Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Hispanic Self-Employment: A Dynamic Analysis of Business Ownership

Contents:

Author Info

  • Lofstrom, Magnus

    () (Public Policy Institute of California)

  • Wang, Chunbei

    () (University of Texas at Dallas)

Abstract

This paper analyzes causes of the low self-employment rates among Hispanics, which are nearly half of non-Hispanic white self-employment rates. Relatively little is known of the reason for the lower entrepreneurship rates among Hispanics, the fastest growing ethnic group in the U.S. The paper analyzes the self-employment gap by studying self-employment entry and exits, which determine the observed self-employment rates, utilizing nationally representative longitudinal data, the 1996 panel of the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP). The data reveals differences between Mexican-Hispanics and Hispanics not of Mexican descent, referred to as Other-Hispanics. While Mexican-Hispanics are less likely to enter self-employment, relative to whites, Other-Hispanics are more likely to start a business. The differences however, are relatively small but shown to be meaningful in explaining the white-Hispanic self-employment rate gap. The data show large differences in business survival rates between Hispanics and whites. Mexican-Hispanics are almost twice as likely to exit business ownership in a year compared to whites. Our results indicate that differences in education and financial wealth are important factors in explaining differences in entrepreneurship across groups. We also show that the lower self-employment entry rates among Mexican-Hispanics is due to lower entry rates into business ownership of firms in relatively high barrier industries. In fact, Hispanics are more likely to start-up a business in a low barrier industry than whites. Differences in the industry composition across groups is also discussed and analyzed as a determinant of differences in business survival rates.

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://ftp.iza.org/dp2101.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in its series IZA Discussion Papers with number 2101.

as in new window
Length: 45 pages
Date of creation: Apr 2006
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp2101

Contact details of provider:
Postal: IZA, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany
Phone: +49 228 3894 223
Fax: +49 228 3894 180
Web page: http://www.iza.org

Order Information:
Postal: IZA, Margard Ody, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany
Email:

Related research

Keywords: self-employment; entrepreneurship; Hispanic;

Find related papers by JEL classification:

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

References

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
as in new window
  1. David G. Blanchflower, 2004. "Self-Employment: More may not be better," NBER Working Papers 10286, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  2. Douglas Holtz-Eakin & David Joulfaian & Harvey Rosen, 1992. "Entrepreneurial Decisions and Liquidity Constraints," Working Papers 679, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section..
  3. Lofstrom, Magnus, 1999. "Labor Market Assimilation and the Self-Employment Decision of Immigrant Entrepreneurs," IZA Discussion Papers 54, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
  4. Evans, David S & Leighton, Linda S, 1989. "Some Empirical Aspects of Entrepreneurship," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(3), pages 519-35, June.
  5. Holtz-Eakin, Douglas & Joulfaian, David & Rosen, Harvey S, 1994. "Sticking It Out: Entrepreneurial Survival and Liquidity Constraints," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 102(1), pages 53-75, February.
  6. Robert W. Fairlie & Bruce D. Meyer, 1996. "Ethnic and Racial Self-Employment Differences and Possible Explanations," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 31(4), pages 757-793.
  7. Evans, David S & Jovanovic, Boyan, 1989. "An Estimated Model of Entrepreneurial Choice under Liquidity Constraints," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 97(4), pages 808-27, August.
  8. Fairlie, Robert W, 1999. "The Absence of the African-American Owned Business: An Analysis of the Dynamics of Self-Employment," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 17(1), pages 80-108, January.
  9. Timothy Bates, 1989. "The changing nature of minority business: A comparative analysis of asian, nonminority, and black-owned businesses," The Review of Black Political Economy, Springer, vol. 18(2), pages 25-42, September.
  10. Julian R. Betts & Magnus Lofstrom, 1998. "The Educational Attainment of Immigrants: Trends and Implications," NBER Working Papers 6757, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  11. Dunn, Thomas & Holtz-Eakin, Douglas, 2000. "Financial Capital, Human Capital, and the Transition to Self-Employment: Evidence from Intergenerational Links," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 18(2), pages 282-305, April.
  12. Erik Hurst & Annamaria Lusardi, 2004. "Liquidity Constraints, Household Wealth, and Entrepreneurship," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 112(2), pages 319-347, April.
  13. Bates, Timothy, 1990. "Entrepreneur Human Capital Inputs and Small Business Longevity," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 72(4), pages 551-59, November.
  14. Timothy Bates, 1990. "Self-Employment Trends Among Mexican Americans," Working Papers 90-9, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
  15. Lindh, Thomas & Ohlsson, Henry, 1996. "Self-Employment and Windfall Gains: Evidence from the Swedish Lottery," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 106(439), pages 1515-26, November.
  16. Hiromi Taniguchi, 2002. "Determinants of Women's Entry into Self-Employment," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 83(3), pages 875-893.
  17. Kihlstrom, Richard E & Laffont, Jean-Jacques, 1979. "A General Equilibrium Entrepreneurial Theory of Firm Formation Based on Risk Aversion," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 87(4), pages 719-48, August.
Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

Citations

Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
as in new window

Cited by:
  1. Lofstrom, Magnus, 2009. "Low-Skilled Immigrant Entrepreneurship," IZA Discussion Papers 4560, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
  2. Chad Moutray, 2008. "Educational Attainment and Other Characteristics of the Self-Employed: An Examination using Data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics," The Office of Advocacy Small Business Working Papers 07cm, U.S. Small Business Administration, Office of Advocacy.
  3. Robert W. Fairlie, 2013. "Entrepreneurship, Economic Conditions, and the Great Recession," CESifo Working Paper Series 4140, CESifo Group Munich.
  4. Bohn, Sarah & Lofstrom, Magnus, 2012. "Employment Effects of State Legislation against the Hiring of Unauthorized Immigrant Workers," IZA Discussion Papers 6598, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
  5. Taehyun Ahn, 2011. "Racial differences in self-employment exits," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 36(2), pages 169-186, February.
  6. Lofstrom, Magnus & Wang, Chunbei, 2006. "Mexican-Hispanic Self-Employment Entry: The Role of Business Start-Up Constraints," IZA Discussion Papers 2422, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
  7. Lofstrom, Magnus, 2009. "Does Self-Employment Increase the Economic Well-Being of Low-Skilled Workers?," IZA Discussion Papers 4539, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
  8. Georgarakos, Dimitris & Tatsiramos, Konstantinos, 2007. "Entrepreneurship and Survival Dynamics of Immigrants to the U.S. and their Descendants," IZA Discussion Papers 2792, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
  9. Jana Bruder & Doris Neuberger & Solvig Raethke-Doeppner, 2007. "Financial Constraints of Ethnic Entrepreneurship: Evidence from Germany," Thuenen-Series of Applied Economic Theory 84, University of Rostock, Institute of Economics, Germany.
  10. José Millán & Emilio Congregado & Concepción Román, 2012. "Determinants of self-employment survival in Europe," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 38(2), pages 231-258, February.
  11. Fairlie, Robert W., 2011. "Entrepreneurship, Economic Conditions, and the Great Recession," IZA Discussion Papers 5725, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).

Lists

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp2101

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Mark Fallak).

If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

If references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link to it, you can help with this form.

If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.