Investigation of the Relationship Between Life Insurance Growth and Economic Growth in Selected Countries of MENA Region

Extended Abstract
1- Insurance is one of the useful tools of risk management to ensure the peace and comfort of people in the community. Considering the role of life insurance in helping people save and invest and its effective role in economic growth, we can understand the importance of this field of insurance in the economy of countries (impact on household economy in developed or developing countries). the purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between growth of life insurance and economic growth in selected countries in the MENA region. Since there was no access to uniform statistics for all countries in the MENA region, the study was used on 13 selected countries in the region using balanced data for the period 1994-2017. In this study, in order to investigate the causal relationship between the growth of insurance industry activities and economic growth, the Demteresco and Herlein (DH) causality model has been used for the data panel.
2- THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Considering the important role of the insurance industry, especially life insurance in the economies of countries, the study of the impact and also the impact of life insurance on economic growth in previous research were studied, which are divided into two categories.
2-1- The Impact of Life Insurance on Economic Growth
Four factors (population, natural resources, investment and technology) play an important role in the process of economic growth, the most important of which is capital or financial resources. for this reason, access to financial resources is very important to increase economic growth. one of the most important prerequisites for economic growth in all countries is financial resources for productive investments. access to financial resources can be provided through various means such as foreign borrowing, sale of bonds, etc. but the best way to provide it is to use people's savings. insurance is one of the important channels of savings and important financial institutions, which in addition to providing security for economic activity, also plays a key role in providing investable funds.
The insurance industry leads to the development of investments in economic systems in two ways. on the one hand, by guaranteeing the coverage it provides, it reduces the effects of investment threatening factors that result in the expansion of investments, and on the other hand, insurance companies participate in various economic and commercial activities as investors from the resources at their disposal. this way in paving the paths that lead to the development of the country play an important role. the greater the share of insurance in the economies of countries (insurance penetration rate), the greater the impact on economic growth.
2-2- The impact of economic growth on life insurance
Studies have shown that there is a two-way relationship between economic growth and the growth of the insurance industry. in most studies, the per capita income index is considered as a proxy for economic growth. one of the factors that has a strong impact on increasing the demand for life insurance is the income of individuals. demand for life insurance increases as economic growth increases and, consequently, per capita income increases and, as a result, purchasing power increases. inflation also affects the demand for life insurance in two ways. first, inflation causes life insurance capital to be paid at a much lower real value than at the commencement date of the contract. in the context of inflation, if the insurance companies do not neutralize the negative impact of inflation on the real purchasing power of the insured capital by applying some appropriate methods, the purchase of life insurance policies will decrease day by day. as a result, it diverts people from the demand for life insurance and leads to safer or shorter-term investments. unemployment will have a negative impact on the demand for life insurance and, consequently, the growth of the insurance industry. according to research, one of the main motivations for buying life insurance is to protect family members against the early death of the breadwinner, and the amount of life insurance sales depends on the number of dependents on the breadwinner, which is called the dependency ratio (Campbell, 1980). With increasing population and increasing dependence on the breadwinner of the family, the risk of financial crisis of the family in the event of the breadwinner's death is felt more, so the need for insurance coverage in this area becomes more apparent.
 
3- The main purpose of this study is to evaluate the causal relationship between economic growth and life insurance growth and their effectiveness. therefore, in order to investigate the causal relationship between the growth of life insurance activities and economic growth, the Demteresco and Herlein (DH) causality model has been used for the data panel. We first determined the effect of the economy and the insurance industry by examining the Demetresco Herlin causality test. then, in order to determine the effect of variables on each other, we used the pattern of simultaneous equations of panel data. to solve problems such as heteroskedasticity and heterogeneity, the research equations are estimated in three modes of primary model, resistant to heterogeneity and clustered (resistant to heterogeneity and heteroskedasticity) and in each of the mentioned models by two methods of estimators of instrumental variables (IV) and torque. Generalized Momentum (GMM) is used.
 
4- CONCLUSION & SUGGESTION
Undoubtedly, the economic growth of countries leads to higher per capita incomes. this increase in per capita income will increase the demand for life insurance and consequently the growth of life insurance will have a new impact on economic growth. in other words, with the increase in per capita income, we will see a double impact on economic growth. another indicator that affects the growth of life insurance is the level of education. the higher the level of education will cause the higher growth of life insurance. of course, this positive connection can be due to the increase in public awareness and, as a result, the effort to secure their families' future, as well as possibly the greater demand for urbanization. population growth, which has a positive effect on economic growth, can also be affected by per capita income index, life expectancy and education level. one of the important indicators that has a positive effect on the growth of life insurance is the good governance index. this index includes the index of accountability and the right to comment, political stability, the absence of violence / terrorism, the quality of regulation, the rule of law, the effectiveness of government and the control of corruption. undoubtedly, if the governments of this region pay attention to these indicators, we can expect them to face the growth of demand for life insurance as well as the growth of the economy.