EuroEconomica, Vol 38, No 2 (2019)

Abstract

The study examines the demand for corruption in Nigeria between 1991 and 2018. While there exist a vast number of literatures on the impact of corruption on several socioeconomic indicators, this study adds to the scanty existing literature on the demand for corruption from the Nigerian perspective. Applying the Autoregressive Distributed Lag Model (ARDL) estimation technique, findings show that both in the shortrun and long run, there exist a positive relationship between income levels, income inequality, unemployment rate and the demand for corruption in Nigeria. Also a negative relationship between poverty and the demand for corruption was found to exist both in the short and long run. Notably, income levels was found to significantly influence the demand for corruption in Nigeria both in the short and long run. The implication of the finding suggests that since higher income levels imply higher demand for corruption in Nigeria, government can significantly reduce the demand for corruption by reducing income inequality through wealth redistribution measures.