[go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/growch/v46y2015i3p458-480.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Externalities or Experience? Localization Economies and Start-up Business Survival

Author

Listed:
  • Henry Renski
Abstract
This study examines whether spatial variations in the human capital of business owners help explain why the failure rates of new businesses tend to be lower in areas where similar businesses are concentrated. More specifically, I test whether the prior industry experience of the firm's owner/founder has a mediating influence on the relationship between industrial localization and new business failure for six industry sectors. Localization is found to have either a beneficial or a damaging relationship to new firm survival, depending on the industry in question. Localization reduces the likelihood of failure in two sectors, while competition effects prevail in two others. When industry experience is added to the models, the benefits of localization diminish, but only for entrants in the business, professional, and information services sector and only by a small amount. This suggests that at least some of the observed benefits of localization are due to regional differences in embodied human capital, but localization economies remain significant. Further study is needed to see if such mediating effects are common among a wider array of more narrowly defined industries and for other forms of entrepreneurial human capital.

Suggested Citation

  • Henry Renski, 2015. "Externalities or Experience? Localization Economies and Start-up Business Survival," Growth and Change, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(3), pages 458-480, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:growch:v:46:y:2015:i:3:p:458-480
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/grow.12099
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Robert Huggins & Piers Thompson, 2014. "A Network-based view of regional growth," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 14(3), pages 511-545.
    2. Paul Davidson Reynolds, 2007. "Entrepreneurship in The United States," International Studies in Entrepreneurship, Springer, number 978-0-387-45671-3, November.
    3. Drucker, Joshua & Feser, Edward, 2012. "Regional industrial structure and agglomeration economies: An analysis of productivity in three manufacturing industries," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(1-2), pages 1-14.
    4. Gilles Duranton & Diego Puga, 2000. "Diversity and Specialisation in Cities: Why, Where and When Does it Matter?," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 37(3), pages 533-555, March.
    5. Gilles Duranton & Henry G. Overman, 2005. "Testing for Localization Using Micro-Geographic Data," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 72(4), pages 1077-1106.
    6. Feser, Edward J., 2001. "A flexible test for agglomeration economies in two US manufacturing industries," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 1-19, February.
    7. Erik Stam, 2007. "Why Butterflies Don’t Leave: Locational Behavior of Entrepreneurial Firms," Economic Geography, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 83(1), pages 27-50, January.
    8. Edward L. Glaeser & Glenn Ellison, 1999. "The Geographic Concentration of Industry: Does Natural Advantage Explain Agglomeration?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(2), pages 311-316, May.
    9. Michael Fritsch & Oliver Falck, 2007. "New Business Formation by Industry over Space and Time: A Multidimensional Analysis," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 41(2), pages 157-172.
    10. Michael Fritsch & Udo Brixy & Oliver Falck, 2006. "The Effect of Industry, Region, and Time on New Business Survival – A Multi-Dimensional Analysis," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 28(3), pages 285-306, May.
    11. Feldman, Maryann P. & Audretsch, David B., 1999. "Innovation in cities:: Science-based diversity, specialization and localized competition," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 43(2), pages 409-429, February.
    12. Glaeser, Edward L & Hedi D. Kallal & Jose A. Scheinkman & Andrei Shleifer, 1992. "Growth in Cities," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 100(6), pages 1126-1152, December.
      • Edward L. Glaeser & Hedi D. Kallal & Jose A. Scheinkman & Andrei Shleifer, 1991. "Growth in Cities," NBER Working Papers 3787, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
      • Glaeser, Edward Ludwig & Kallal, Hedi D. & Scheinkman, Jose A. & Shleifer, Andrei, 1992. "Growth in Cities," Scholarly Articles 3451309, Harvard University Department of Economics.
    13. Veronique A.J.M. Schutjens & Egbert Wever, 2000. "Determinants of new firm success," Papers in Regional Science, Springer;Regional Science Association International, vol. 79(2), pages 135-153.
    14. Paul Westhead, 1995. "Survival and Employment Growth Contrasts between Types of Owner-Managed High-Technology Firms," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 20(1), pages 5-28, October.
