Small Business Establishments Research Articles

Development of Multi-dimensional Scale to Measure the Abilities of Rural Women towards Entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship has emerged as a powerful tool for rural women’s empowerment, offering them opportunities to generate income, build self-confidence, and transform their lives. By engaging in entrepreneurial activities, rural women can leverage their skills, creativity, and local knowledge to establish and manage businesses that address the unique needs and challenges of their communities. The present study aimed to develop and validate a multi dimensional scale for evaluating rural women’s entrepreneurial skills, essential for empowering communities through the establishment of small businesses promoting economic progress. The study was conducted in 2023. 60 attitudinal items were initially gathered, evaluated for relevance, and examined. The scale’s final composition included 41 statements spread across six sub-dimensions viz. Cognitive skill, Motivational skill, Social & Relational skill, Management skill, Technical skill and Strategic skill. Cronbach’s Alpha was used to assess reliability, and the resultant coefficient of 0.81 was satisfactory. Expert evaluation was used to check the validity of the content. Researchers in relevant fields can use this standardized scale to evaluate rural women’s entrepreneurial abilities, either as is or with adjustments, promoting empowerment and community development.

Our ‘Pacific family’. Heroes, guests, workers or a precariat?

ABSTRACT Australia launched a Seasonal Worker Programme (SWP) in 2012, shortly after a similar scheme in New Zealand, to bring seasonal workers from Pacific Island Countries (PICS) to work in agriculture. The scheme was seen as a potential ‘Triple Win' with sending and receiving countries, and workers' households, benefiting. Workers’ remittances contributed to welfare, especially housing and education, and small business establishment, but there were social costs associated with repeated absences. In 2018, Australia introduced the Pacific Labour Scheme (PLS) to extend guestwork opportunities into other areas of non-seasonal labour shortage such as aged care, tourism and meat processing. The shortage of local labour during COVID-19 demonstrated that Pacific guestworkers were invaluable to Australia, and in 2022 the schemes were revamped and expanded further as the PALM (Pacific Australia Labour Mobility) Scheme. Concern over a Chinese threat in the region gave further support for the expansion. PICs expressed concerns about exploitative practices, while higher rates of participation increased the potential for an incipient brain drain from the PICs, with wages roughly four times those at home, as migrants now left non-agricultural jobs. The expanded scheme continues to favour Australian employers leaving questions over, equity, uneven development and the future of the PICs.

Investigating the Impact of Institutions on Small Business Creation Among Saudi Entrepreneurs.

Institutions significantly impact people’s attitudes and behaviors, both favorably and negatively. The purpose of this article is to examine the influence of several institutions on the intentions and decisions of Saudi entrepreneurs to start a business. Accordingly, the study on which this article is based used cross-sectional data of 3,376 respondents obtained from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) in 2016. The findings demonstrated that insufficient business legislations and policies have a detrimental impact on the ability to start small businesses. Furthermore, it was discovered that the more media attention is given to successful entrepreneurs, the greater the likelihood of small businesses being established. Surprisingly, the typically high regard for successful entrepreneurs had no positive impact on the establishment of small businesses in Saudi Arabia. Moreover, there was no negative impact of fear of failure on the likelihood of starting small firms. Finally, the influence of control variables, such as age and gender, was also varied. Because the study was limited to the context of Saudi Arabia, future research could focus on expanding the analysis to other Gulf countries and including more institutions.

Effect of workplace dietary intervention on salt intake and sodium-to-potassium ratio of Japanese employees: A quasi-experimental study.

