Small Business Economics

We investigate the productivity spillovers from the UK government’s decision to use extensive property tax reductions as a key instrument to stimulate innovation in smaller businesses and drive local growth. To capture the complex interaction and clustering of hierarchical effects, we apply non-parametric Random Effects Expectation Maximisation algorithm that complements more standard econometric estimators, namely matching to control for endogeneity and control functions to estimate total factor productivity. These approaches enabled us to incorporate various contextual configurations in comparing the recipients of these reductions to non-recipients with regard to productivity, in which the UK has experienced a considerably worse performance than its peers since the great recession. Contrary to policy assumptions and business community expectations, we show that generic tax reductions, when significant, are mostly associated with lower productivity and thus have been unsuitably chosen as a policy mechanism to stimulate productivity growth. We further show how instruments that are not built for causality could be beneficial for policy evaluation. Reductions in small business property tax will not solve UK productivity problem. We investigate the productivity spillovers from the UK government’s decision to use extensive property tax reductions as a key instrument to stimulate innovation in smaller businesses and drive local growth. We incorporate various contextual interactions in comparing the recipients of these reductions to non-recipients with regard to productivity, in which the UK has experienced a considerably worse performance than its peers since the great recession. Contrary to policy assumptions and business community expectations, we show that generic tax reductions, when significant, are mostly associated with lower productivity and thus have been unsuitably chosen as a policy mechanism to stimulate productivity growth. Thus, the principal implication of this study is that instead of generic tax incentives based on building and land value, policy should be more nuanced and targeted, enabling the inclusion of finer-grained characteristics. We also contribute to methodology development by showing how configuration approaches, centring on non-linearity and equifinality, could be enabled through the application of machine learning to study organisations.

Women are consistently underrepresented among graduate entrepreneurs. This is especially true among the entrepreneurs who graduate in STEM fields. Here, we aim at identifying factors that reduce/enlarge the gender imbalance in entrepreneurship among STEM graduates. In particular, we explore the underinvestigated association between university education in STEM fields and entrepreneurial entry of recent female and male graduates considering graduates’ whole university curriculum. Our analyses on the graduates who obtained a Master of Science degree in the 2005–2009 period from Politecnico di Milano reveal that training in economics and management reduces the gender imbalance in entrepreneurial entry among STEM recent graduates. The gap is instead larger among the graduates who attended courses that aggregate students from different STEM fields or did an internship. University education affects the gender gap in entrepreneurship among STEM graduates! Attending courses aggregating students from multiple STEM programs and doing internships enhance this gap, while training in economics and management reduces it. Women are severely underrepresented among STEM graduate entrepreneurs. Our study investigates the relationship between university education in STEM fields and entrepreneurial entry of recent female and male graduates. Using data on 13,840 graduates who obtained a Master of Science degree in the 2005–2009 period from Politecnico di Milano, we find that attending courses in economics and management reduces the gender imbalance in entrepreneurial entry among STEM recent graduates. The gap is instead larger among the graduates who attended courses aggregating students from different STEM fields or did an internship. Our study offers important implications for university managers, as it helps them design university curricula in STEM fields that may be more conducive to female entrepreneurial entry.

This paper gives an empirical analysis of determinants of new-firm survival in the manufacturing sector of Baden-Wuerttemberg (Germany) from 1981 to 1994. The analysis focuses on firm- and industry-specific determinants of new-firm survival. A possible effect of regional agglomeration and of the business cycle is also tested, albeit in a very general manner. From a methodical point of view parametric and semiparametric duration models are used. Grouped duration models are estimated taking into account the problem of ties. Moreover, the problem of unobserved heterogeneity is considered which has so far been neglected in numerous studies. The empirical analyses show with respect to industry-specific effects that the risk of new-firm failure is the larger the larger an industry’ s minimum efficient scale is, the worse the sectoral demand-conditions are, the more narrow the market is, the higher dynamics of foundation within an industry are. The liability of smallness-hypothesis is confirmed for German manufacturing while with respect to firm age the results favour the liability of adolescence-hypothesis instead of a pure liability of newness.