    15. Silviano Esteve-Pérez & Amparo Sanchis-Llopis & Juan Sanchis-Llopis, 2010. "A competing risks analysis of firms’ exit," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 38(2), pages 281-304, April.
    16. Bates, Timothy, 1990. "Entrepreneur Human Capital Inputs and Small Business Longevity," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 72(4), pages 551-559, November.
    17. Klepper, Steven, 2001. "Employee Startups in High-Tech Industries," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 10(3), pages 639-674, September.
    18. Figueiredo, Octavio & Guimaraes, Paulo & Woodward, Douglas, 2002. "Home-field advantage: location decisions of Portuguese entrepreneurs," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(2), pages 341-361, September.
    19. Dunne, Paul & Hughes, Alan, 1994. "Age, Size, Growth and Survival: UK Companies in the 1980s," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(2), pages 115-140, June.
    20. Doms, Mark & Lewis, Ethan & Robb, Alicia, 2010. "Local labor force education, new business characteristics, and firm performance," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(1), pages 61-77, January.
    21. Michael Dahl & Toke Reichstein, 2007. "Are You Experienced? Prior Experience and the Survival of New Organizations," Industry and Innovation, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 14(5), pages 497-511.
    22. Mercedes Delgado & Michael E. Porter & Scott Stern, 2010. "Clusters and entrepreneurship," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 10(4), pages 495-518, July.
    23. C. Praag & Peter Versloot, 2007. "What is the value of entrepreneurship? A review of recent research," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 29(4), pages 351-382, December.
    24. Constance E. Helfat & Marvin B. Lieberman, 2002. "The birth of capabilities: market entry and the importance of pre-history," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 11(4), pages 725-760, August.
    25. Scott Shane, 2000. "Prior Knowledge and the Discovery of Entrepreneurial Opportunities," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 11(4), pages 448-469, August.
    26. Doms, Mark & Dunne, Timothy & Roberts, Mark J., 1995. "The role of technology use in the survival and growth of manufacturing plants," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 13(4), pages 523-542, December.
    27. Henderson, J. Vernon, 2003. "Marshall's scale economies," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(1), pages 1-28, January.
    28. Audretsch, David B & Mahmood, Talat, 1995. "New Firm Survival: New Results Using a Hazard Function," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 77(1), pages 97-103, February.
    29. Udo Brixy & Reinhold Grotz, 2007. "Regional patterns and determinants of birth and survival of new firms in Western Germany," Entrepreneurship & Regional Development, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(4), pages 293-312, July.
    30. Zoltán J. Ács & Catherine Armington & Ting Zhang, 2015. "The determinants of new-firm survival across regional economies: The role of human capital stock and knowledge spillover," Chapters, in: Global Entrepreneurship, Institutions and Incentives, chapter 18, pages 344-368, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    31. Mata, Jose, 1996. "Markets, entrepreneurs and the size of new firms," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 52(1), pages 89-94, July.
    32. Deniz Ucbasaran & Paul Westhead & Mike Wright, 2008. "Opportunity Identification and Pursuit: Does an Entrepreneur’s Human Capital Matter?," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 30(2), pages 153-173, February.
    33. Dahl, Michael S. & Sorenson, Olav, 2010. "The migration of technical workers," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(1), pages 33-45, January.
    34. David P. Mackinnon & James H. Dwyer, 1993. "Estimating Mediated Effects in Prevention Studies," Evaluation Review, , vol. 17(2), pages 144-158, April.
    35. Henry Renski, 2011. "External economies of localization, urbanization and industrial diversity and new firm survival," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 90(3), pages 473-502, August.
    36. Henderson, Vernon & Kuncoro, Ari & Turner, Matt, 1995. "Industrial Development in Cities," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(5), pages 1067-1090, October.
    37. Folta, Timothy B. & Cooper, Arnold C. & Baik, Yoon-suk, 2006. "Geographic cluster size and firm performance," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 217-242, March.
    38. Olav Sorenson, 2005. "Social networks and industrial geography," Springer Books, in: Uwe Cantner & Elias Dinopoulos & Robert F. Lanzillotti (ed.), Entrepreneurships, the New Economy and Public Policy, pages 55-69, Springer.
    39. Henry Renski, 2014. "The Influence of Industry Mix on Regional New Firm Formation in the United States," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(8), pages 1353-1370, August.
