Regional Institute For Population Studies University Of Ghana.

ABSTRACT This dissertation uses data from the 2000 and 2010 Ghana Population and Housing Censuses on the active labour force aged 15-64 years and carries out a comparison of 2000 and 2010 regarding the socio-economic differences associated with unemployment in both years. It examines the variation between the unemployed in 2000 and 2010 in terms of their level of education and place of residence and investigates the factors that explain these variations. The study sampled a total of 828,048 and 1,153,395 respondents of age 15-64 years in the 2000 and 2010 Population and Housing Census data respectively and run two separate models to observe the statistical association between levels of education and unemployment and place of residence and unemployment in 2000 and 2010. Another model was further run to observe the statistical association between the two independent variables (level of education and place of residence) together with the six control variables (age, sex, migration status, marital status, religion and ethnicity) and unemployment in 2000 and 2010. It tested the hypothesis that unemployment in Ghana is associated with people with no education. Again, unemployment in Ghana is associated with urban residents relative to their rural counterparts. Inter alia, the study found that respondents with primary and secondary education are more likely to be unemployed compared to their counterparts with no education in 2000. But in 2010 respondents with secondary and tertiary levels of education were more likely than those with no education to be unemployed. It found education to be statistically significant in both years. The study also confirmed that Ghana‟s unemployment is more prevalent in urban than rural areas. The study recommended that, the high youth unemployment which coincides with the transition from various levels of education to the world of work be managed with pragmatic policies such as apprenticeship and start-up capital so as to reduce the proportion of unemployed youth. Ghana can as well resort to provision of entrepreneurial training and start‐up support would attract these young secondary school leavers into setting up small enterprises and grow them gradually. The high proportion of migrants which is rapidly urbanizing our cities has contributed to the high unemployment prevalence in the country. Hence, the study suggested both „job creation‟ and „job expansion‟ to address the unemployment incidence in these urban areas. Job expansion would ensure the absorption and balance with the growth of the unemployed population