growth china and india外文电子书籍.pdfVIP

ECONOMIC PAPERS, VOL. 29, NO. 3, SEPTEMBER, 2010, 333–341 Ageing, Labour Force Participation and Education: Comparing the Implications for Economic Growth in China and India John Hicks,1 Parikshit K. Basu1 and Richard B. Sappey1 An ageing population will result, over the next forty years, in a fall in China’s labour force as the more youthful Indian labour force continues to grow. How- ever, we find that growth in output per capita has been dominated, in both countries, by growth in labour productivity. China’s stronger labour productiv- ity performance has resulted, until recently, from a stronger growth in their capital⁄ labour ratio. Now, however, it is the growth of China’s total factor productivity, driven by a much stronger public investment in education, that keeps them ahead. To match China, India must increase participation in education and in the workforce, especially amongst women. Keywords: growth, productivity, education, China, India. 1. Introduction Lee (2009) argues that ‘‘Unlike China, whose population is ageing, more than half of India’s popu- lation is under 25. If reforms continue, India will reap a significant demographic dividend well past the middle of this century.’’2 Lee’s comments receive limited support in the academic literature; many predict that over the next ten to fifteen years, China’s working age population will begin to contract and this will tend to retard economic growth in per capita terms (see Feng, 2005; Feng and Mason, 2005; Golley and Tyers, 2006; Nielsen and Fang, 2007). Australia is clearly a benefi- ciary of growth in these two Asian giants, and both business and government alike have an inter- est in the impact of demographic changes taking place in t