Income elasticity of vaccine spending versus general healthcare spending – an empirical analysis (MA)
Background:
Despite recent advancements, more than a fifth of the global population of children remain inadequately immunized with essential childhood vaccines such as those for diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis. Increasing vaccination coverage necessitates greater financial investment, a burden that primarily falls on the economies of low and middle-income countries (LMICs). However, there exists a dilemma akin to the Samaritan's predicament, where heightened external aid may diminish these countries' motivation to independently finance their vaccine programs. Studies highlighting the cost-effectiveness of immunization expenditure underscore the rationale for prioritizing vaccine funding over other health expenditures. One way to assess whether there might indeed exist such a Samaritan’s dilemma that leads LMICs to sideline their vaccine spending is to explore these countries’ propensity to spend on vaccines per incremental unit of GDP compared to their propensity to spend on general healthcare per unit of GDP, i.e. comparing the income elasticity.
Objective:
The objective of this thesis is to compare the income elasticity of vaccine spending and general healthcare spending for LMICs by using publicly available data on GDP, vaccination expenditure and general health expenditure. Data can be used and extracted from sources such as the International Monetary Fund (GDP) and the WHO (vaccine expenditure, general health expenditure). Students are expected to extract the data and build a dataset first and then perform an econometric analysis following the approach suggested in the paper by Alfonso et al. (2016).
Literature:
- Alfonso, Y. N.; Ding, G.; Bishai, D. (2016). Income elasticity of vaccines spending versus general healthcare spending. Health Economics. 25(7), 860-872. https://doi.org/10.1002/hec.3190
- Faraq, M.; NandaKumar, A. K., Wallack, S., Hodgkin, D., Gaumer, G., Erbil, C. (2012). The income elasticity of healthcare spending in developing and developed countries. International Journal of Health Care Finance and Economics. 12, 145-162. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10754-012-9108-z
Software-Recommendations:
- Kohler, U., Kreuter, F. (2016): Datenanalyse mit Stata. Allgemeine Konzepte der Datenanalyse und ihre praktische Anwendung. De Gruyter, Oldenburg.
- De Vries, A., Meys, J., Leidenfrost, R., Haselier, R. G., & Kunze, K. (2021). R für Dummies (3. Auflage.). Wiley, Wiley-VCH GmbH.
Note: Writing in English or German language possible. Students should have a high interest (and preferably also some prior experience) in data analysis.