Abstract
The study examined the impact of fiscal fundamental on unemployment rate in Nigeria from 1980 to 2020 focusing on COVID-19 imperatives. The research work embraces OLS estimating techniques to estimate the relationship between the variables. The result of the analysis revealed that government expenditure had positive and significant effect on the rate of unemployment. Also government revenue had a positive but insignificant impact on unemployment during. The implication of these findings for COVID-19 is that the narrative which is obtained from the analysis needs to be changed. Government revenue should be made to have significant impact on unemployment. The pandemic has led to a lot of job lost and the unemployment rate in Nigeria has risen by about 55% peaking at 36% youth unemployment rate as at last quarter of 2020. The study therefore, recommends that government should refocus expenditure and revenue in the country in such a way it will target development of infrastructural facilities so as to increase productivity and in turn facilitate employment generation.