IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/unu/wpaper/wp-2015-140.html

Understanding Ghana's growth success story and job creation challenges

Author

Listed:
  • Ernest Aryeetey
  • William Baah-Boateng

Abstract

Ghana's status as one of the African Lions is linked to the country's remarkable growth performance, which culminated in the attainment of lower middle-income status. However, employment response to growth has been weak. Additionally, growth has been accompanied by substantial reduction in poverty, albeit increasing inequality. This development is explained by a slower growth in high labour absorption sectors of agriculture and manufacturing as against high growth in low employment generating sectors of mining and oil extraction.

Suggested Citation

  • Ernest Aryeetey & William Baah-Boateng, 2015. "Understanding Ghana's growth success story and job creation challenges," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2015-140, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
  • Handle: RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2015-140
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.wider.unu.edu/sites/default/files/Publications/Working-paper/PDF/wp2015-140.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. repec:wbk:wbpubs:18237 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Sparreboom, Theo. & Gomis, Roger., 2015. "Structural change, employment and education in Ghana," ILO Working Papers 994895323402676, International Labour Organization.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lambon-Quayefio, Monica & Asiedu, Edward & Atitsogbui, Edwin, 2025. "Educational inequality and labour market outcomes in Ghana: A district-level analysis," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 1063-1081.
    2. Hoedoafia, Mabel Akosua, 2019. "Private Sector Development in Ghana: An Overview," MPRA Paper 96732, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Christian K. Darko & Kennedy K. Abrokwa, 2020. "Do you really need it? Educational mismatch and earnings in Ghana," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 24(4), pages 1365-1392, November.
    4. Kwakwa, Paul Adjei, 2019. "Ghana’s economic growth and welfare issues," MPRA Paper 96019, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Sèna Kimm Gnangnon, 2023. "Do unilateral trade preferences help reduce poverty in beneficiary countries?," International Journal of Economic Policy Studies, Springer, vol. 17(1), pages 249-288, February.
    6. Diao, Xinshen & Fang, Peixun & Magalhaes, Eduardo & Pahl, Stefan & Silver, Jed, 2017. "Cities and rural transformation: A spatial analysis of rural youth livelihoods in Ghana," IFPRI discussion papers 1599, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    7. Diao, Xinshen & Magalhaes, Eduardo & Silver, Jed, 2019. "Cities and rural transformation: A spatial analysis of rural livelihoods in Ghana," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 121(C), pages 141-157.
    8. Gamel Abdul-Nasser Salifu, 2019. "The Political Economy Dynamics of Rural Household Income Diversification: A Review of the International Literature," Research in World Economy, Research in World Economy, Sciedu Press, vol. 10(3), pages 273-290, December.
    9. Clementi, Fabio & Molini, Vasco & Schettino, Francesco, 2018. "All that Glitters is not Gold: Polarization Amid Poverty Reduction in Ghana," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 275-291.
    10. Gnangnon, Sèna Kimm, 2021. "Do Unilateral Trade Preferences Help Reduce Poverty in Beneficiary Countries?," EconStor Preprints 247346, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    11. Desai, Raj M. & Rudra, Nita, 2019. "Trade, poverty, and social protection in developing countries," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 60(C).
    12. James Atta Peprah & Isaac Kwesi Ofori & Abel Nyarko Asomani, 2019. "Financial development, remittances and economic growth: A threshold analysis," Cogent Economics & Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 7(1), pages 1625107-162, January.
    13. Stephen Golub & Aly Mbaye & Hanyu Chwe, 2015. "Labor Market Regulations in Sub-Saharan Africa, With a Focus on Senegal," Working Papers 201505, University of Cape Town, Development Policy Research Unit.
    14. Esther Duflo & Pascaline Dupas & Michael Kremer, 2021. "The Impact of Free Secondary Education: Experimental Evidence from Ghana," NBER Working Papers 28937, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Tian Hongyun & William Adomako Kankam & Florence Appiah-Twum & Isaac Gumah Akolgo, 2019. "Effect of Social Capital on Firm Performance: The Role of Entrepreneurial Orientation and Dynamic Capability," International Review of Management and Marketing, Econjournals, vol. 9(4), pages 63-73.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Cirera, Laia & Castelló, Judit Vall & Brew, Joe & Saúte, Francisco & Sicuri, Elisa, 2022. "The impact of a malaria elimination initiative on school outcomes: Evidence from Southern Mozambique," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 44(C).
    2. Ernest Aryeetey & William Baah-Boateng, 2015. "Understanding Ghana's growth success story and job creation challenges," WIDER Working Paper Series 140, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    3. Nimoh, Nana C. & Ali, Abdilahi & Syme, Tony, 2020. "Earnings gaps, Segmentation and Competitiveness in the Ghanaian Labour Market," EconStor Preprints 214817, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2015-140. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Siméon Rapin (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/widerfi.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.