findings, we recommend that the role of money
should not be completely de-emphasised. JEL Classification: E31, E52.
Keywords: Monetary Policy Instruments, Price Puzzle, ARDL, Pakista
Does Gold Act as a Hedge or a Safe Haven? Evidence from Pakistan
Full text linkThis paper seeks to determine whether in Pakistan gold
protects investors against the risks associated with the exchange rate,
oil shocks, and stock returns by testing the hedging and safe haven
properties of gold returns for the period from August 1997 to May 2016.
The analysis has been done to understand the relationship between
moderate (normal) and extremely tumultuous conditions through least
squares and DCC-GARCH models. The key results indicate that gold acts as
a hedge against exchange rate risk only whereas it acts as a safe haven
in terms of the risks associated with the oil, exchange rate and stock
market shocks—thereby indicating that investors can potentially invest
in gold to hedge against losses emanating from the exchange rate, while
they may avoid potential losses originating from turmoil conditions in
terms of the exchange rate, oil, and stock markets. JEL Classification:
E32, F31. Keywords: Gold Returns, Safe Haven, Hedge, DCC GARC
Corruption, Tax Evasion, and Economic Development in Economies with Decentralised Tax Administrative System
Full text linkThis theoretical paper looks into joint determination of
corruption and development where there is a decentralised bureaucratic
setup in a multi-tiered system: tier one bureaucrats and tier two
bureaucrats. Corruption takes place at two levels, firstly when tier one
bureaucrats collude with households for tax evasion, and secondly when
tier one and tier two bureaucrats collude to hide corruption. This paper
determines that at high levels of corruption, there is low development,
and at a low incidence of corruption, there is high development. This
paper postulates that for a developing country like Pakistan, low tax
collection due to poor institutional decentralisation leads to low
economic growth and development. JEL Classifications: E02, E26, E42
Keywords: Corruption, Tax Evasion, Economic Growt
The Economic Analysis of Law in Pakistan
Full text linkOne of the most important functions of law is to assign rights
and liabilities in such a way that disputes do not arise. The failure to
prevent disputes in a society indicates that the structure of the law is
inefficient. Since the focus of law and economics is on efficiency (see
Box 1) and how people respond to incentives, one way to carry out the
economic analysis of the law is to use the framework of market
capitalism. Driven by the idea of the invisible hand, the fundamental
point of capitalism is that individuals should be able to use their
capital freely, without the state’s interference. It implies that
individuals’ legal ability to move capital should be frictionless