Human capital and employment in the WAEMU countries : Case of Benin, Burkina, Niger and Senegal

The issue of employment is one of the main challenges of inclusive growth for most African countries. 11 million young people enter the labor market each year, while the sub-Saharan Africa labor market offers only 3 million jobs, a gap of around 8 million jobs per year (ADB, 2017). From this work, we evaluate, using a multinomial logit model (MLM), the impact of human capital on the probability of access to employment in a sample of WAEMU countries with data from household surveys. The results show that a significant increase in human capital allows for a qualified job in all four WAEMU countries. However, in Senegal, the accumulation of vocational and/or technical training has led to a considerable increase in skilled employment.