Pub Date : 2009-09-04DOI: 10.1108/01443580910973565
Colin Williams
Purpose - This paper aims to evaluate critically the assumption that the main reason for acquiring domestic services from the off-the-books economy is to save money. Design/methodology/approach - Data are reported from an internet survey of 5,500 people living in households with one or more members in employment in the city of Sheffield in the UK, which resulted in 418 responses (a 7.6 per cent response rate). Findings - In just 13 per cent of cases where domestic tasks were outsourced to the off-the-books economy the main reason was to save money or cost. Instead, off-the-books workers were used principally due to the problems customers confronted regarding the availability and quality of formal service providers. Research limitations/implications - This survey covers only households with one or more members in employment, a population group previously shown to be more likely to outsource domestic services and use off-the-books workers. It does not cover no-earner households and is not a nationally representative sample. Practical implications - The implication is that using penalties to change the cost/benefit ratio confronting those acquiring domestic services from the off-the-books economy is unlikely to be successful since cost is in most cases not their major rationale. Instead, attention needs to be paid to improving the availability and quality of formal service provision so as to negate the need for customers to outsource to off-the-books workers. Originality/value - The paper refutes the assumption that goods and services are acquired from the off-the-books economy in order to save money.
{"title":"Rationales for Outsourcing Domestic Services to Off-the-Books Workers","authors":"Colin Williams","doi":"10.1108/01443580910973565","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/01443580910973565","url":null,"abstract":"Purpose - This paper aims to evaluate critically the assumption that the main reason for acquiring domestic services from the off-the-books economy is to save money. Design/methodology/approach - Data are reported from an internet survey of 5,500 people living in households with one or more members in employment in the city of Sheffield in the UK, which resulted in 418 responses (a 7.6 per cent response rate). Findings - In just 13 per cent of cases where domestic tasks were outsourced to the off-the-books economy the main reason was to save money or cost. Instead, off-the-books workers were used principally due to the problems customers confronted regarding the availability and quality of formal service providers. Research limitations/implications - This survey covers only households with one or more members in employment, a population group previously shown to be more likely to outsource domestic services and use off-the-books workers. It does not cover no-earner households and is not a nationally representative sample. Practical implications - The implication is that using penalties to change the cost/benefit ratio confronting those acquiring domestic services from the off-the-books economy is unlikely to be successful since cost is in most cases not their major rationale. Instead, attention needs to be paid to improving the availability and quality of formal service provision so as to negate the need for customers to outsource to off-the-books workers. Originality/value - The paper refutes the assumption that goods and services are acquired from the off-the-books economy in order to save money.","PeriodicalId":443161,"journal":{"name":"ERPN: Employment Impacts (Sub-Topic)","volume":"35 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-09-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125031119","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2006-07-01DOI: 10.1111/j.1475-4991.2011.00491.x
R. Fairlie, Harry Krashinsky
A large body research shows a positive relationship between wealth and entrepreneurship and interprets the relationship as providing evidence of liquidity constraints. Recently, however, the liquidity constraint interpretation has been challenged because of the finding that the relationship between business entry rates and assets is flat throughout most of the asset distribution and only rises dramatically after this point (Hurst and Lusardi 2004). We reexamine the liquidity constraint hypothesis in three ways. First, we demonstrate that examining the relationship separately for those who experience a job loss and those who do not reveals generally increasing entry rates through the wealth distribution for both groups. Based on the entrepreneurial choice model of Evans and Jovanovic (1989), these two groups face different incentives, and thus have different solutions to the entrepreneurial decision. We also find evidence of a stronger relationship between entrepreneurship and a different measure of wealth – net housing equity – for the two groups. Second, we examine the liquidity constraint hypothesis using a two-period simulation model that extends the Evans and Jovanovic (1989) model. The model shows how exogenous wealth shocks can be used to accurately identify the presence of liquidity constraints even allowing for endogenous saving and correlated abilities. Third, we provide new evidence from matched Current Population Survey (1993-2004) data to study whether changes in housing prices affect self-employment entry.
