Going From Entrepreneur Back to Employee: Employer Type, Task Variety, and Job Satisfaction

While the literature documents a wage loss for entrepreneurs that return to paid employment, we examine how these entrepreneurs are re-integrated into the labor market. We consider which type of employers hire entrepreneurs and their satisfaction with the new corporate job. Using matched employer-employee data from Belgium combined with an ad-hoc survey, we find that entrepreneurs are hired by smaller employers that offer fewer employee benefits and pay less, contributing to explaining the wage loss. We also find that entrepreneurs are more satisfied than observationally equivalent employees when they are assigned to jobs that involve higher task variety. This effect is more pronounced for entrepreneurs who sort into better employers. Our findings highlight the importance for managers to assign entrepreneurs to the "right" job tasks.