ObjectivesExcess salt intake is a major risk factor for hypertension and cardiovascular disease. Modifying workplace environments has been recognized to be important for reducing salt intake. However, studies examining the effects of improving the workplace environment regarding salt reduction are limited. This study aimed to evaluate the effects of workplace dietary intervention on employees' salt intake and sodium‐to‐potassium (Na/K) ratio.MethodsA quasi‐experimental study was conducted. Two small business establishments in Saitama Prefecture, Japan, were allocated as the intervention (n = 69) and comparison (n = 68) workplaces, respectively. The 1‐year intervention involving healthy lunch and nutrition education was implemented in the intervention workplace. Spot urine samples, physical assessments, and self‐administered questionnaire data were collected at baseline, 6 months, and 1 year after the start of the intervention. Analysis of covariance was conducted to investigate differences in the salt intake or Na/K ratio between the study workplaces at year 1. Educational status and rotating work schedules were included as covariates.ResultsSalt intake in the intervention workplace decreased significantly from 10.7 to 9.3 g (−1.4 g change; 95% confidence interval [CI]: “−2.4, −0.5”). The adjusted difference in changes in salt intake between workplaces was statistically significant (−3.7 g change; 95% CI: “−5.2, −2.3”). Although no significant change was observed in the Na/K ratio in the intervention workplace (3.37–3.08; −0.29 change; 95% CI: “−0.59, 0.01”), the adjusted difference in changes between the workplaces was statistically significant (−0.60 change; 95% CI: “−1.03, −0.17”).ConclusionsProviding healthy lunch and nutrition education may be effective approaches to reduce employees' salt intake and Na/K ratio.

The Impact of COVID-19 on Small Business Dynamics and Employment: Real-time Estimates With Homebase Data

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to an explosion of research using real-time establishment-level data. One key challenge when working with this data is how to take into account the effects of business openings and closings. In this paper, we address this challenge by matching small business establishment records from Homebase with information on business activity from Google, Facebook, and Safegraph to distinguish business closings and openings from other sample exits and entry. We show that this distinction is critical to benchmark the data to pre-pandemic administrative records and estimate the effects of the pandemic on small business activity. We find four key results: (1) employment of small businesses in four of the hardest hit service sectors contracted more severely in the beginning of the pandemic than employment of larger businesses, but small businesses also rebounded more strongly and have on average recovered a higher share of job losses than larger businesses; (2) closings account for 70% of the initial decline in small business employment, but two thirds of closed businesses have reopened and the annual rate of closings is just slightly higher than prior to the pandemic; (3) new openings of small businesses constitute an important driver of the recovery but the annual rate of new openings is only about half the rate one year earlier (4) small business employment was affected less negatively in counties with early access to loans from the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) and in counties where Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC) was more generous relative to pre-pandemic earnings of likely recipients, with business closings accounting for a large part of these two effects. The results dispel the popular notion that small businesses continue to suffer more from the pandemic than larger businesses. At the same time, our analysis suggests that PPP and FPUC helped to significantly mitigate the negative effects of the pandemic for small businesses by, respectively, alleviating financial constraints and stimulating demand for local services.

Neighborhood Demographics and the Allocation of Paycheck Protection Program Funds

Neighborhoods with a high percentage of racial and ethnic minorities received significantly more Paycheck Protection Program dollars per small business than other areas, BPI’s analysis demonstrates. In particular, the nation’s largest banks — those with more than $50 billion in assets — robustly channeled PPP credit into communities with a high percentage minority population. The pandemic relief program also directed a relatively large share of funds to neighborhoods encompassing Opportunity Zones as designated by the Treasury Department. The research shows a neighborhood made up entirely of Opportunity Zones that is in the top fifth of percent minority population would receive about 50 percent more PPP dollars per small business establishment than an area without those zones and with the bottom fifth percent minority population, according to BPI’s estimates.The analysis utilizes detailed loan-level data released by the SBA, merged at the ZIP code level with data from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Treasury Department, to examine the distribution of PPP funds in relation to the percent minority population of neighborhoods and presence of an Opportunity Zone. This is the first national study of which we are aware that analyzes the distribution of PPP funds across neighborhoods within counties.

