Globalization and life expectancy gap between countries: A dynamic panel data analysis

Previous studies did not extensively investigate the impact of globalization on the health disparities between developing and developed countries. Globalization affects disparities in access to social determinants of health through direct linkages (e.g. cross-border transmission of infectious disease) and indirect linkages (e.g. the effects of globalization on public expenditure on health) between globalization and health.

This study contributes to the empirical literature by investigating globalization as a channel of life expectancy gap between developing and developed countries during the period 1995-2010. Dynamic panel data models are used to estimate the impact of globalization on life expectancy gap between developed and developing countries using globalization indexes (e.g. KOF globalization index).

The study uses GMM method that can overcome serious econometric problems and gives more accurate and efficient results than previous studies. Baltagi (2008) lists the main advantages for using panel data analysis. Firstly, panel data analysis assumes that individuals are heterogeneous. This advantage avoids the risk of obtaining biased results that may happen in time series and cross-section studies. Secondly, panel data results are less collinearity among the variables than time series studies. Thirdly, panel data analysis leads to more reliable results than purely cross-section data or time-series data, in particular, the case of study the dynamics of adjustment.

The results of dynamic panel data regressions show that globalization widens the life expectancy gap between developing countries and developed countries. In addition, the study suggests some short-run and long-run government policies that help shrink the life expectancy gap between developing countries and developed countries.