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The study aims to determine whether there is a bidirectional causality relationship between health expenditures and per capita income in Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa and Turkey (BRICS+T).

For that purpose, the 2000–2018 period data of the variables were tested with the Kónya (2006) panel causality test. Additionally, the causality relationships between public and private health expenditures and per capita income were also investigated in the study.

According to the analysis results, there is no statistically significant causality relationship from total health expenditures and public health expenditures to per capita income in the relevant countries. Besides, there is a unidirectional causality relationship from private health expenditures to per capita income only in Turkey. On the other hand, a unidirectional causality relationship from per capita income to total health expenditures in China, Russia, Turkey and South Africa and from per capita income to public health expenditures in India, Russia, Turkey and South Africa were determined. Consequently, a causality relationship from per capita income to private health expenditures was found out in Russia and Turkey.

The variables are tested for the first time for BRICS+T countries, vis-à-vis the period under consideration and the method used.

This study aims to examine the interrelationship between financial stability and economic growth with a comprehensive analysis.

The panel Granger causality testing approach is carried out to the panels of the Fragile Five (F5) and the Group of Seven (G7) countries for the period 1998–2020. To capture the different aspects of financial stability the authors use eight different indicators.

The findings reveal some important implications: the relationship between financial stability and economic growth is sensitive to the financial stability indicators for both the F5 and G7 countries. The stability indicators related to the credit market contain much more causality relationship with economic growth than the indicators related to the stock market. Z-score and provisions to nonperforming loans (NPLs) are among the two variables with the highest causality relationship with economic growth. The least number of causality link is found for the Regulatory Capital Ratio and Stock Price Volatility in F5 countries and Credit Ratio, NPLs and Stock Price Volatility in G7 countries. Economic growth affects financial stability through credit market stability indicators and mostly for the F5 countries. No causal relationship is found for any of the financial stability indicators of Canada, the UK and the USA from economic growth to financial stability.

Since the linkages between financial stability and economic growth may vary due to country/group specific differences, apart from the previous studies, the authors select two different groups of countries in terms of financial stability and economic size.

This study investigates the causal relationship between financial innovation (FI) as proxied by the bank credits to private sector, as percentage of GDP and economic growth in case of Azerbaijan using annual data covering the period from 1992 to 2018. For this purpose, the Toda–Yamamoto causality test with the framework of vector autoregressive (VAR) model is utilized to test causal relationship between the variables. The estimation results reveal that there is bidirectional causal relationship between FI and economic growth. The findings of the study suggest the researchers and policy makers to understand the role of FI in economic growth for macroeconomic stability and sustainable development purposes in Azerbaijan and other developing oil-rich countries.

This paper provides a state-of-the-art review of the financial development in the Middle East and Central Asia (MECA) and examines its impact on its economic growth.

The authors use a Panel Data Regression Analysis on a sample of 21 countries in MECA for the period 2008–2018.

Using the financial development indices and subindices retrieved from IMF, the study finds that the whole region has a below average index compared to other developing regions. However, this hides a great deal of variation across MECA countries. Surprisingly, financial development does not necessarily contribute to economic growth. It seems that some developing countries are still not predisposed to benefit from financial development due to several obstacles.

The authors recommend policymakers and regulators in MECA to promote financial stability and keep inflation in check so that economic agents can reap the fruits of financial development and foster economic growth. Policymakers should also stimulate competition in the financial sector, build skillful human capital, attract foreign direct investments, strengthen supervision and forensic audit and more importantly reinforce the independence of central banks.

The authors mitigate the shortcomings of single indicators as proxies for financial development by using the IMF Financial Development index that captures the depth, access and efficiency of both financial institutions and financial markets. The authors employ lower-middle-, upper-middle and high-income country groups to test the magnitude of income level on the relationship between financial development and economic growth.

This study examines the roles of cross-sectional dependence, asymmetric structure and country-to-country policy variations in the inflation-poverty reduction causal nexus in selected sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries from 1981 to 2019.

