What Distinguishes a Serial Entrepreneur?

HECER Discussion Paper No. 111

33 Pages Posted: 23 Aug 2006

See all articles by Pekka Ilmakunnas

Pekka Ilmakunnas

Aalto University School of Business

Ari Hyytinen

University of Jyväskylä

Multiple version iconThere are 2 versions of this paper

Date Written: August 2006

Abstract

We analyze serial entrepreneurship using a unique crosssectional survey of employees that is for this study linked with longitudinal, register-based employer-employee data. Serial entrepreneurship accounts for nearly 30% of the transitions from paid employment into entrepreneurship. What make an entrepreneur serial are her aspirations and her ability to go ahead and live by them. Specifically, we document that having worked in the past as an entrepreneur increases both the probability that a person presently in paid employment aspires to again become an entrepreneur and, holding the aspirations constant, the probability of her again becoming an entrepreneur. We also find that an employee with entrepreneurial aspirations is more likely to become an entrepreneur subsequently, than an employee without such aspirations. Finally, holding aspirations constant, working in the public sector and being a union member are inversely related to the likelihood of transiting into entrepreneurship.

Keywords: self-employment, aspirations, serial entrepreneurship, employer-employee data

JEL Classification: J23, J64, L20

Suggested Citation

Ilmakunnas, Pekka and Hyytinen, Ari, What Distinguishes a Serial Entrepreneur? (August 2006). HECER Discussion Paper No. 111, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=926047 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.926047

Pekka Ilmakunnas (Contact Author)

Aalto University School of Business ( email )

PO Box 21240
FI-00076 Aalto, Helsinki
Finland
+358 40 5815390 (Phone)

Ari Hyytinen

University of Jyväskylä ( email )

PO Box 35
Jyväskylä, 40014
Finland

HOME PAGE: http://www.jyu.fi

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
332
Abstract Views
2,025
Rank
166,045
PlumX Metrics