Targeted state economic development incentives and entrepreneurship

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between state economic development incentives programs and entrepreneurial activity.Design/methodology/approachThe authors use panel data and a fixed-effects model to examine the determinants of five measures of entrepreneurial activity. To measure state economic development incentives programs, they use a new and substantially improved data set from Bartik (2017). They also include a measure for economic freedom, the Fraser Institute’s Economic Freedom of North America index.FindingsThe authors find a robustly negative relationship between development incentives and patent activity. They find some evidence that incentives are negatively associated with small business establishments (<10 employees) as a percentage of total establishments but positively associated with the large business establishment (>500 employees) share. They also find evidence of a positive relationship between economic freedom and both patent activity and net business formation.Research limitations/implicationsThe results imply that economic development incentive programs are unlikely to increase entrepreneurial activity and may decrease it. They also imply increased economic freedom (lower taxes, lower spending, and lower governmental restrictions on labor markets) may increase entrepreneurial activity.Originality/valueTo the authors’ knowledge, this paper provides the first examination of the relationship between development incentives and entrepreneurial activity that utilizes Bartik (2017), a new vastly improved data set of state economic development incentive programs. The paper also contributes to the literature on the relationship between economic freedom and entrepreneurial activity.

Untargeted Incentives and Entrepreneurship: An Analysis of Local Fiscal Policies and Small Businesses in Florida

This paper examines the effects of local taxes and local fiscal expenditures on small businesses in Florida. Our analysis sheds light on the linkage between small business development and local fiscal decisions, which seem to have no obvious or direct connection with targeted business assistance and incentives. Spatial panel regression models are calibrated with county-level tax, expenditure, and social and economic factors for the period of 2008-2013. The estimation results suggest that local tax and expenditure structure and decisions affect the number of small business establishments not only in their “home” counties but also in their neighboring jurisdictions.

Business angels as an alternative to financial support at the early stages of small businesses’ life cycle

In the process of small business establishment and development, it is very important to understand both the financial needs of entrepreneurs and the main obstacles and difficulties arising in the way of financing. Alternative sources of financial support, along with traditional ones, create opportunities to increase funds, but the solution to the issue of their attraction should be based on modern effective methods and decision- making technologies. The article uses the decision tree method to determine the optimal alternative to financial support of small business at the early stages of the life cycle. The results highlight the importance of alternative source of resources for small business entities, namely business angels’ means. The empirical and statistical analysis confirms that access to alternative sources of financing for small businesses in EU countries is improving, while in Ukraine, informal financing is a rather new and underdeveloped area. Based on the analysis of the advantages of using the business angels’ funds, it was concluded that they need to implement their potential in small business of Ukraine. The results show that the decision tree method is an effective tool for deciding on the prioritization of a financial alternative to the small business, and is characterized by ease of use, forecast precision and problems solution novelty.

The Kauffman Index of Main Street Entrepreneurship: National Trends 2016

For the first time since the recovery got underway, Main Street entrepreneurship activity is at higher levels in 2016 than those recorded before the onset of the Great Recession. This increase was primarily driven by a jump in the business survival rates, which reached a three-decade high of 48.7 percent. This means almost half of new businesses are making it to their fifth year of operation. Greater longevity for startup businesses marks a major turnaround from the Great Recession, which saw the business survival rate drop to a low of 42.9 percent in 2011. Survival rates have increased every year since then. The national Rate of Business Owners and the Established Small Business Density remained steady in the 2016 Main Street Index. The Rate of Business Owners was 60 out of 1,000 adults, the same as the previous year. Business Density changed little, logging 676 established small businesses per 1,000 businesses. However, the results show that U.S. small businesses have gotten smaller over the last 20 years. The smallest of those small businesses – companies with one to four employees – make up 53.1 percent of all established small businesses, up from 49.5 percent in 1996.

The Kauffman Index 2016: Main Street Entrepreneurship Metropolitan Area and City Trends

The Kauffman Index of Main Street Entrepreneurship is a comprehensive indicator of small business activity in the United States, integrating high-quality sources of timely information into one composite indicator. The Index captures business activity in all industries and is based on both a nationally representative sample size of roughly 900,000 responses each year and on the universe of all employer businesses in the United States on a dataset covering approximately five million businesses. The focus here is on business owners based on a location, survival rates of firms, and established small businesses — employer firms five years old and older and with fewer than fifty employees. As such, we examine both the business owners and the businesses they own.Main Street entrepreneurship is an important aspect of the U.S. economy and society. Established small businesses make up almost 68 percent of all employer firms in the United States and are a source of local economic activity.This report represents trends in Main Street entrepreneurship activity of the past two decades for the forty largest metropolitan areas in the United States by population. Two separate reports look at these same trends in all fifty states and at the national level. Some Main Street Entrepreneurship Index components, when available, also are reported by demographic groups.

