A study on the impact of economic freedom on economic growth in ASEAN countries

We examine the impact of economic freedom on economic growth using data of ASEAN countries over the period of 2000-2017. To capture the characteristics of ASEAN liberalization purposes, we use different proxies documented in prior literature such as trade freedom, labor freedom and financial freedom as proxies of economic freedom. We document that higher economic freedom and higher labor freedom lead to higher economic growth. However, more trade freedom appears to inhibit economic growth in ASEAN countries. We find no significant relationship between financial freedom and economic growth. These findings survive robustness tests.