Skip to main content
Log in

Do Entrepreneurs Create Jobs?

  • Published:
Small Business Economics Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Many countries support the creation of new firms. Such policy is based on the presumption that the total number of jobs increases when a person moves from unemployment or regular employment to self-employment. In this paper the link between self-employment and overall employment is analyzed. The empirical analysis, based on panel data of Swedish counties from 1976–1995, pays particular attention to simultaneity issues. The results suggest that self-employment may have a significant positive effect on overall employment.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Acs, Z. J. (ed.), 1996, Small Firms and Economic Growth, Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.

    Google Scholar 

  • Acs, Z. J., B. Carlsson and C. Karlsson (eds.), 1998, Entrepreneurship, Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises and the Macro Economy, Cambridge University Press.

  • Anderson, T. W. and C. Hsiao, 1981, ‘Estimation of Dynamic Models with Error Components’, Journal of American Statistical Association 76.

  • Baumol, W. J., 1990, ‘Entrepreneurship: Productive, Unproductive, and Destructive’, Journal of Political Economy 98(5).

  • Baumol, W. J., 1993, Entrepreneurship, Management, and the Structure of Payoffs, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Birch, D., 1979, The Job Generation Process. Final Report to Economic Development Administration, Cambridge, MA: MIT Program on Neighborhood and Regional Change.

    Google Scholar 

  • Blanchflower, D. G. and B. D. Meyer, 1994, ‘A Longitudinal Analysis of the Young Self-employed in Australia and the United States’, Small Business Economics 6(1), 1–19.

    Google Scholar 

  • Blanchflower, D. G. and A. J. Oswald, Does Access to Capital Help Make an Entrepreneur?, NBER Working Paper, No. 3252, 1991.

  • Blau, D. M., 1989, ‘A Time-series Analysis of Self-employment in the United States’, Journal of Political Economy 95(3), 445–467.

    Google Scholar 

  • Calmfors, L., 1994, Active Labour Market Policy and Unemployment - A Framework for the Analysis of Cirucial Design Features. OECD Economic Studies, No. 22, 1994.

  • Calmfors, L. and P. Skedinger, 1995, ‘Does Active Labourmarket Policy Increase Employment?’, Oxford Review of Economic Policy 11, 91–109.

    Google Scholar 

  • Crouchley, R., P. Abell, and D. Smeaton, 1994, An Aggregate Time Series Analysis of Non-agricultural Self-employment in the U.K., Discussion Paper No. 209, Centre for Economic Performance, London School of Economics, London.

    Google Scholar 

  • Davidsson, P., L. Lindmark and C. Olofsson, 1998, ‘The Extent of Overestimation of Small Firm Job Creation - An Empirical Examination of the Regression Bias’, Small Business Economics 11, 87–100.

    Google Scholar 

  • Davis, S. J., J. Haltiwanger and S. Schuh, 1996a, ‘Small Business and Job Creation: Dissecting the Myth and Reassessing the Facts’, Small Business Economics 8(4), 297–315.

    Google Scholar 

  • Davis, S. J., J. Haltiwanger and S. Schuh, 1996b, Job Creation and Destruction, Boston, MA: The MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Evans, D. S. and B, Jovanovic, 1989, ‘An Estimated Model of Entrepreneurial Choice under Liquidity Constraints’, Journal of Political Economy 97(4).

  • Fölster, S. and G. Trofimov, G., 1997, Does the Welfare State Discourage Entrepreneurs?, IUI Working Paper.

  • Grubb D. and Wells, W., Employment regulation and patterns of work in EC countries. OECD Economic Studies, no. 21, 1993.

  • Holtz-Eatkin, D., D. S. Joulfaian and H. S. Rosen, 1994a, ‘Sticking It Out: Entrepreneurial Survival and Liquidity Constraints’, Journal of Political Economy 102(1), 53–75.

    Google Scholar 

  • Holtz-Eatkin, D., D. Joulfaian and H. S. Rosen, 1994b, ‘Entrepreneurial Decisions and Liquidity Constraints’, Rand Journal of Economics 25(2), 334–347.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kihlstrom, R. E. and J. J. Laffont, 1979, A General Equilibrium Entrepreneurial Theory of Firm Foundation Based on Risk Aversion, vol. 87, 719–748.

    Google Scholar 

  • Knight, F. H., 1921, Risk, Uncertainty and Profit, New York: Houghton Mifflin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Koskela, E. and M. Virén, 1994, ‘Taxation and Household Saving in Open Economies - Evidence from the Nordic Countries’, Scandinavian Journal of Economics 96(3), 425–441.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kotlikoff, L. J., 1995, Privatization of Social Security: How It Works and Why It Matters, NBER Working Paper No. 5330.

  • Laussel, D. and M. Le Breton, 1995, ‘A General Equilibrium Theory of Firm Formation Based on Individual Unobservable Skills’, European Economic Review 39, 1303–1319.

    Google Scholar 

  • Layard, R., R. Jackman and S. Nickell, 1991, Unemployment, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lindh, T. and H. Ohlsson, 1995, ‘Self-employment and Selffinancing’, Economic Journal.

  • Lindh, T. and H. Ohlsson, 1996, Self-employment and Selffinancing, Department of Economics, Uppsala University, Working Paper.

  • Lucas, R. Jr., 1978, ‘On the Size Distribution of Business Firms’, Bell Journal of Economics 9, 508–523.

    Google Scholar 

  • Maddala, G. S., 1977, Econometrics, McGraw Hill International.

  • Meager, N., 1994, Self-employment Schemes for the Unemployed in the European Community: The Emergence of a New Institution and Its Evaluation, I Schmid, G., red., Labor Market Institutions in Europe - a Socioeconomic evaluation of performance, M.E. Sharpe, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Moore, R. L., 1983, ‘Employer Discrimination: Evidence from Self-employed Workers’, Review of Economics and Statistics 65, 496–501.

    Google Scholar 

  • Murphy, K. M., A. Schleifer and R. W. Vishny, 1991, ‘The Allocation of Talent: Implications for Growth’, Quarterly Journal of Economics,503–530.

  • Nickell, S., 1981, ‘Biases in Dynamic Models with Fixed Effects’, Econometrica 49.

  • OECD Employment Outlook, July 1992, p. 158.

  • Parker, S. C., 1996, ‘A Time Series Model of Self-employment under Uncertainty’, Economica 63(251), 459–475.

    Google Scholar 

  • Quadrini, V., Entrepreneurship, Saving and Social Mobility, Mimeo, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania.

  • Rees, H. and A. Shah, 1986, ‘An Empirical Analysis of Selfemployment in the U.K.’, Journal of Applied Econometrics 1, 95–108.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schumpeter, J. A., 1911, The Theory of Economic Development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, English translation, 1936.

    Google Scholar 

  • Storey, D. J., 1994, Understanding the Small Business Sector, New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Thurik, R., 1999, The Dutch Polder Model: Shifting from the Managed Economy to the Entrepreneurial Economy, Paper presented at AEA meeting in New York, January.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Fölster, S. Do Entrepreneurs Create Jobs?. Small Business Economics 14, 137–148 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1008141516160

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1008141516160

Keywords

Navigation