Necessity Entrepreneurs. Determining Factors

Abstract

The aim of this study is to analyse the factors that turn individuals into necessity-driven entrepreneurs. The starting point is a theory of the logic of entrepreneurial action, whereby given a number of individual conditioning and contextual factors, only certain people choose entrepreneurship out of necessity, while others do not. The data were taken from the Eurobarometer and the Generalised Structural Equation Modelling (GSEM) methods were employed using Stata. The results show significant differences among the European Union population in terms of necessity-driven entrepreneurship based on a number of individual factors, namely their entrepreneurial spirit, image of entrepreneurs, propensity for risk-taking, gender, age, entrepreneurship education, perception of a household’s economic situation; and also, on contextual factors such as unemployment rate, industrial relations system and development levels of their country of residence.