{"title":"Liquidity Constraints, Household Wealth, and Entrepreneurship Revisited","authors":"R. Fairlie, Harry Krashinsky","doi":"10.1111/j.1475-4991.2011.00491.x","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-4991.2011.00491.x","url":null,"abstract":"A large body research shows a positive relationship between wealth and entrepreneurship and interprets the relationship as providing evidence of liquidity constraints. Recently, however, the liquidity constraint interpretation has been challenged because of the finding that the relationship between business entry rates and assets is flat throughout most of the asset distribution and only rises dramatically after this point (Hurst and Lusardi 2004). We reexamine the liquidity constraint hypothesis in three ways. First, we demonstrate that examining the relationship separately for those who experience a job loss and those who do not reveals generally increasing entry rates through the wealth distribution for both groups. Based on the entrepreneurial choice model of Evans and Jovanovic (1989), these two groups face different incentives, and thus have different solutions to the entrepreneurial decision. We also find evidence of a stronger relationship between entrepreneurship and a different measure of wealth – net housing equity – for the two groups. Second, we examine the liquidity constraint hypothesis using a two-period simulation model that extends the Evans and Jovanovic (1989) model. The model shows how exogenous wealth shocks can be used to accurately identify the presence of liquidity constraints even allowing for endogenous saving and correlated abilities. Third, we provide new evidence from matched Current Population Survey (1993-2004) data to study whether changes in housing prices affect self-employment entry.","PeriodicalId":443161,"journal":{"name":"ERPN: Employment Impacts (Sub-Topic)","volume":"3 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2006-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"128724110","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Innovative start-ups and their respective market partners are faced with severe problems of asymmetric information due to their lack of prior production history and reputation. We study whether entrepreneurial signaling can help solve these problems and thereby increase the potential success of innovative start-ups. We concentrate our analysis on the credit and labor market because they are crucial for the success of innovative start-ups and focus on the role of educational signals. We argue that entrepreneurs signal their quality to potential employees and creditors with certain characteristics of their educational history. According to our theoretical considerations we expect potential employees to use an entrepreneur's university degree as a quality signal when deciding whether to accept a job at an innovative start-up. And we expect banks to use a more precise indicator, namely the actual length of study in relation to a standard length, as a signal when deciding upon credits for an innovative founder. However, since asymmetric information problems and skill requirements are different for traditional start-ups we do not expect employees or banks to use the same signals for traditional start-ups. We empirically test our implications based on a dataset of more than 700 German start-ups collected in 1998/99. All implications are borne out in the data. So contrary to conventional wisdom, educational degrees and studying fast (not just studying) are even more important success factors for innovative than for traditional start-ups.
{"title":"Entrepreneurial Signaling: Success Factor for Innovative Start-Ups","authors":"U. Backes-Gellner, Arndt Werner","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.383941","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.383941","url":null,"abstract":"Innovative start-ups and their respective market partners are faced with severe problems of asymmetric information due to their lack of prior production history and reputation. We study whether entrepreneurial signaling can help solve these problems and thereby increase the potential success of innovative start-ups. We concentrate our analysis on the credit and labor market because they are crucial for the success of innovative start-ups and focus on the role of educational signals. We argue that entrepreneurs signal their quality to potential employees and creditors with certain characteristics of their educational history. According to our theoretical considerations we expect potential employees to use an entrepreneur's university degree as a quality signal when deciding whether to accept a job at an innovative start-up. And we expect banks to use a more precise indicator, namely the actual length of study in relation to a standard length, as a signal when deciding upon credits for an innovative founder. However, since asymmetric information problems and skill requirements are different for traditional start-ups we do not expect employees or banks to use the same signals for traditional start-ups. We empirically test our implications based on a dataset of more than 700 German start-ups collected in 1998/99. All implications are borne out in the data. So contrary to conventional wisdom, educational degrees and studying fast (not just studying) are even more important success factors for innovative than for traditional start-ups.","PeriodicalId":443161,"journal":{"name":"ERPN: Employment Impacts (Sub-Topic)","volume":"23 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2004-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121105537","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The authors explore the relationship between the relative size of the small and medium enterprise (SME) sector, economic growth, and poverty using a new database on the share of SME labor in the total manufacturing labor force. Using a sample of 76 countries, they find a strong association between the importance of SMEs and GDP per capita growth. This relationship, however, is not robust to controlling for simultaneity bias. So, while a large SME sector is characteristic of successful economies, the data fail to support the hypothesis that SMEs exert a causal impact on growth. Furthermore, the authors find no evidence that SMEs reduce poverty. Finally, they find qualified evidence that the overall business environment facing both large and small firms-as measured by the ease of firm entry and exit, sound property rights, and contract enforcement-influences economic growth.
{"title":"Small and Medium Enterprises, Growth, and Poverty: Cross-Country Evidence","authors":"Asli Demirgüç-Kunt, T. Beck, R. Levine","doi":"10.1596/1813-9450-3178","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1596/1813-9450-3178","url":null,"abstract":"The authors explore the relationship between the relative size of the small and medium enterprise (SME) sector, economic growth, and poverty using a new database on the share of SME labor in the total manufacturing labor force. Using a sample of 76 countries, they find a strong association between the importance of SMEs and GDP per capita growth. This relationship, however, is not robust to controlling for simultaneity bias. So, while a large SME sector is characteristic of successful economies, the data fail to support the hypothesis that SMEs exert a causal impact on growth. Furthermore, the authors find no evidence that SMEs reduce poverty. Finally, they find qualified evidence that the overall business environment facing both large and small firms-as measured by the ease of firm entry and exit, sound property rights, and contract enforcement-influences economic growth.","PeriodicalId":443161,"journal":{"name":"ERPN: Employment Impacts (Sub-Topic)","volume":"28 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2003-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132252971","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
京公网安备 11010802042870号
京ICP备2023020795号-1
扫码关注我们
求助内容：
应助结果提醒方式：