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Self-employment: the role of intellectual property right laws

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  • Andrew Burke
  • Stuart Fraser

Abstract

Little is known about the impact of intellectual property rights (IPRs) on typically imitative self-employment. IPR laws have contrasting dual innovation creation and access effects on self-employment activity. The first effect is positive where strong IPR laws promote innovation and so create new opportunities for self-employment. The second effect is negative where strong IPR laws restrict access to innovation and technology used as inputs to self-employed businesses. Using a 33-country dataset over the period 1995–2000, we estimate the impact of IPR laws on self-employment, helping to fill the vacuum of empirical evidence that has plagued policy decision making in this area. We find that patent activity has a negative effect on self-employment. However, overall, we find that more extensive and strong IPR laws have a net positive effect on self-employment activity. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media, LLC. 2012

Suggested Citation

  • Andrew Burke & Stuart Fraser, 2012. "Self-employment: the role of intellectual property right laws," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 39(4), pages 819-833, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:sbusec:v:39:y:2012:i:4:p:819-833
    DOI: 10.1007/s11187-011-9336-5
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    Cited by:

    1. Ali Hussein Samadi, 2019. "Institutions and entrepreneurship: unidirectional or bidirectional causality?," Journal of Global Entrepreneurship Research, Springer;UNESCO Chair in Entrepreneurship, vol. 9(1), pages 1-16, December.
    2. André Stel & Serhiy Lyalkov & Ana Millán & José María Millán, 2019. "The moderating role of IPR on the relationship between country-level R&D and individual-level entrepreneurial performance," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 44(5), pages 1427-1450, October.
    3. Andrew Burke & Serhiy Lyalkov & Ana Millán & José María Millán & André Stel, 2021. "How do country R&D change the allocation of self-employment across different types?," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 56(2), pages 695-721, February.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Self-employment; Intellectual property rights; Law; L2; O33; O34; P48; L2; L26;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L2 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior
    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
    • O34 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Intellectual Property and Intellectual Capital
    • P48 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Other Economic Systems - - - Legal Institutions; Property Rights; Natural Resources; Energy; Environment; Regional Studies
    • L2 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior
    • L26 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Entrepreneurship

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