Impact of Unemployment on Economic Growth in Nigeria: An Empirical Analysis

Abstract

This study examined the impact of unemployment on economic growth in Nigeria. 
The study adopted ex-post factor research design and time series data to investigate the impact of unemployment on economic growth in Nigeria during the 1986-2019. The auto regressive distributed lag analysis method was used to carry out the investigation. It was found that while unemployment as negative impact on gross domestic product, population growth, and public expenditure on education 
have positive impact on gross domestic product in Nigeria. The study recommends that government and relevant agencies should formulate policies to encourage self-employment and regulate the nation's population growth rate. There is also the need to formulate policies tailored towards developing the informal sector of the economy so as to ensure entrepreneurship development which may likely 
reduce unemployment and improve the welfare and living standards of Nigerians. Deregulation of the labour market should be paramount to destabilize and decongest the long queue of the unemployed cause by the high demand for formal 
employment.