“A man willing to work, and unable to find work, is perhaps the saddest sight that fortune’s inequality exhibits under this sun.” THOMAS CARLYLE, Chartism
The above quote is aptly fitting for the concluding part of this piece which will further expose the ills of massive chronic unemployment and underemployment among age categories, particularly the weakest link—the youth in the Nigerian society.
Without a doubt, the future of the young adults is being mortgaged by those in the government who could not come up with targeted and effective policies that would address the endemic unemployment problems in the country. It is a discouraging situation that no visible job creation strategies are in place to help the jobless individuals find employment where they could use their skills to contribute toward building a robust economy. In a period when many people are unemployed the country’s economy will continue to deteriorate because there will be limited money from income to infuse into the economy.
That notwithstanding, plethora of studies have shown that unemployment is not only detrimental to the economy of a nation, but it is also harmful to the physical and psychological health of unemployed individuals and their families. Research studies have found that joblessness increases the rates of medical and mental health problems. Furthermore, studies show that unemployment significantly contribute to high mortality rates, reduced life expectancy, and increased poverty.
In a research article published by Daniel Sullivan and Till Von Wachter, entitled “Job Displacement and Mortality: An Analysis Using Administrative Data,” they found that unemployment highly correlates with high mortality rates. They said, “We find that for high-seniority male workers, mortality rates in the year after displacement are 50%–100% higher than would otherwise have been expected.” They also found “that workers with larger losses in earnings [due to unemployment or underemployment] tend to suffer greater increases in mortality. This correlation remains when we examine predicted earnings declines based on losses in industry, firm, or firm-size wage premiums.”
In other studies, unemployment, as well as underemployment is associated with low birthweights among babies born to the affected families. In a research study David Dooley and Joann Prause published in 2005 in the Journal of Health and Social Behavior, entitled “Birth Weight and Mothers’ Adverse Employment Change,” they found that low birthweight babies were born to mothers who were unemployed or underemployed. They found that “controlling for other significant risk factors, women who shifted from adequate employment to underemployment had significantly lighter babies.” They concluded, “Low birth weight has been linked at the aggregate level to unemployment rates and at the individual level to subjective distress.”
Furthermore, they found, “Aggregate time-series studies have found associations between low birth weight incidence and male unemployment rates. Aggregate cross-sectional studies have linked low birth weight to neighborhood indicators of economic disadvantage, including local unemployment rates.”
The above studies were done in the United States. The effects of unemployment would be harsher in Nigeria than in the United States. In the United States, people receive various benefits from the social programs such as unemployment benefits, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, Women, Infant & Children (WIC) Program, and Food Stamps to help alleviate some of the pains of unemployment and poverty.
Reacting to the original piece on unemployment in Nigeria, George I. Umeh profusely wrote, “Dear Orabuchi, UNDP has also reported a few days earlier that over 75% of Nigerian youths are unemployed. I have held my strong belief since the early 70s that only massive industrialization would save Nigeria (and Black African) economies. We are too under- industrialized, spending 90 to 95 percent of our income importing goods which we could make here. Trading businesses, hotels and filling stations will never provide the jobs we need for millions of our graduates. It is only manufacturing companies that can do that, Nigerians generally, and Igbos in particular spend fortunes, and are even ready to starve, to train their children up to university level. These people come out without any jobs to do. The problem is compounded yearly with over 600,000 graduates joining the labour force.
Research has proved it that no government anywhere in the world employs more than 5% of his citizens. The rest are employed by the private sector. The manufacturing sector is the core of any modern economy, Lagos is too little to cater for Nigeria’s needs. We need four to five cities like Lagos in Nigeria. The economy, not leadership is the major problem with Nigeria. Japan has had about 60 prime ministers since the Second World War. Italy has also had about 58 prime ministers since the Second World War and yet their economies have been very good. The United States closed down government between November 1995 and February 1996 but no person noticed. The same US closed down government in October 2014 but no person noticed. The private sector held forth till the government recovered. Nigeria and Black Africa only account for less than 2% of world trade. We cannot give any reason for non-industrialization. Government must induce industrialization at all levels. Government must also dedicate power to industries. It is only through these measures that Nigeria can recover.”
With the elections over, I hope that the federal and state governments should now focus on governing with the aim of making the states better than the last cycle. They should focus on how to create an enabling environment the will attract investments and businesses which will consequently create jobs for the youth.
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