The Role of Economic Growth and Information Technology in Military Development

A number of study show that the relationship between economic growth, information technology, and military development is ambiguous. Some countries with good economic growth reduce their military budget. However, some more developed countries even increase their military budget. In addition, some less developed countries yet promote their military development. This study aims to examine the relationship between economic growth and information techology, such as internet and mobile phone subscription, with military development. The data used came from the World Development Data of the World Bank covering 260 countries in the world and employing panel data regression using the fixed effects model. The dependent variable is the military expenditure (current USD) and the independent variables are GDP (current US$) and the number of mobile cellular subscriptions. The results of the study show that GDP and mobile cellular subscriptions have positive and significant associations with military expenditure. An increase of one US dollar in GDP is associated with an increase of US$ 0.0109002 in military expenditure (current USD). Meanwhile, an increase of one unit of mobile cellular subscription is related with an increase of US$ 38.28941 in military expenditure. Keywords: Economic Growth, Mobile Cellular Subcription, Military Developement, Regression, Panel Data Fixed Effect