The Impact Of Budget Deficits On Macro-Economic Variables In The Nigerian Economy (1981 – 2012)

Abstract

This study examined the impact of budget deficits on macro-economic variables in the Nigerian economy for theperiod 1981-2012. This study sought to find out if there is a long-run relationship between budget deficits and other macro-economic variables in Nigeria. The study used the Augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF) methods for finding out the presence of unit root in all variables and found that they are stationary at first differencing; they are 1(1). We also used Johansen Cointegration test to check for the cointegration of the variables and found that the variables in the study are all cointegrated of order one showing the presence of long-run relationship between budget deficits and our selected macro-economic variables ( GDP, interest rate, nominal exchange rate and inflation rate). The Granger Causality results reveal that there is a uni-directional Granger-causality between Budget deficits and GDP with GDP granger causing budget deficit. However, the test for causality showed that there exists no causality between deficits and interest rate, budget deficits and inflation and budget deficit and nominal exchange rate. We thereby concluded that budget deficits exert significant impact on the macro-economic performance of the Nigerian economy. The study recommend that since budget deficits could crowd-in investment through its reducing effects in interest rate, but emphasis should be placed on capital goods expenditure to make it have positive effect on GDP and thereby contribute to economic growth and development.