Abstract
This paper uses time-series data to attempt to identify the factors responsible for the rise in self-employment amongst UK males, focusing in particular on the period of rapid growth which was experienced during the 1980s. The empirical results suggest that the most significant long-run influence on the growth of self-employment has been the rise in the real value of personal sector liquid wealth, though rising levels of GDP and, to a lesser extent, increases in the real value of housing wealth have also made a significant contribution. There is tentative support for the notion that Mrs Thatcher may have succeeded in ushering in an 'entrepreneurial renaissance' within the UK economy, though the evidence for this is rather crude. There is no evidence for the view that 'recession-push' effects have been significant in accounting for the rise in self-employment.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Acs, Zoltan, J., David B. Audretsch and David S. Evans, 1994, 'Why Does the Self-Employment Rate Vary Across Countries and Over Time?', Discussion Paper No. 871, Centre For Economic Policy Research.
Banerjee, Anindya, David F. Hendry and Gregor W. Smith, 1986, 'Exploring Equilibrium Relationships in Econometrics Through Static Models: Some Monte Carlo Evidence', Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics 48(3), 253-277.
Banerjee, Anindya, Juan Dolado, John W. Galbraith and David F. Hendry, 1993, Co-integration, Error-Correction, and the Analysis of Non-stationary Data, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Black, Jane, David de Meza and David Jeffreys, 1996, 'House Prices, the Supply of Collateral and the Enterprise Economy', Economic Journal 106(434), 60-75.
Blanchflower, David G. and Richard B. Freeman, 1994, 'Did the Thatcher Reforms Change British Labour Market Performance?', in Ray Barrell (ed.), The UK Labour Market: Comparative Aspects and Institutional Developments, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Blanchflower, David G. and Andrew J. Oswald, 1990, 'Self-employment and the Enterprise Culture', in R. Jowell, S. Witherspoon and L. Brook (eds.), British Social Attitudes: the 1990 Report, Aldershot: Gower.
Blanchflower, David G. and Andrew J. Oswald, 1991, 'What Makes an Entrepreneur?', Applied Economics Discussion Paper No. 125, Institute of Economics and Statistics, University of Oxford.
Blau, David M., 1987, 'A Time Series Analysis of Self-Employment in the United States', Journal of Political Economy 95(3), 445-467.
Campbell, Martin and Michael Daly, 1992, 'Self-Employment: Into the 1990's', Employment Gazette, June, 269-292
Cowling, Marc and Nick Clay, 1995, 'Factors Influencing Take-Up Rates on the Loan Guarantee Scheme', Small Business Economics 7(2), 141-152.
Crouchley, R., P. Abell and D. Smeaton, 1994, 'An Aggregate Time Series Analysis of Non-Agricultural Self-Employment in the UK', Discussion Paper No. 209, Centre For Economic Performance, London School of Economics.
Cuthbertson, Keith and David Gasparro, 1995, 'Fixed Investment Decisions in UK Manufacturing: the Importance of Tobin's Q, Output and Debt', European Economic Review 39(5), 919-942.
Cuthbertson Keith, Stephen G. Hall and Mark P. Taylor, 1992, Applied Econometric Techniques, London: Harvester Wheatsheaf.
Employment Department, 1989, Small Firms in Britain, London: HMSO.
Engle, Robert F. and Clive W. J. Granger, 1987, 'Cointegration and Error Correction: Representation, Estimation and Testing', Econometrica 55(2), 251-276.
Engle, Robert F. and B. S. Yoo, 1991, 'Cointegrated Economic Time Series: An Overview With New Results', in Robert F. Engle and Clive W. J. Granger (eds.), Long-Run Economic Relationships, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Evans, David S. and Boyan Jovanovic, 1989, 'An Estimated Model of Entrepreneurial Choice Under Liquidity Constraints', Journal of Political Economy 97(4), 808-827.
Evans, David S. and Linda S. Leighton, 1989, 'The Determinants of Changes in US Self-Employment, 1968–1987', Small Business Economics 1(2), 111-119.
Hall, Stephen G., 1991, 'The Effect of Varying Length VAR Models on the Maximum Likelihood Estimates of Cointegrating Vectors', Scottish Journal of Political Economy 38(4), 317-323.
Hendry, David F., 1989, PC-GIVE, An Interactive Econometric Modelling System, Oxford: University of Oxford.
Hotz-Eakin, Douglas, David Joulfaian and Harvey S. Rosen, 1994, 'Entrepreneurial Decisions and Liquidity Constraints', RAND Journal of Economics 25(2), 334-347.
Johansen, Soren, 1988, 'Statistical Analysis of Cointegration Vectors', Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control 12(2/3), 231-254.
King, Mervyn A., 1977, Public Policy and the Corporation, Cambridge Studies in Applied Econometrics: 3, London: Chapman and Hall.
Kremers, J. J. M., Neil Ericsson and Juan Dolado, 1992, 'The Power of Co-integration Tests', Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics 54(3), 325-348.
Long, James E., 1982, 'The Income Tax and Self-Employment', National Tax Journal 35(1), 31-42.
MacKinnon, James G., 1991, 'Critical Values for Co-integration Tests', in Robert F. Engle and Clive W. J. Granger (eds.), Long-Run Economic Relationships, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Meyer, Bruce, 1990, 'Why Are There So Few Black Entrepreneurs?', National Bureau of Economic Research, Working Paper No. 3537.
Moore, Robert L., 'Self-Employment and the Incidence of the Payroll Tax', National Tax Journal 36(4), 491-501.
Parker, Simon C., 1996, 'A Time Series Model of Self-Employment Under Uncertainty', Economica 63(431), 459-475.
Reddaway, W. B., 1973, Effects of the Selective Employment Tax: Final Report, Department of Applied Economics, Cambridge, Occassional Paper 32, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Robson, Martin T., 1996a, 'Macroeconomic Factors in the Birth and Death of UK Firms: Evidence From Quarterly VAT Registrations', The Manchester School 64(2), 170-188.
Robson, Martin T., 1996b, 'Housing Wealth, Business Creation and Dissolution in the UK Regions', Small Business Economics 8(1), 39-48.
Robson, Martin T., 1996c, 'Self-Employment in the UK Regions', mimeograph, Department of Economics, University of Newcastle upon Tyne.
Robson, Martin T. and Colin Wren, 1996, 'Marginal and Average Tax Rates and the Incentive for Self-Employment', paper presented at the Employment and Education Economics Group overnight workshop, University of Leeds, July 1996.
Staber, Udo and Dieter Bogenhold, 1993, 'Self-Employment: A Study of Seventeen OECD Countries', Industrial Relations Journal 24(2), 126-137.
Stock, James H., 1987, 'Asymptotic Properties of Least-Squares Estimators of Co-integrating Vectors', Econometrica 55(5), 1035-1056.
Storey, David J., 1994, Understanding the Small Business Sector, London: Routledge.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Robson, M.T. The Rise in Self-Employment Amongst U.K. Males. Small Business Economics 10, 199–212 (1998). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1007990921394
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1007990921394