Resumen de Education, gender equality, social well-being and economic development in American countries, 2000-2010,
María del Carmen Guisán Seijas, Eva Aguayo Lorenzo
We analyse the important role of education in economic development and social wellbeing of American countries, including indicators of gender opportunities for development as part of social well-being. In this regard we select some indicators which usually have a great importance for reaching improvements in social well-being such as Government effectiveness and voice of citizens, among Governance Indicators, and the indicator of interpersonal trust from World Values Survey. Regarding life satisfaction we analyse the correlations of three indexes with economic development and other variables. The USA and Canada have a clear outstanding position in average educational indicators and other variables, while only a few Latin American and Caribbean countries show values of education spending above World average. In spite of the UN declaration of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) many American countries show very low levels of education spending for the period 2000-2007. Fostering international cooperation to finance education is of uppermost importance to achieve the MDGs in those cases, and to guarantee socio-economic development. Regarding economic and social equality of opportunities for Women we find also a positive impact of education. Finally we present some econometric models which relate life satisfaction with economic development, gender equality and other variables.