    40. Catherine Armington & Zoltan J. Acs, 2008. "The Determinants of Regional Variation in New Firm Formation," Chapters, in: Entrepreneurship, Growth and Public Policy, chapter 18, pages 224-243, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    41. Frank G. van Oort & Martijn J. Burger & Joris Knoben & Otto Raspe, 2012. "Multilevel Approaches And The Firm-Agglomeration Ambiguity In Economic Growth Studies," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(3), pages 468-491, July.
    42. B. Curtis Eaton & Richard G. Lipsey, 1980. "Exit Barriers are Entry Barriers: The Durability of Capital as a Barrier to Entry," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 11(2), pages 721-729, Autumn.
    43. Witt, Ulrich, 2000. "Changing Cognitive Frames--Changing Organizational Forms: An Entrepreneurial Theory of Organizational Development," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 9(4), pages 733-755, December.
    44. Karl Wennberg & Göran Lindqvist, 2010. "The effect of clusters on the survival and performance of new firms," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 34(3), pages 221-241, April.
    45. Anders Malmberg & Bo Malmberg & Per Lundequist, 2000. "Agglomeration and Firm Performance: Economies of Scale, Localisation, and Urbanisation among Swedish Export Firms," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 32(2), pages 305-321, February.
    46. Peter Johnson & Simon Parker, 1996. "Spatial Variations in the Determinants and Effects of Firm Births and Deaths," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 30(7), pages 679-688.
    47. C. Mirjam van Praag, 2003. "Business Survival and Success of Young Small Business Owners," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 03-050/3, Tinbergen Institute.
    48. Otto Raspe & Frank Oort, 2011. "Growth of new firms and spatially bounded knowledge externalities," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 46(3), pages 495-518, June.
    49. Charles A. Campbell, 1992. "A Decision Theory Model for Entrepreneurial Acts," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 17(1), pages 21-27, October.
    50. David L. Rigby & J¸rgen Essletzbichler, 2002. "Agglomeration economies and productivity differences in US cities," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 2(4), pages 407-432, October.
    51. Steven Klepper, 2002. "The capabilities of new firms and the evolution of the US automobile industry," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 11(4), pages 645-666, August.
    52. Cooper, Arnold C. & Gimeno-Gascon, F. Javier & Woo, Carolyn Y., 1994. "Initial human and financial capital as predictors of new venture performance," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 9(5), pages 371-395, September.
    53. Stuart, Toby & Sorenson, Olav, 2003. "The geography of opportunity: spatial heterogeneity in founding rates and the performance of biotechnology firms," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 229-253, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Gao, Xing & Meng, Jing & Ling, Yantao & Liao, Maolin & Cao, Mengqiu, 2022. "Localisation economies, intellectual property rights protection and entrepreneurship in China: A Bayesian analysis of multi-level spatial correlation," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 156-165.
    2. Tobias Ebert & Thomas Brenner & Udo Brixy, 2019. "New firm survival: the interdependence between regional externalities and innovativeness," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 53(1), pages 287-309, June.
    3. Tavassoli, Sam & Jienwatcharamongkhol, Viroj & Arenius, Pia, 2021. "Colocation of Entrepreneurs and New Firm Survival: Role of New Firm Founder’s Experiential Relatedness to Local Entrepreneurs," Papers in Innovation Studies 2021/13, Lund University, CIRCLE - Centre for Innovation Research.
    4. Joseph Farhat & Sharon Matusik & Alicia Robb & David T. Robinson, 2018. "New directions in entrepreneurship research with the Kauffman Firm Survey," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 50(3), pages 521-532, March.
    5. Gao, Xing & Meng, Jing & Ling, Yantao & Liao, Maolin & Cao, Mengqiu, 2022. "Localisation economies, intellectual property rights protection and entrepreneurship in China: a Bayesian analysis of multi-level spatial correlation," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 114290, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    6. Matt Saboe & Simon Condliffe, 2020. "Explaining New Firm Survival: Is the Firm, Owner, or Agglomeration at Fault?," Eastern Economic Journal, Palgrave Macmillan;Eastern Economic Association, vol. 46(2), pages 323-343, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Niklas Elert, 2014. "What determines entry? Evidence from Sweden," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 53(1), pages 55-92, August.