The Kauffman Index 2016: Main Street Entrepreneurship State Trends

The Kauffman Index of Main Street Entrepreneurship is a comprehensive indicator of small business activity in the United States, integrating high-quality sources of timely information into one composite indicator. The Index captures business activity in all industries and is based on both a nationally representative sample size of roughly 900,000 responses each year and on the universe of all employer businesses in the United States on a dataset covering approximately five million businesses. The focus here is on business owners based on a location, survival rates of firms, and established small businesses—employer firms five years old and older and with fewer than fifty employees. As such, we examine both the business owners and the businesses they own.Main Street entrepreneurship is an important aspect of the U.S. economy and society. Established small businesses make up almost 68 percent of all employer firms in the United States and are a source of local economic activity.This report represents trends in Main Street entrepreneurship activity of the past two decades for all fifty states of the United States. Two separate reports look at these same trends in the forty largest metros in the country and at the national level. Some Main Street Entrepreneurship Index components, when available, also are reported by demographic groups.

The Kauffman Index 2015: Main Street Entrepreneurship Metropolitan Area and City Trends

The Kauffman Index: Main Street Entrepreneurship is a novel indicator of small business activity in the United States, integrating high-quality sources of timely information into one composite indicator. The Index captures business activity in all industries, and is based on both a nationally representative sample size of roughly 900,000 responses each year and on the universe of all employer businesses in the United States. The focus here is on established small businesses — employer firms older than five years and with fewer than fifty employees — and the business owners based on a location. As such, we examine both the business owners and the businesses they own.Main Street entrepreneurship is an important aspect of the U.S. economy and society. Established small businesses make up 63 percent of all employer firms in the United States and are a source of local economic activity.Entrepreneurship is a multi-dimensional phenomenon, and the Kauffman Index of Entrepreneurship series — the umbrella initiative for all Kauffman Index reports — studies and analyzes entrepreneurship from various perspectives. Another report, the Kauffman Index: Startup Activity, seeks to view the beginnings of entrepreneurship, focusing on new business creation, market opportunity, and startup density. This series, the Kauffman Index: Main Street Entrepreneurship, takes a different angle and attempts to understand prevalence of local small business.This report presents trends in Main Street entrepreneurship activity for the forty largest metropolitan areas in the United States by population.

The Kauffman Index 2015: Main Street Entrepreneurship State Trends

The Kauffman Index: Main Street Entrepreneurship is a novel indicator of small business activity in the United States, integrating high-quality sources of timely information into one composite indicator. The Index captures business activity in all industries, and is based on both a nationally representative sample size of roughly 900,000 responses each year and on the universe of all employer businesses in the United States. The focus here is on established small businesses — employer firms older than five years and with fewer than fifty employees — and the business owners based on a location. As such, we examine both the business owners and the businesses they own.This report presents trends in Main Street entrepreneurship activity over the past two decades for all fifty states of the United States. Main Street entrepreneurship is an important aspect of the U.S. economy and society. Established small businesses make up 63 percent of all employer firms in the United States and are a source of local economic activity.Entrepreneurship is a multi-dimensional phenomenon, and the Kauffman Index of Entrepreneurship series — the umbrella initiative for all Kauffman Index reports — studies and analyzes entrepreneurship from various perspectives. Another report, the Kauffman Index: Startup Activity, seeks to view the beginnings of entrepreneurship, focusing on new business creation, market opportunity, and startup density. This report, the Kauffman Index: Main Street Entrepreneurship, takes a different angle and attempts to understand prevalence of local small business.This report presents trends in Main Street entrepreneurship activity for the fifty states of the United States, and analyzes trends for states looking at them in two different cohorts: one for the twenty-five largest states by population and another for the twenty-five smallest states by population.

