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Motivations for Entrepreneurship

Trends in Entrepreneurship | Take a closer look at what motivates an individual to become an entrepreneur, and how it can reflect the broader economic environment as well as influence the nature and direction of the business activity itself.

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Featured highlights:

  • In 2018, the opportunity share of new entrepreneurs was 86.2%, indicating that nearly 9 out of 10 new entrepreneurs were pursuing a business opportunity and about 1 in every 10 new entrepreneurs likely lacked other options in the labor market.
  • Fewer women became new entrepreneurs than men. When they did, women were more likely to be pursuing a business opportunity than their male counterparts.
  • Employer businesses are the subset of businesses that hire employees. In 2016, among employer business owners, the most common reasons for starting a business were pursuing a greater income (55.5% said this was very important) and wanting to be their own boss (55.4% said this was very important). Being their own boss was very important to 60.3% of men compared to 44.2% of women employer business owners.
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