    2. Henry Renski, 2014. "The Influence of Industry Mix on Regional New Firm Formation in the United States," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(8), pages 1353-1370, August.
    3. Tobias Ebert & Thomas Brenner & Udo Brixy, 2019. "New firm survival: the interdependence between regional externalities and innovativeness," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 53(1), pages 287-309, June.
    4. Alexandra Tsvetkova & Jean-Claude Thill & Deborah Strumsky, 2014. "Metropolitan innovation, firm size, and business survival in a high-tech industry," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 43(3), pages 661-676, October.
    5. Marco Vivarelli, 2013. "Is entrepreneurship necessarily good? Microeconomic evidence from developed and developing countries," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 22(6), pages 1453-1495, December.
    6. Vivarelli, Marco, 2012. "Drivers of entrepreneurship and post-entry performance : microeconomic evidence from advanced and developing countries," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6245, The World Bank.
    7. Vivarelli, Marco, 2012. "Entrepreneurship in Advanced and Developing Countries: A Microeconomic Perspective," IZA Discussion Papers 6513, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    8. Francesco Quatraro & Marco Vivarelli, 2015. "Drivers of Entrepreneurship and Post-entry Performance of Newborn Firms in Developing Countries," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 30(2), pages 277-305.
    9. Sam Tavassoli & Viroj Jienwatcharamongkhol, 2016. "Survival of entrepreneurial firms: the role of agglomeration externalities," Entrepreneurship & Regional Development, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 28(9-10), pages 746-767, October.
    10. Marco Vivarelli, 2012. "Entrepreneurship and Post-Entry Performance: the Microeconomic Evidence," DISCE - Quaderni del Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche e Sociali dises1286, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimenti e Istituti di Scienze Economiche (DISCE).
    11. Francesco Quatraro & Marco Vivarelli, 2013. "Entry and Post-Entry Dynamics in Developing Countries," GREDEG Working Papers 2013-20, Groupe de REcherche en Droit, Economie, Gestion (GREDEG CNRS), Université Côte d'Azur, France.
    12. Quatraro, Francesco & Vivarelli, Marco, 2013. "Entrepreneurship In A Developing Country Context," Department of Economics and Statistics Cognetti de Martiis LEI & BRICK - Laboratory of Economics of Innovation "Franco Momigliano", Bureau of Research in Innovation, Complexity and Knowledge, Collegio 201314, University of Turin.
    13. Combes, Pierre-Philippe & Gobillon, Laurent, 2015. "The Empirics of Agglomeration Economies," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 247-348, Elsevier.
    14. Matthias Duschl & Tobias Scholl & Thomas Brenner & Dennis Luxen & Falk Raschke, 2015. "Industry-Specific Firm Growth and Agglomeration," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 49(11), pages 1822-1839, November.
    15. Peter van der Zwan & Ingrid Verheul & Roy Thurik & Isabel Grilo, 2009. "Entrepreneurial Progress: Climbing the Entrepreneurial Ladder in Europe and the US," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 09-070/3, Tinbergen Institute, revised 17 Mar 2010.
    16. Dirk Dohse & Sascha Walter, 2012. "Knowledge context and entrepreneurial intentions among students," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 39(4), pages 877-895, November.
    17. Edward L. Glaeser & William R. Kerr, 2009. "Local Industrial Conditions and Entrepreneurship: How Much of the Spatial Distribution Can We Explain?," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(3), pages 623-663, September.
    18. Javier Changoluisa, 2021. "The early development of new establishments: An evaluation of the role of spatial selection and agglomeration," Jena Economics Research Papers 2021-009, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena.
    19. Enrico Santarelli & Marco Vivarelli, 2007. "Entrepreneurship and the process of firms’ entry, survival and growth," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 16(3), pages 455-488, June.
    20. Kim, Jungho & Kollmann, Trevor & Palangkaraya, Alfons & Webster, Elizabeth, 2022. "Does local technological specialisation, diversity and dynamic competition enhance firm creation?," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(7).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:growch:v:46:y:2015:i:3:p:458-480. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0017-4815 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.