Precarious Versus Entrepreneurial Pathways into Self-Employment: Work and Nonwork Antecedents of Canadians’ Self-Employment Transitions

• In Event: 1184 - Section on Organizations, Occupations, and Work Refereed Roundtable Session
  In Refereed Roundtable 100min: Table 13. Entrepreneurship

Abstract

To what extent do contemporary self-employment trends reflect entrepreneurialism or labor market precariousness? We investigate the work, family and labor market antecedents associated with wageworkers’ transitions into self-employment. We distinguish between self-employment ventures that hire others from solo account operations. Analyses of a national panel survey of Canadian workers tracked over six years (Canadian Work, Stress, and Health Study) reveal that the solo account self-employed are approximately twice as likely to report low income (<$25,000) than wageworkers and the employer self-employed. Event history analyses based on a multinomial logit hazard model also reveal differences in the conditions that predict wageworkers’ transitions into each form of self-employment. Indicators of labor market insecurity predict the majority of self-employment transitions (solo account ventures), while job quality and good mental health predict entry into employer self-employment. Our findings support the value of using a ‘good jobs, bad jobs’ perspective to disaggregate the different pathways that wageworkers take into desirable versus less desirable forms of self-employment.

Authors

• Paul Glavin, McMaster University

• Tomislav Filipovic, McMaster University

• Mark van der Maas, University of Toronto