Corrupting Politicians to Get Out of Unemployment: Empirical Evidence from Africa

Unemployment rates in Africa have reached record levels in recent years. While, on the other hand, politicians are increasingly using their positions to influence recruitment processes. This study examines the effect of this political corruption on unemployment in 54 African countries. In particular, it dwells on the heterogeneity of the effects of political corruption on unemployment, particularly the types of jobs through which unemployment is most likely to be affected. To achieve this, we mobilize three indices of political corruption, which allows us to have a diversified and more explicit vision. The use of the generalized method of moments (GMM) reveals that the increase in employment in the private sector caused by the corruption of politicians fails to significantly reduce unemployment. Instead, the corruption of politicians affects unemployment primarily through its effect on public sector jobs. Public jobs’ contribution in the reduction of unemployment remains rather marginal. In other words, politicians can help a person out of unemployment through bribes, but this practice cannot reduce unemployment in an economy significantly. The actions of governments to reduce unemployment must focus, and this with respect to merit, on the private sector because the jobs in the private sector are those which contribute best to the reduction of unemployment.