Question

How do Bangladesh fare on various social indicators and social spending? How does this compare with Vietnam?

Answer 1

Bangladesh is a poor country . Inspite of being poor the country has made extraordinary improvement in social indicator.It has done a lot to reduce child mortality,alleviate poverty and on other indicators of growth.These improvements has happened inspite of lower GDP. TheUnited nations human development report says that Bangladesh has low infant mortality,less gender difference, higher life expectancy.Bangladesh has forged ahead in social indicators even though government spending on health and education has been a smaller percentage of GDP.

Several countries of south and south east Asia like India ,vietnam have grown faster than Bangladesh but Bangladesh's social development is much more than these countries.Bangladesh is poorer than Vietnam .But it has done much better than Vietnam in alleviating poverty,reducing child mortality and on other social indicators.Bangladesh public spending on health and education is the same as vietnam. The main stimulus to economic growth in Bangladesh comes from labor intensive garment export,Rise in non-farm employment,and remittances of bangladeshis from abroad, has reduced poverty.In vietnam similar remittances have increased household income and national output but has increased inequality and inflation