The Kauffman Index 2016: Main Street Entrepreneurship National Trends

The Kauffman Index of Main Street Entrepreneurship is a comprehensive indicator of small business activity in the United States, integrating high-quality sources of timely information into one composite indicator. The Index captures business activity in all industries and is based on both a nationally representative sample size of roughly 900,000 responses each year and on the universe of all employer businesses in the United States on a dataset covering approximately five million businesses. The focus here is on business owners based on location, survival rates of firms, and established small businesses — employer firms older than five years and with fewer than fifty employees. As such, we examine both the business owners and the businesses they own.Main Street entrepreneurship is an important aspect of the U.S. economy and society. Established small businesses make up almost 68 percent of all employer firms in the United States and are a source of local economic activity.This report presents trends in Main Street entrepreneurship over the past two decades for the United States. Two separate reports look at these same trends in all fifty states and the forty largest U.S. metropolitan areas. Some Main Street Entrepreneurship Index components, when available, also are reported by demographic groups.

Large Banks and the Transmission of Financial Shocks

We explore the role of large banks in propagating economic shocks across the U.S. economy. We show that in 2007 and 2008, large banks operating in U.S. counties most affected by the decline in real estate prices contracted their credit to small businesses in counties that were not affected by falling real estate prices. These exposed banks were also more likely to completely cease operations in unaffected counties. By contrast, healthy banks — those not exposed to real estate price shocks — were more likely to expand operations and even to enter new banking markets, capturing market share in both loans and deposits. On average, the market share gain of healthy banks relative to exposed banks was a standard deviation above the long-run historic average market share growth. This offsetting effect was stronger for counties with a larger presence of exposed banks, and it resulted in changes in market share composition that had lasting effects. However, the net effect was negative and counties with a larger presence of exposed banks experienced slower overall growth in deposits, loans, employment, and number of small business establishments. These effects persist for several years after the initial shock.

Crisis phenomena in Russia and cooperation of enterprises to improve the development of monotowns

This article discusses the crisis in Russia, provides suggestions for improving the interaction between the main participants of the socio-economic regional development processes. AS such members large and small enterprises are regarded Emphasis is placed on the promotion and creation of favorable conditions for small business development, a key factor in overcoming territorial problems enhancing the innovative development of the socio-economic system in monoprofile cities. The executive authorities are often inclined to oppose the large-scale enterprises to the small ones, the emerging conflicts are solved in favor of large enterprises. This situation proves that despite declared recognition of the small business importance in practice the small business is discriminated because they are believed to turn out the low efficiency. The involvement of the Russian economy into the global processes implements searching for and finding places where the operation will allow to get the maximum benefit from participation. Such places are presented for instance by «niches» for the provision of resources, primarily oil, gas and partially recycled metal and wood. This situation does not allow the economy of single-industry towns to develop effectively, partially due to lack of developed small businesses interacting with a large enterprise. It becomes clear that today it is impossible to ensure balanced growth of the mono cities economy providing the parallel development of small and large enterprises. The emergence of favorable conditions for the successful solution of local problems is possible when authorities will directly participate in the small business establishment including concrete measures aimed to its development.

Disentangling the roles of international entrepreneurial orientation and networking in the internationalisation process of SESBs

We use the international entrepreneurial orientation construct and network support to understand the internationalisation process of subcontracting established small businesses. This is useful because if there is an abundant literature calling upon the variables independently, a gap subsists concerning their relative roles. In a multiple case study approach, our findings show that, if IEO leads on the long run to higher levels of export activity; it is at the expense of a slow and incremental process. We also find that if networking indeed leads to a more rapid export process, the levels of export activity remain modest and some firms even stop exporting.

