Determinants of Economic Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa: The case of Ghana

Bonga-Bonga, Lumengo and Ahiakpor, Ferdinand (2015): Determinants of Economic Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa: The case of Ghana.

Abstract

This paper assesses the determinants of economic growth in Ghana during the period 1970-2012 by making use of the Bayesian Model Averaging (BMA) in order to address the issue of model uncertainty. Making use of the Markov Chain Monte Carlo Model composition (MC)3 for model selections, the results of the empirical analysis show the importance of variables such as current account balance, inflation rate and population growth as well as the role of the dual economy in driving economic growth in Ghana. These results show that economic growth policy in Ghana should not be confined within a specific growth theory, be it neoclassical and Keynesian. The results are robust with the change of model priors in the context of the BMA analysis.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: Ghana, Growth, Model uncertainty, Bayesian model averaging
• Subjects: C - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods > C5 - Econometric Modeling; O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O4 - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity > O47 - Empirical Studies of Economic Growth ; Aggregate Productivity ; Cross-Country Output Convergence

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