Pushed or Pulled? Women's Entry into Self-Employment and Small Business Ownership

Abstract

Over the past two decades the economies of Canada and many other industrialized countries have seen significant restructuring, bringing with it steadily rising levels of self-employment and small business ownership. Women have been at the forefront of this change. Of the many questions raised by women's entrance into self-employment, a central one concerns the factors fuelling its growth. While some argue that women have been pulled into self-employment by the promise of independence, flexibility and the opportunity to escape barriers in paid employment, others argue that women have been pushed into it as restructuring and downsizing has eroded the availability of once secure jobs in the public and private sector. To date, existing research on the 'push-pull' debate has not fully answered; these questions, with survey and labour force data suggesting only general and sometimes contradictory, trends. This article examines this issue in greater detail, drawing on in-depth interviews with 61 self-employed women in Canada. Overall their experiences shed further light on the expansion of women's self-employment in the 1990s, suggesting push factors have been underestimated and challenging the current contours of the 'push-pull' debate.

Female entrepreneurs in transition economies: insights from Albania, Macedonia and Kosovo

“…'Push' factors put pressure on women to forgo current work. 'Pull' factors are those factors that attract women to entrepreneurship and influence their decision to establish their own business (Hughes, 2003;Baughn et al, 2006). 'Push' factors have greater impact on female entrepreneurs in deciding the type of business they want to establish.…”

Entrepreneurship Motivation: Tunisian Case

“…In a second step, we proceeded by some tests such as the fiability analysis (α of Crombach) and unidimensionality analysis (factor reduction analysis with varimax rotation), to measure the scale pertinence. We have to obtain a fiability score superior to 0.6 [15]. This test allowed as the respecting of the most important condition for data treatment.…”

“…Others studies [10,11,13,15] consider that push factors are relevant for entrepreneurs as a result of job loss, difficulty of finding employment, prolonged joblessness, involuntary layoff. These factors are the major motivating one.…”

Potansi̇yel Gi̇ri̇şi̇mci̇ Olan Kadinlarin Moti̇vasyon Faktörleri̇ Ve Eski̇şehi̇r De Bi̇r Araştirma

“…Ġten faktörler, baĢka alternatifinin olmaması gibi, bireyleri giriĢimciliğe zorlayan, olumsuz olarak da nitelendirilen faktörlerken; çeken faktörler, özerklik gibi bireyleri giriĢimciliğe çeken, giriĢimciliği cazip kılan olumlu faktörlerdir. Çeken faktörleri bağımsızlık, onay alma ihtiyacı, kendini gerçekleĢtirme, kendini geliĢtirme ihtiyacı, özerklik, finansal baĢarı, refah düzeyinin arttırılma isteği, tanınma, rol modellerini izleme, iĢ ve özel yaĢamı dengeleme olarak belirtmek mümkündür (Carter ve diğerleri, 2003;Hughes, 2003;Shane, Kolvereid and Westhead, 1991;Birley, Westhead, 1994). Bu bağlamda iĢ tatminsizliği, algılanan ayrımcılık, terfi edilmeme, ücretten duyulan memnuniyetsizlik, iĢsizlik, iten motivasyon faktörleri olarak değerlendirilmektedir (Hisrich, Brush, 1987;Buttner, Moore, 1997;Moore and Mueller, 2002).…”

“…Ayrıca giriĢimcilik niyetini Ģekillendiren motivasyon faktörleri ile yatırım faaliyetlerinin yapısı, büyüklüğü gibi değiĢkenler arasında bir iliĢki olduğu saptanmaktadır (Kolvereid, 1992;Cassar, 2007). Hughes (2003), Kanadalı kadınların motivasyon faktörleri ve yatırım türleri ile ekonomi baĢarıları arasındaki iliĢkiyi araĢtıran çalıĢmasında motivasyon faktörlerini üç tip giriĢimcilik temelinde incelemiĢtir. Bağımsızlık, finansal bağımsızlık, fırsatlar gibi motivasyon faktörlerine sahip olan klasik giriĢimciler, insan sermayesi ve geliri yüksek, çalıĢma saatleri daha fazla olan ve tüzel kiĢilik kazanmıĢ Ģirketleri olan, baĢkalarına istihdam olanağı yaratan giriĢimcilerdir.…”