Impact of Recent Flood on the Economy of Small Business at Rockhampton

The paper investigates the impact of floods during 2010 December to 2011 January on small business at Rockhampton, A survey of 100 small businesses was undertaken to determine the impact of the recent flood for this study and the valid response rate was 55%. Four research questions and hypotheses were developed to test. The main purpose of the study was to find the relationship among location of business, number of employees including the owner, weekly turnover, and the year of establishment of the business and the impact of recent floods. To test the hypotheses Pearson and Spearman s correlation were used. The results show that the impact of flood on small businesses is directly related to the location of businesses, weekly turnover, and small business with lower number of employees caused more flood impact on the businesses at 1% level of significance using Pearson correlation test. The number of years of establishment of small business is not correlated with the impact of flood and the results support that there is no correlation between the year of establishment of business and the impact of flood. The paper ends with limitations and policy implications.

THE IMPACT OF AUTOMOBILE PRODUCTION ON THE GROWTH OF NON-FARM PROPRIETOR DENSITIES IN ALABAMA’S COUNTIES

This paper studies the impact of the auto industry on the growth of non-farm proprietor densities in Alabama's counties. Results show that automobile production in Alabama significantly increases non-farm proprietor in all counties. The impact of automobile production on the growth of non-farm proprietor densities in distressed black belt counties is greater than other counties. Then, appropriate policies to lure industrial development become very important to increase the self employment opportunity. There is significant spatial lag effects and spatial error effects between non-farm proprietor densities and per capita income.Keywords: Automobile Production, Non-Farm Proprietor Densities, Spatial Dependence, Generalized Spatial Three Stage Least Square, Generalized Method of MomentsJEL classification: O14, R11, R12(ProQuest: ... denotes formulae omitted.)1. INTRODUCTIONEntrepreneurship is a key catalyst for economic growth and regional development. State and local policymakers are allocating considerable resources to promote entrepreneurship. In the United States, the number of full and part time non-farm self employed, or proprietors, grew by around 300% or from 9.6 million in 1969 to 29.2 million in 2004. In comparison, the number of full and part time wage and salary workers grew by only 77% or from 78.8 million in 1969 to 138.8 million workers in 2004. The ratio of self to wage and salary employment nearly doubled, from 0.12 to 0.21, over this period (Goetz and Rupasingha, 2009).In 2006, nonfarm proprietor employment accounted for 18.8 percent of total nonfarm employment in United States. In Alabama, this percent was 17.8, and ranged from 10.4 percent to 43.3 percent. Microenterprise employment represented 17.7 percent of U.S nonfarm employment and 16.7 percent of Alabama nonfarm employment. Within Alabama, this ranged from 12.6 percent to 30.5 percent (RUPRI, 2007). Over the past two decades the focus of economic development policy has shifted more heavily toward entrepreneurship. This increased interest in the entrepreneur's role in the economy has led to a growing body of research attempting to identify the factors that promote entrepreneurship. Most applied economic research on entrepreneurship uses the number of nonfarm self-employed individuals as a share of the labor force as a measure of entrepreneurship.The greatest spillover benefit of automobile plants in Alabama is the movement of input suppliers and supporting services to Alabama counties. These firms cluster around automobile plants. Clusters are characterized by a focus on one particular industrial activity and the fact that many small firms specialize in different phases of the production process (OECD, 1996). Clusters enhance the competitiveness of established small businesses and thereby influencing the survival rate of these businesses. Clustering thus can have an impact on the level of entrepreneurship through both entry and exit. Automobile production in Alabama helped spur the formation of new businesses and increased the growth of existing firms.This paper studies the impact of automobile production on the ratio of non farm proprietorships to all full and part time workers. This study also examines how county level economic, social variables and county level spillover effects influence rates of non-farm proprietorships density. In this study, non-farm proprietorships density and per capita income are considered to be interdependent.2. LITERATURE REVIEWEntrepreneurship is important because the competitive behavior of entrepreneurs drives the market process and leads to economic progress (Kirzner, 1973). From society's perspective, the profits earned by entrepreneurs represent gains to society as a whole. Entrepreneurs deal with uncertainty about the future, not with risk. Probabilities can be estimated for risky activities and thus are insurable. Since entrepreneurs are dealing with uncertainty about the profitability of their new combinations of resources, entrepreneurs cannot insure against the probability that new goods and services will not be liked. …