The paper focuses attention on the persistent problem of unemployment and poverty among the youths, which is a serious phenomenon in Nigeria. It constitutes a problem not only for the youths themselves but to the overall social, political and economic structures of the country. By examining the condition of the youths, it indicates that there is no concrete attempt by the government to connect, organize and improve the dynamisms of its youths towards sustainable national development. Unemployed youths in the country have not only been neglected and left unattended but have been imposed by unemployment and poverty. This problem not only leads to their disempowerment but also creates a situation that influences them to involve in deviant behaviours such as crime, drug trafficking, prostitutions, internet scam, election rigging and other fraudulent activities. Youth unemployment and poverty threatened peace and national security which shows that the country needs to re-consolidate, educate, and be dedicated to youths by developing policies and programmes that address their problems. Therefore, the problems associated with youth unemployment and poverty in Nigeria include government failure to empower youths to sustain a living, high rate of crime, the rapid growth of ethnic militias and Boko Haram insurgency, youth involvement in political violence and drug trafficking. The solutions to the problem of youth unemployment and poverty in the country comprise of youth empowerment, employment creation, establishing well-articulated National youth policy, propagate moral reorientation, provide sporting and recreational services and train youths the philosophy of tolerance and hardworking.

The purpose of this paper is to look into the causes, effects and solutions to youth unemployment problems in Nigeria. The rate at which unemployed graduates roam the street after the National Youth Service constitutes social malice to the country as a whole. The data for this paper was collected from secondary sources using descriptive approach of previous researches and analysis of scholars to gather empirical data. The findings revealed that unemployment in Nigeria among youths are caused by six major problems and six major effects which has created tension and hatred between the haves and have not, leading to communal clashes and the rise of such groups such as Boko Haram, Niger Delta Militant, armed robbery, prostitution and child trafficking constituting hiccups to security of lives and properties. Also, the findings revealed that unemployment in Nigeria increased from 21.1% in 2010 to 23.9% in 2011 with youth unemployment at over 50%. From 2011 to 2013 there is an increase of 16% unemployment growth rate in Nigeria. Significantly, the impact of this paper is that government should create labour market that work better for the youths employment and recommends that the government should invest heavily on education to enable the youth become self reliance instead of job seekers through skills development and training.

The Minister of Education, Sam Egwu, while addressing the recent convocation ceremony of Yaba College of Technology, Lagos, assured the millions of unemployed and poor youth lacking employability skills that technical education would enjoy more government support in 2010 because of the role of technology in national development. Such a pronouncement is not new in Nigeria. Previous administrations have raised the people’s hope by painting glowing pictures of their development plans and defined the linkages between technological capability and national development. They also swore that youth empowerment would become the government’s top priority yet successive administrations have refused to properly fund education and failed to prepare the youth for the world of work and to create employment for the millions of graduates churn out by the educational institutions yearly. This paper calls for the leaders to move away from rhetoric to action and tackle the challenges facing education, p...

Unemployment remains one of the greatest problems Nigeria is facing today. This paper thus looks into the unemployment situation in Nigeria, types of unemployment, causes of unemployment in Nigeria and the social effect of unemployment. The paper examines library materials, journal publications, internet materials and other documented materials relevant to the subject matter. It is recommended that the government should put in place massive youth development programmes in all the states of the federation; The general school curriculum should be remodeled to inculcate technical skill acquisition which will help even secondary school graduates to have employable skills; Youth creativeness and entrepreneurial skills need to be encouraged by private organizations and government institutions; Government should make agriculture more attractive by providing and making available modernized tools and also encouraging youths into this direction. The paper concludes that in order to reduce une...

This paper examines the effects of youth unemployment on socioeconomic development in contemporary Nigeria. Youth unemployment in Nigeria is due to high population growth, lack of employable skills due to inappropriate school curricula, perception of policy makers amongst other factors. Youth unemployment can make youths become frustrated as they have to depend on their family for sustenance because they cannot cater for their own needs. The implication of this is that the crises facing contemporary African youths in socioeconomic sectors, like employment, education, and other institutions, are addressed by the government. One striking revelation from this paper is that unemployment affects youth psychologically which can have many short term and long term effects. This paper concludes that tackling the problem of youth unemployment will really do the country good as it will become a better place, safer place and a country filled with talented and confident young men and women. It is, therefore, recommended that youth should be encourage not to only relying on white collar jobs alone but they should be ready to learn vocational jobs such as motor mechanic, fashion designing, catering, soap making, etc. while they are in secondary school. This can be done after school or weekend.