Savings and economic diversification among youth in Ghana: implications for policy and practice

Figures & data

Table 1. Definition of variables, measurement and summary statistics

			Savings	Non-Savings
Variable	Measurement	Pool	Mean	Mean	χ^2Value	P-value
Savings	Dummy (yes=1, otherwise 0)	0.37
Youth-Specific factors
Age	Years	21.73	22.27	21.41	275.215	0.000
Gender	Dummy (male = 1, female = 0)	0.586	0.583	0.588	0.3124	0.576
Marital status	Dummy (Married = 1)	0.337	0.348	0.045	170.12	0.000
Number employed	Count	2.33	2.39	1.97	323.391	0.000
Socioeconomic factors
Farm Size	Acres	5.682	13.925	0.892	220.140	0.000
MASO_Entrepr	Dummy (If youth perceived MASO helped equip entrepreneurial skill = 1)	0.392	0.416	0.295	47.819	0.000
Migration	Dummy (Yes = 1)	0.143	0.324	0.037	170.33	0.000
Structural/Institutional factors
Com_Devt_grp	Dummy (If youth belong to community development group = 1)	0.061	0.144	0.013	747.091	0.000
Leadership function	Dummy (If youth holds a leadership position = 1)	0.956	0.896	0.991	528.714	0.000
FIs_Unavailable	Dummy (If youth perceive financial institutions are unavailable = 1)	0.026	0.011	0.039	18.631	0.0001
FIs_Trust	Dummy (If youth trust financial institutions = 1)	0.213	0.211	0.671	15.731	0.000
Digital Marketing	Dummy (If youth uses mobile phone for online marketing)	0.232	0.221	0.121	418.921	0.000

N = 10,656

Source: Analysis of MASO data, 2020.

Figure 1. Regional distribution of savings among the youth of Ghana.

Source: Analysis of MASO data, 2020

Figure 2. Distribution of economic diversification among the youth in Ghana.

Source: Analysis of MASO data, 2020.

Figure 3. Density plot of Economic Diversification.

Figure 4. Reason why the youth do not save regularly in Ghana.

Source: Analysis of MASO data, 2020.

Table 2. Effect of savings on economic diversification of the youth in Ghana

Variable	Endogenous-Switch Poisson		Exogenous-Switch Poisson
	Coef.	Std. Err.	Coef.	Std. Err.
Economic Diversification
Age	0.062^a	0.006	0.062^a	0.006
Gender	0.279^a	0.028	0.279^a	0.028
Marital status	0.147^a	0.028	0.147^a	0.028
Number employed	0.041^a	0.012	0.041^a	0.012
Farm Size	0.000	0.00	0.000	0.000
MASO_Entrepr	0.134^a	0.026	0.134^a	0.026
migration	0.044	0.028	0.044	0.028
Com_Devt_grp	0.155^a	0.058	0.155^a	0.058
Leadership role	0.124^c	0.069	0.124^c	0.069
Savings	0.242^a	0.05	0.239^a	0.037
Constant	−1.817^a	0.147	−1.815^a	0.146
Switch (Savings)
Age	0.018	0.097	0.037^a	0.008
Marital status	0.036	0.191	0.071	0.046
FIs_Unavailable	−0.370^b	0.177	0.230	0.177
FIs_Trust	0.241^a	0.024	0.321^a	0.121
Digital Marketing	0.421^a	0.124	0.412^a	0.121
Constant	0.33	1.623	−0.004	0.183
sigma	0.003	0.022	0.000	0.005
rho	−0.973^a	0.293
Observations	10,763		10,763
Wald C hi2	449.48		478.52
Prob (Chi2)	0.000		0.000
Log likelihood	−8386.6213		−8386.905

a, b and c represent 1%, 5% and 10% significance level respectively

N = 10,656.

Source: Analysis of MASO data, 2020.