Peter van der Zwan

Business Takeover or New Venture? Individual and environmental determinants from a cross-country study.

Whereas the determinants of entrepreneurial choice have been thoroughly analyzed in the literature, little is known about the preferred mode of entry into entrepreneurship, such as taking over an existing business or starting a new venture. Using a large international data set, this study reports considerable differences in takeover preferences across 33 countries. Hierarchical (multilevel) regressions are performed to explore individual–level and country–level determinants of the preferred mode of entry. At the individual level, a persons human capital, risk attitude, and inventiveness influence the preference for starting a new venture versus taking over an existing business. At the country level, the culture–inherent level of risk tolerance, the countrys level of innovation output, and the administrative difficulty of starting a new business are found to explain the between–country variation in the preferred mode of entry. Implications of our findings for research and practice are also discussed.

The Entrepreneurial Ladder in Transition and Non-Transition Economies

This paper compares (former) transition and non-transition economies in Europe and Asia with respect to the opportunities available to achieve entrepreneurial progress. In addition, the differential impacts of three perceived environmental barriers to new venture creation are investigated. Entrepreneurial progress is measured using five levels of incremental entrepreneurial involvement. Data from the 2009 “Flash Eurobarometer Survey on Entrepreneurship, No. 283” by the European Commission, which covers all 27 EU Member States, five other European countries, China, Japan, South Korea, and the U.S., are used. China is found to have a forward position during the early stages of entrepreneurial progress, which contrasts with a lack of early-stage entrepreneurial potential in Japan and South Korea. However, converting nascent activities into a business start-up seems to be the most difficult in China and the U.S. Furthermore, we find that perceived environmental constraints hinder entrepreneurial progress most in (former) European transition countries.

The stature of the self-employed and its relation with earnings and satisfaction

Taller individuals have on average a higher socio-economic status than shorter individuals. In countries where entrepreneurs have high social status, we may therefore expect that entrepreneurs are taller than wage workers. Using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (2002-2012), we find that a 1cm increase in an individuals height raises the probability of being self-employed (the most common proxy for entrepreneurship) versus paid employed by 0.15 percentage points. Within the self-employed, the probability of being an employer is increased by 0.10 percentage points as a result of a 1cm increase in height, whereas this increase is 0.05 percentage points for an own-account worker. This result corroborates the higher social status of employers compared to own-account workers. We find a height premium in earnings for self-employed and paid-employed individuals: an additional 1cm in height is associated with a 0.39% increase in hourly earnings for paid employees and a 0.52% increase for self-employed individuals. Our analysis reveals that approximately one third of the height premium in earnings is explained by differences in educational attainment. We also establish the existence of a height premium in terms of work and life satisfaction, which is more pronounced for paid employees than for self-employed individuals.

Life satisfaction and self-employment in different types of occupations

ABSTRACT In this research, we investigate whether a positive relationship between life satisfaction and self-employment (versus paid employment) exists while simultaneously considering two occupational dimensions: white-collar versus blue-collar work and high-skilled versus low-skilled work. Using Eurobarometer data for a large number of European countries (2008–2012), our findings confirm that self-employed workers are more satisfied with their lives than paid employees are. A life satisfaction premium is also found when the self-employed and paid employees are compared within similar occupations in terms of collar type and skill level. Finally, self-employment can help to overcome low life satisfaction scores associated with blue-collar and low-skilled work.

Health and entrepreneurship in four Caribbean Basin countries

The literature dealing with health and entrepreneurship has focused on developed countries. We use a sample of almost 5000 business owners and wage-workers from four Caribbean Basin countries to study this relationship. Analyses are performed using data from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor along with the Visual Analogue Scale of the EQ-5D-5L instrument as an overall health rating. The results show that business owners are healthier than wage-workers, which is in line with the findings from studies in developed countries. Furthermore, better health is associated with a lower likelihood for fear of business failure to be a deterrent to new business formation, a greater likelihood of self-belief in having the skills to run a business, and an increased recognition of start-up business opportunities among wage-workers. These positive associations between health and entrepreneurial perceptions provide new evidence about why less healthy individuals refrain from entrepreneurship. Finally, we find that the healthiest business owners run the companies with the highest growth expectations.

The Pleasures and Pains of Self-Employment: A Panel Data Analysis of Satisfaction with Life, Work, and Leisure

We investigate how a transition from paid employment to self-employment in the labor market influences life satisfaction. Furthermore, we consider the dynamics of work and leisure satisfaction because the balance between work and leisure is an important element of life satisfaction. Fixed-effects regressions using German Socio-Economic Panel data (1984-2012) reveal that switching to self-employment benefits life and work satisfaction. The effects on life satisfaction are weak and temporary, but they are pronounced and relatively persistent for work satisfaction. However, the gain in work satisfaction is outweighed by a decrease in leisure satisfaction, thus placing work-life balance under severe pressure.

Self-employment and stress: Cross-sectional, longitudinal and experimental evidence

We compare self-reports on stress at work between the self-employed and wage workers in a large, world-wide, cross-sectional sample. Next, we examine what happens with stress levels when people leave paid employment and become self-employed in a longitudinal framework. Lastly, we analyse within an experimental framework how the self-employed and wage workers respond to stressors. The analyses reveal that self-employed workers report less work-related stress than wage workers. The higher degree of decision autonomy of the self-employed is largely responsible for this finding. The results hold in particular for the self-employed without employees. The analysis of responses to stressors induced by experimental tasks suggests that the self-employed and wage workers do not differ in their capabilities of dealing with stress. Together, these findings suggest that job characteristics of self-employment rather than individual characteristics of the self-employed are responsible for the stress differences.

The pleasures and pains of self-employment: A panel data analysis

Despite the fact that the self-employed are more satisfied with their work than the paid employed, they are not more satisfied with their life. We show that the balance between one’s working and no...

Bank Debt and Trade Credit for SMEs: International Evidence

This paper examines the links between firm age, firm size and the ability to obtain capital in a sample of European SMEs. The results indicate that age and size are positively linked to debt capacity. Furthermore, our analysis reveals that it is crucial to distinguish between bank debt financing and trade credit. Young and small firms are more subject to denial due to the higher moral hazard they represent for a bank. Only very young firms are more constrained for trade credit. The results of simultaneous analysis show that trade credit is positively related to bank credit financing, thus providing empirical support for the complementarity of these forms of financing.