Sunday, August 31, 2003
"If one thing ties neoconservatives, Likudniks, and post-cold-war hawks together -- observes Ian Buruma in today's NY Times Magazine -- it is the conviction that liberalism is strictly for sissies."
It's not for nothing that 30 August happens once a year: happy birthday to Bethie!!! Don't forget to send her your best birthday wishes!
Thursday, August 28, 2003
My department at LSE has received my dissertation! The prose is witty, the econometrics: spell-binding, the implications for the international policy-making community: unnerving.
This paper accounts for divergent levels of public health spending in Central Europe from 1991 to 2000 in terms of inherited distortions, domestic fiscal constraints, and international involvement. Panel regression analysis confirms that a communist past has precipitated higher levels of public health spending that income level, government size, or demography would predict. Cross-country regressions suggest that after a decade of transition, government size still explains much variance and that Central Europe has shown no single model of health finance. Two case studies evaluate national reform experiences with fiscal and external pressures in light of a common legacy of high welfare state spending. Whereas Poland experienced a steady drive to lower health spending fueled by intra-governmental conflict and perceived fiscal pressures from the EU, Croatia maintained high public health spending owing to mandatory insurance contributions substituted for budget sources and World Bank neglect of programmatic health planning. Though distortions from the communist period left transition countries with high initial public commitments to health, considerable national autonomy exists to confront this legacy within the confines of unique national fiscal constraints and differing relationships with the international community.
This paper accounts for divergent levels of public health spending in Central Europe from 1991 to 2000 in terms of inherited distortions, domestic fiscal constraints, and international involvement. Panel regression analysis confirms that a communist past has precipitated higher levels of public health spending that income level, government size, or demography would predict. Cross-country regressions suggest that after a decade of transition, government size still explains much variance and that Central Europe has shown no single model of health finance. Two case studies evaluate national reform experiences with fiscal and external pressures in light of a common legacy of high welfare state spending. Whereas Poland experienced a steady drive to lower health spending fueled by intra-governmental conflict and perceived fiscal pressures from the EU, Croatia maintained high public health spending owing to mandatory insurance contributions substituted for budget sources and World Bank neglect of programmatic health planning. Though distortions from the communist period left transition countries with high initial public commitments to health, considerable national autonomy exists to confront this legacy within the confines of unique national fiscal constraints and differing relationships with the international community.
You'll be pleased to know the PMJ has left LSE in search of greener pastures. Pastures: hello! Obviously, it will take me a little while to get everything straightened out... and of course, witty.
Danas je . Čitate stalno Joshievo izaslanstvo.