To account for cross-sectional dependence, heterogeneity and policy variations across countries in the inflation-poverty reduction causal nexus, this study uses robust Hatemi-J data decomposition procedures and a battery of second-generation techniques. These techniques include cross-sectional dependency tests, panel unit root tests, slope homogeneity tests and the Dumitrescu-Hurlin panel Granger non-causality approach.

Unlike existing studies, the panel and country-specific findings exhibit several dimensions of asymmetric causality in the inflation-poverty nexus. Positive inflationary shocks Granger-causes poverty reduction through investment and employment opportunities that benefit the impoverished in SSA. These findings align with country-specific analyses of Botswana, Cameroon, Gabon, Mauritania, South Africa and Togo. Also, a decline in poverty causes inflation to increase in the Congo Republic, Madagascar, Nigeria, Senegal and Togo. All panel and country-specific analyses reveal at least one dimension of asymmetric causality or another.

All stakeholders and policymakers must pay adequate attention to issues of asymmetric structures, nonlinearities and country-to-country policy variations to address country-specific issues and the socioeconomic problems in the probable causal nexus between the high incidence of extreme poverty and double-digit inflation rates in most SSA countries.

Studies on the inflation-poverty nexus are not uncommon in economic literature. Most existing studies focus on inflation’s effect on poverty. Existing studies that examine the inflation-poverty causal relationship covertly assume no asymmetric structure and nonlinearity. Also, the issues of cross-sectional dependence and heterogeneity are unexplored in the causal link in existing studies. All panel studies covertly impose homogeneous policies on countries in the causality. This study relaxes this supposition by allowing policies to vary across countries in the panel framework. Thus, this study makes three-dimensional contributions to increasing understanding of the inflation-poverty nexus.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the non-linear impact of defence spending on economic growth for the USA, the UK and Russia by using quarterly frequency from 1992 to 2014.

The unit root property is tested by ADF and PP unit root test. Further, BDS test is applied to test the linear independence. To verify the results of BDS test, we apply short and long-run symmetry test. The cointegration non-linear relationship is examined by NARDL approach. Further, Multipliers predict the speed of adjustments by considering the nonlinearity.

The short and long-run symmetry test confirms the existence of asymmetry in all countries. Further, asymmetric cointegration is confirmed through Wald statistics of Pesaran and Banerjee for all countries. The long-run asymmetric coefficient predicts negative and significant impact of defence spending on economic growth for the USA and the UK, but, these impacts were positive and significant in the case of Russia. The multiplier effect of defence spending on economic growth confirms the findings of NARDL model.

This study contributes in existing literature by applying newly developed non-linear ARDL approach, including a Wald test for long and short-run symmetry, asymmetric cointegration and asymmetric long run parameters in case of the USA, the UK and Russia.

The purpose of this study is to find the causal relationship among energy consumption (renewable energy and non-renewable energy), gross domestic product (GDP) growth and carbon dioxide (CO₂) emission for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa for the period of 1990-2017.

The study uses bootstrap Dumitrescu and Hurlin panel causality test, which accepts heterogeneity and dependency in cross-sectional units across emerging countries.

The results find unidirectional causality from GDP to CO₂ for India, China, Brazil, South Africa and no causality for Russia. The causality results from renewable energy consumption to GDP show that there is evidence of feedback hypothesis for China and Brazil, growth hypothesis for Russia, conservation hypothesis for South Africa and neutrality hypothesis for India. However, the results accept growth hypothesis for India, China, Russia, Brazil and neutrality hypothesis for South Africa. In the case of renewable energy and non-renewable energy consumption to CO₂ emission, the results find convergence in India, Russia and South Africa and divergence in China and Brazil.

It is the first study that investigates the part of balanced economic growth, instead of simply financial development in those economies. Numerous studies have used diverse factors such as economic development, renewable energy, non-renewable energy and CO₂ emission; however, the examination has used total GDP growth rate, energy consumption and CO₂ emissions.

