Phd thesis summary. Regional determinants of unemployed women entrepreneurship in Poland

Transcription

1 Katarzyna Gerejczyk Phd thesis summary Regional determinants of unemployed women entrepreneurship in Poland The dissertation covers the problem of unbalance of regional labour markets in Poland in the context of women s distinctive situation as important and underutilised resources of the supply side of the labour market. From the theoretical perspective, the thesis in question draws from the heritage of the new institutional economics and the new economic geography. In particular, it refers to the role of informal institutions in the formation of economic phenomena and social boundaries of any business activity, as well as to the heterogeneity of the geographic and economic space. In the course of conducted analysis the process definition of entrepreneurship has been adopted. It is assumed that the entrepreneurial process consists of consecutive phases. The first phase of the process, which is the subject of analysis in the dissertation, is named the creation of an enterprise. This phase of the entrepreneurial process is composed of all the elements which lead to the entrepreneurial decision made by an unemployed women and of all the output elements which constitute the newly-established enterprise (e.g. the type of undertaken business activity, sources of finance etc.). Thus, the regional determinants of the process are interpreted as a set of characteristics of a given economic territory which have direct or indirect influence on the entrepreneurship development in a given area. The research problem is to determine the regional mechanisms of the entrepreneurial process of unemployed women, who were registered at the County Labour Offices as unemployed (so called registered unemployment) and who have set up their own enterprises utilising the nonrecurring start-up funding offered by the County Labour Offices. The main thesis of the research indicates that the region s specificity influences the enterprise creation by unemployed women. Under the term region s specificity it is refereed to both: region s unique attribute, as well as region s attribute which occurs extraordinarily frequent in a given region in comparison to other regions. The dissertation is composed of 7 chapters. The first chapter covers theoretical background and introduction to the issue of importance of regional determinants in creation of 1

2 enterprises by unemployed women. The introduction is presented in view of macro- and microeconomic determinants of entrepreneurship. In this chapter a conceptual regional model of entrepreneurial process of unemployed women is being introduced, which constitutes a conceptual background for divagations in the course of further analysis. The second chapter deals with an analysis of regional differences in an entrepreneurial potential embodied in unemployed women and their sources, as well as with an analysis of regional differences in the local environment of newly-created enterprise belonging to unemployed women. The third chapter of the dissertation in devoted to the methodical introduction to the empirical research. The research was composed of individual in-depth interviews with unemployed women (n=30) and a survey carried out among entrepreneurs, both women (n=126) and men (n=104), who were previously registered as unemployed in the Country Labour Offices and who were granted start-up funding for establishing their own company. Next chapters cover the following issues: the differences in the inflow sources of unemployed women into entrepreneurship (chapter 4), the influence of regional determinants on the entrepreneurial decision of the unemployed (chapter 5) and the influence of regional determinants on the characteristics of the newly-established enterprises of the unemployed (chapter 6). The last chapter is devoted to summarise the analysis and divagations presented in the dissertation. It includes the presentation of specificity of the enterprise creation phase of the entrepreneurial process model of unemployed women in different regional breakdowns. The divagations presented in the dissertation allow to conceptualise the individual entrepreneurship of unemployed women in Poland as an economic process, which takes place in a given time and space. It is also justified to conclude that the structural differences of the unemployed women resources in different regional breakdowns (in terms of their age, level of education, work experience and unemployment duration) depict the regional demographic, educational, historical, political, spatial, economic, administrative-legal, organisational and socio-cultural determinants. At the same time, the regional differences in the companies local environment to a high degree depend on the location of a given territorial unit in the socioeconomic space, historically-bounded region s economic specialisation and region's development level, socio-cultural, administrative-legal and organizational determinants. The local environment is also influenced by the short-, middle-, and long-term economic business cycles. Thus, the changes of the business cycles have impact on the size and type of women's unemployment in a given region, as well as, for instance, on the size of internal demand. Therefore, the economic business cycle may facilitate or inhibit the entrepreneurial decisions made by the unemployed. 2

3 Due to the fact that the place of residence of the unemployed more often becomes the headquarters of a newly-established company, the spatial determinants play a vital role in the entrepreneurial process of this subpopulation. In fact, the spatial determinants influence to a high degree all the other determinants of the phenomenon in question. In the dissertation special attention has been drawn to the administrative-legal and organisational determinants of the entrepreneurial process of unemployed women. Thus, the level of entrepreneurship support from the Country Labour Offices plays a crucial role as a prerequisite for entrepreneurial decisions made by the researched subpopulation. The level of this support shows substantial regional differences. Moreover, in the company creation phase of the entrepreneurial process very important role is played by the socio-economic determinants, which have conscious or unconscious impact on the economic decisions made by unemployed women. Factually, those determinants have detrimental effect on the women s entrepreneurship. Among the socio-economic determinants the following are referred to in the thesis: personal determinants, the need to reconcile work and family life and lack of tradition of women s occupational activity in some regions. Additionally, in many regions there are difficulties encountered in the physical or economic access to the institutional forms of children and dependant people care facilities. This problem is particularly visible in case of rural and peripheral regions. Generally, the meso-level of women s occupational activity, region s entrepreneurial traditions and the prevailing economic family model influence the individual entrepreneurship of the unemployed women in a given region. Basing on the empirical research, 7 typical profiles of unemployed women who set up their own companies has been identified. The structure of the profiles and the dominant profile differentiated when spatial and economic filters have been applied into analysis. Analysed spatial variables (east-border and west-border localisation, as well as the localisation in the sphere of influence of Warsaw, Katowice and Olsztyn agglomerations) had greater impact on the structural changes than economic variables (structure and level of development of regional economy). Moreover, the research has shown that unemployed women are motivated by both reactive and proactive motivational factors while making decision on setting up their enterprise. Furthermore, unemployed women s entrepreneurship is strongly rooted in families. They often tend to set also non-economic goals while making entrepreneurial decision. Further, the dominant motivation and motivational sets were differentiated when regional and sex variables were introduced into analysis. The most complex and diverse motivational sets were characteristic for all the agglomerations spheres of influence. 3

