Country-level institutional conditions and individual-level entrepreneurship dynamics

Entrepreneurship, or the creation of new businesses by individuals, is an important catalyst of economic development and growth. In different countries, population-level prevalence rates of active new business creation activity within the adult-age population can range from 1% to more than 20%, with higher self-employment rates usually observed in low-income economies (Levie, Autio, Acs, and Hart 2014). Given that the creation of entrepreneurial businesses requires the allocation of human, financial, and social capital, and that new businesses are launched to pursue a perceived entrepreneurial opportunity, the entrepreneurial dynamic offers the potential of contributing to the total factor productivity (TFP) at the macro level (Acs, Autio, and Szerb 2014b). Entrepreneurship, therefore, merits close policy attention. [...]