The work describes the essence and genesis of entrepreneurship; It is highlighted that entrepreneurship, as an object of research, was not always given a prominent place in the history of economic thought. The first to use the term "entrepreneur" and explain its importance in the development of the economy was the French scholar Richard Cantillon; It is shown that the foundation of the modern understanding of entrepreneurship was laid by the Austrian Joseph Schumpeter, who recognized the creative entrepreneur as a revolutionary of the economy, i.e. the basis of development. Based on existing studies, entrepreneur and businessman are distinguished from each other because the entrepreneur tends to experiment, innovate and create new things. A businessman is focused on effective business management issues. An entrepreneur, as opposed to a businessman, is someone who owns and manages his own business; Entrepreneurship is divided according to the level of innovation and degree of risk: "business", "traditional entrepreneurship" and "innovative entrepreneurship. Such a separation is made only at the theoretical level, because it is impossible to do it in practice even due to the lack of statistical accounting data; It is justified that business and entrepreneurship have different goals and objectives, ways of achieving the goal, role of owners and attitude to mistakes; The difference between an entrepreneur and an inventor (rational analyst), an entrepreneur and a manager is established point by point; It is noted that a maximum of ten percent of the economically active population is gifted with entrepreneurial ability (talent), and professional managers are much more; It is emphasized that the content of the entrepreneur's work is very similar to the people of such creative professions as: scientist, writer and director. Keywords: entrepreneur, businessman, manager, business, traditional entrepreneurship, innovative entrepreneurship, inventor.
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