In the 1970's the Japanese machine tool builders began to create and develop, first in the US and later in Europe, new markets for computer-numerically controlled (CNC) machine tools. Their control-technology innovations rendered the machines of their US competitors obsolete. Consequently, many US and German machine tools builders, who saw their markets being destroyed by their larger Japanese competitors in the late 1970's, were forced to exist the industry in the mid 1980's. This study identifies the main characteristics of the world machine tool industry, describes the evolution of the world machine tool industry from the early 1960's, and analyzes the effect of Japanese innovation on US and German machine tool markets.

In the market of business services the easier segment of large business is being saturated. Therefore, suppliers of business services must seek to cater to the growing but more difficult segment of small business, if their growth is to be maintained. With appropriate extensions, Transaction Cost Economics can facilitate understanding of the nature of the difficulty involved. Due to effects of scale in transaction costs it is relatively more expensive to provide services tailored to the individual smaller firm. Standardisation of services may be required to make access to this market viable. The question arises whether such standardised methods should be stimulated by the government. To see how this issue is perceived by suppliers of various business services, a survey was conducted on a sample of 1,000 firms, with a response of 30%. The issue of economies of scale in transaction costs did emerge, but was not universally perceived as a problem. Many respondents confirmed the need for standardised modules. Opinions were sharply divided on the issue whether the government should step in to promote standardisation across suppliers. Cluster analysis shows that respondents fall neatly into a number of classes that conceptually and statistically are highly distinct. Just over half of the respondents were clearly against government intervention, and about one third of these (“radical market proponents”) were of that opinion even though they granted that the scale issue constituted a problem of access to the small business market. Just under half of the respondents clearly favoured government intervention, and about half of those (“radical interventionists”) were of that opinion even though they saw no great problem of access due to problems of scale, or were hesitant about that problem. Accountancy firms tended to be in favour of intervention, and business consultants tended to be against. The government might explore the matter further with accountants, while leaving the business consultants alone.

This paper studies the relationship between entrepreneurship and regional growth by arguing that the entrepreneurship/growth relationship is mediated by the characteristics of the innovative environment in which new firms operate, which can explain the high volatility of the empirical results on the entrepreneurship/regional growth nexus existing in the literature. The innovation context represents the pool of discovery opportunities and of creative atmosphere that may explain the birth of an entrepreneurial activity. Moreover, these opportunities may or may not be grasped according to behavioral characteristics of regional entrepreneurs, interpreted as potential capacity to discover, risk orientation and strategic vision. We provide evidence of the complex and spatially heterogeneous interplay between regional innovation modes, entrepreneurial behavioral characteristics and economic growth for 252 NUTS2 regions of the European Union.

This study investigates the effects of human capital, social capital and their interaction on the performance of 1,398 Vietnamese new-born firms. Operating profit is used as the measure of success. Human capital is captured by individual-level professional education, start-up experience, and learning. Whereas the first two dimensions of human capital are measured with traditional indicators, we define learning as the ability to accumulate knowledge to conduct innovation activities (new product introduction, product innovation and process innovation). Social capital is measured as benefits obtained from personal strong-tie and weak-tie networks. Key findings are threefold: (i) human capital strongly predicts firm success, with learning exhibiting a statistically significant positive association with operating profit, (ii) benefits from weak ties outweigh those from strong ties, (iii) interaction of human capital and social capital displays a statistically significant positive effect on new-firm performance.

This paper examines the innovative ability of small firms in the semiconductor industry regarding their exploration of technological diversity and their integration within local knowledge networks. Through the analysis of patent data, we compare the innovative activity of start-up firms and larger firms. We find that small firms explore new technological areas by innovating in less ‘crowded’ areas. The analysis of patent citation data reveals that small firms are tied into regional knowledge networks to a greater extent than large firms. These findings point to the role of entrepreneurial firms in the exploration of new technological spaces and in the diffusion of their accumulated knowledge through local small firm networks.