4 It is to be noted that six types of entrepreneurship barriers, which are characteristic for the unemployed, have been identified. These include: administrative-legal, educational, financial, psychological, market and socio-cultural. The prevalent one was the financial barrier of entrepreneurship. The most important component of this barrier were too high taxes and obligatory payments (especially to the National Insurance Agency). Among barriers which were women-specific the psychological and personal have been exemplified (namely: risk avoidance, lack of self-confidence and fear of defeat). It is to be underlined that the empirical research results show that the regional determinants have no influence on: the dominant type of economic activity undertaken by unemployed women (sections: M, G, P of the Polish Classification of Business Activities, 2007), types of financial sources engaged in the creation of a new company and the level of employment in newly-established firms. On the contrary, the regional determinants have an impact on: the emergence of typical types of business activities which are characteristic for a given region category or type, the structure of financial sources (the degree of own savings utilisation) and the operational scale of women s enterprises. In particular, business activities undertaken by unemployed women and characteristic for a given category or type of regions include: craftsmen activities (east-border region), health care (west-border region), industrial manufacturing (industrial and less-developed regions), other service activities (rural and lessdeveloped regions) and artistic activities (service regions). The highest shares of unemployed women who have utilised savings as a financial source for company creation were recorded in the west-border region and the industrial, highly-developed regions. This correlation reflects the general level of regional affluence differences and capital intensity of different business activity types which were undertaken by unemployed women. Lastly, the local operational scale, which is typical for the subpopulation of unemployed women, gained most importance in case of west- border region and industrial regions. Furthermore, regions, which are characterised as representing conducive situation on the women s labour market, were most often of industrial or service type, moderately or highly-developed. Those regions are distinguished by the location advantages, absorptive internal market, high level of women s occupational activity and low unemployment level. Typical profile of an unemployed women starting their company in those kind of regions is resourceful. This profile describes an entrepreneurial women who has positive entrepreneurial motivations: entrepreneurial personality needs, need for personal and professional development or need to manage her working time in an elastic manner. In particular, regions of conducive situation on the female labour market are distinguished by the 4

5 advantageous situation of the young women on the labour market. Therefore, the profile of female unwilling entrepreneurs defining a young unemployed women who preferred to work as an employee but could not find a job offer on a regional labour market is not characteristic for those regions. Nevertheless, young women who enter the labour market for the first time with relatively low salary expectations push out of the market older and more experienced women. In turn, it results in the situation in which in regions of good situation of women on the labour market the profile of forced female entrepreneur becomes typical. This profile describes an experienced women who was not able to find acceptable job offer on the regional labour market, what led her to opt for self-employment. Other typical profiles in those type of regions include: fed up female entrepreneur (meaning unemployed women who set up her own company as a result of negative experiences from previous employment) and accidental female entrepreneur. What is characteristic for those type of regions is that the newly set up enterprises often copy the economic specialisation of a given region. For example, in service regions unemployed women relatively often were establishing specialised and professional service companies, in industrial regions they were establishing industry manufacturing ones. At the same time, regions of average situation on the female labour market were often moderately developed of rural or industrial economy specialisation. The situation of young unemployed women in those type of regions was relatively good, however, the unemployment was frequently of long-term nature. The recognisable profile in this case was a forced female entrepreneur. It is to mention that unemployed women from labour market of average women s situation had very strong preference for job positions. Among the most important entrepreneurial motivators were: lack of job offers and willingness to utilise the public financial support for counteracting unemployment. Typical for those regions was also profile of young mother entrepreneur. Although, a substantial share of unemployed women was motivated by positive factors (self-development, entrepreneurial personality), still the profile of a resourceful female entrepreneur was atypical. In regions of average situation on the female labour market, besides the financial barrier of entrepreneurship, also the psychological barrier has been frequently encountered: lack of self-confidence, fear of defeat or unwillingness to have financial obligations. Finally, the regions of unconducive situation on the female labour market were the least developed regions of rural economic structure. Those regions entail low women s business activity and high unemployment, as well as high level of economic inactivity of 5

6 women. The unemployed women in those regions do not have at all or have very little working experience and their unemployment is of long-term nature. Typical is the female unwilling entrepreneurship profile. The resourceful female entrepreneurs are rarely encountered and reactive entrepreneurial motivation in the form of lack of job offers prevails. Often unemployed women are also motivated to set up their own company by the possibility of taking advantage of the unemployment counteracting programmes. In the research it was demonstrated that the geographic location of place of residence of unemployed women from those regions is considered by them as disadvantageous and having detrimental effect on their entrepreneurial decision. Unemployed women from regions of unconducive situation on the female labour market dealt with unprofessional service activities (so called hollow services). Their companies had operational scope limited to the local area. The main barriers of entrepreneurship include, apart from the financial one, also: difficulties in entering the market and lack of professional experience to run a company. 6