Demographics in MENA countries: a major driver for economic growth
Pré-publication, Document de travail: MENA region is undergoing rapid demographic transition, where 50% of the population is under the age 25 and high youth unemployment rates are argued to be one of the main sources of political instability. Fighting youth ex- clusion from work is one of the main challenges in the region. In this paper we evaluate the economic impact of the demographic transition for selected coun- tries which experience di_erent speeds of transition, namely: Iran, Morocco and Egypt. The impact of demographic shift on the evolution of human capital stock and physical capital stock, has been highlighted by the literature. Since _nan- cial markets play a crucial role to allocate capital and channel the funds to the productive sector, it is hence fundamental to take into account the role of the _nancial markets in the growth process associated with demographic change. We have developed a general equilibrium overlapping generations model with a cost for capital mobilisation as a proxy for _nancial markets' e_ciency. We have found that the demographic shift will be an important driver for growth in the upcoming decades. Furthermore, our results show that a more e_cient _nancial sector leads to better economic performance. Speci_cally, youth are the primary bene_ciaries: an increase in the _nancial sector e_ciency can reduce up to 8 percentage points of the youngest age group unemployment.
Auteur(s)
Yeganeh Forouheshfar, Najat El Mekkaoui, Hippolyte d’Albis
Date de publication
- 2019
Mots-clés JEL
Mots-clés
- Financial efficiency
- Development
- MENA region
- Demographic transition
Référence interne
- PSE Working Papers n°2019-68
URL de la notice HAL
Version
- 1