IMPACT OF HEALTHCARE FINANCING ON YOUTH EMPLOYMENT IN NIGERIA

EZE, KELECHUKWU EMMANUEL (2026) IMPACT OF HEALTHCARE FINANCING ON YOUTH EMPLOYMENT IN NIGERIA. Other thesis, Godfrey Okoye University, Enugu.

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Abstract

This study sought to explore the impact of health care financing on youth employment in Nigeria over the period 2000-2024. Nigeria being home to a vast youthful population forms the core of its labour force. The pace at which youth unemployment has soared over the past two decades is quite alarming and represents a critical developmental challenge to the country.One of the structural reasons for this can be attributed to Nigeria's ailing healthcare financing model, driven by low government investment, high out-of-pocket payments, and its significant reliance on external donor funding.The study period for Nigeria's economy is 2000-2024, utilizing data from the World Bank, WHO, CBN, and NBS. The realities are that restricted government investment in health can significantly impede youths’ ability to afford care, triggering a negative cycle with reduced investment in education, skills development, employability of youths, and diminishing capacity of policymakers to make data-driven decisions. To address this, this study aimed to investigate the impact of government expenditure in healthcare (GHE), out-of-pocket health care expenditures (OOP), and external healthcare financing (EHF) on youth employment (YEMP), while controlling for factors like literacy, population growth, and life expectancy using the ARDL bounds test approach to cointegration. The results indicated that a long-run relationship among the variables exists, supported by the bounds test results (F-statistic = 10.039).High out-of-pocket healthcare spending demonstrably exacerbated youth unemployment (coefficient = 2.107, p = 0.0353) by a significant margin, whereas government health expenditure showed a marginal positive effect (coeff = 2.389, p = 0.0564). No impact was observed from external financing for short- or long-term effects. Although individual long-run effects were not statistically significant possibly due to multicollinearity and a limited sample size, the models overall explained over 99.79% (R^2) of the variations in youth employment. Policy recommendations include a considerable boost in public spending on healthcare, aligning with the objectives of the 2014 Abuja Declaration on Public Health Spending Target; expanding the coverage of social health insurance to reduce the burden of OOP expenditures; reframing external assistance as Strengthening-Oriented rather than vertical interventions on youth employment; incorporating demographic and family planning into health investments; and integrating education with workforce development to strengthen human capital

Item Type: Thesis (Other)
Subjects: H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General)
Divisions: Faculty of Management and Social Sciences
Depositing User: MICHAEL MADUBUKO
Date Deposited: 10 Aug 2026 14:36
Last Modified: 10 Aug 2026 14:36
URI: http://eprints.gouni.edu.ng/id/eprint/6239

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