Effects of Unemployment in Relation to Poverty
in a Country

Dreams of iPads, smartwatches, private jets and SUVs, warm winter vacations and best colleges, turn to reality for only a few families.

Ambitions to own a mansion along the sandy beaches or an apartment within reasonable distance to place of work are taking longer to materialize as savings don’t seem to accumulate even as days turn to weeks and weeks to month, years and decades for many families today. What has become crystal clear is the cost of living which rises each year while the rate of unemployment seems to be out of control.

Little or no action is being undertaken to reduce unemployment rates or laxity in government policies is felt deep among individual and social groups. This is entrenching poverty and decline in developments and eventually decline in economy.

Measures governments should undertake to reduce unemployment

The best solution for unemployment in any nation is to create jobs. There are several solutions that any government should embrace and they include:

Enhancing the employability of the labour market.

This means that government should empower the citizens with the necessary skills needed for various disciplines. To achieve this, policies should be set up to improve the education sector as well as lower education costs so as to boost the accessibility to formal education by the poor as well as the rich.

Boost in economic performance and growth.

Sustained economic performance and growth encourages investment because the aggregate demand for goods and services is optimally high for businesses and corporations hence expansion in the workforce.

Provision of incentives for people to search and accept paid work.

This can be achieved through government policies and reforms on the tax and benefits system to offer incentives, subsidies and quotas so as to motivate and encourage people to search for jobs.

Reflating aggregate demand.

Government can undertake measures and use macro-economic policies to increase the levels of aggregate demand. The policies needed include lowering interest rates and lowering VAT and excise duties. This in turn provides a good investment atmosphere for investors and businesses which will seek to expand and in turn the need to offer more jobs.

The government can also foster a conducive business atmosphere for investors who in turn will provide job opportunities to the public.

Employment subsides.

The government could extend subsidies to organization that take on long-term employment policies hence boosting the increase in the size of workforce.