This paper aims to examine whether there exists a long-run causal relationship between house prices and unemployment rates for eight major European countries.

The bootstrap panel Granger causality approach that accounts for cross-sectional dependence, slope heterogeneity and structural breaks is used to detect the direction of causality.

The empirical findings for the overall panel support the presence of unidirectional causality running from house prices to unemployment.

The findings are not only important for households but also for policymakers concerned with economic and financial stability.

There are only a limited number of studies that have investigated the direct link between house prices and employment or unemployment. Given the increased importance of labor market variables, particularly the choice of the unemployment rate as a key indicator in designing forward guidance and the increased financial stability concerns regarding house price dynamics, it is important to better understand the causal linkages between house prices and unemployment rates. To the best of the author’s knowledge, this paper is the first to apply the bootstrap panel Granger causality approach to examine the relationship between house prices and unemployment rates.

Asymmetric information impedes the efficiency of financial intermediation by widening the gap between lending and deposit rates. The cost of information gathering is high and often translates into high borrowing costs. Consequently, high borrowing costs may make it hard for borrowers to repay loans and increase the volume of non-performing loans – a recipe for financial instability. This study first compares the application of the simple GARCH (1,1) and BGARCH (1,1,1) models in the estimation of macroeconomic volatility and finds that the latter is more suitable for this purpose. Moreover, the choice of BGARCH (1,1,1) over the simple GARCH (1,1) implies different outcomes for Granger causality tests. This finding implies that the BGARCH (1,1,1) model minimises loss of important information when estimating macroeconomic volatility in developing countries. Second, the study uses bootstrap panel Granger causality to test the hypothesis that there is a causal relationship between financial instability and the financial intermediation spread in Southern African Customs Union (SACU). The findings support this hypothesis and underscore the importance of implementing sound macroeconomic policies for high and stable growth as well as effective monetary policy to attain and maintain low and stable prices in order to narrow the financial intermediation spread in SACU. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

This study uses bootstrap panel Granger causality to test the hypothesis that there is a causal relationship between financial instability and the financial intermediation spread in SACU.

The findings support this hypothesis and underscore the importance of implementing sound macroeconomic policies for high and stable growth as well as effective monetary policy to attain and maintain low and stable prices in order to narrow the financial intermediation spread in SACU.

Application of panel bootstrap Granger causality test to test for a casual relationship between financial intermediation spread and financial stability in the context of SACU.

The search for more effective policies, choice of optimal implementation strategies for achieving defined policy targets (e.g., cost-containment, improved access, and quality healthcare outcomes), and selection among the metrics relevant for assessing health system policy change performance simultaneously pose continuing healthcare sector challenges for many countries of the world. Meanwhile, research on the core drivers of healthcare costs across the health systems of the many countries continues to gain increased momentum as these countries learn among themselves. Consequently, cross-country comparison studies largely focus their interests on the relationship among health expenditures (HCE), GDP, aging demographics, and technology. Using more recent 1980–2014 annual data panel on 34 OECD countries and the panel ARDL (Autoregressive Distributed Lag) framework, this study investigates the long- and short-run relationships among aggregate healthcare expenditure, income (GDP per capita or per capita GDP^_HCE), age dependency ratio, and “international co-operation patents” (for capturing the technology effects). Results from the panel ARDL approach and Granger causality tests suggest a long-run relationship among healthcare expenditure and the three major determinants. Findings from the Westerlund test with bootstrapping further corroborate the existence of a long-run relationship among healthcare expenditure and the three core determinants. Interestingly, GDP less health expenditure (GDP^_HCE) is the only short-run driver of HCE. The income elasticity estimates, falling in the 1.16–1.46 range, suggest that the behavior of aggregate healthcare in the 34 OECD countries tends toward those for luxury goods. Finally, through cross-country technology spillover effects, these OECD countries benefit significantly from international investments through technology cooperations resulting in jointly owned patents.