Measuring Schumpeterian activity using a composite indicator
Journal of Entrepreneurship and Public Policy
ISSN: 2045-2101
Article publication date: 13 April 2015
Abstract
Purpose
As an economic development strategy, entrepreneurship policies should target innovative activities – those which Schumpeter described as leading to new goods, production methods, markets, input sources, or new industries. However, popular entrepreneurship proxies, such as firm births (<500 employees) and sole proprietorships, capture multiple types of entrepreneurship which may have conflicting qualities. To address the need for more accurate measures of Schumpeterian activity, indices are constructed to specifically measure the relative amount of Schumpeterian activity among US states. The paper aims to discuss these issues.
Design/methodology/approach
Four composite indices of Schumpeterian activity are constructed using different methods to combine variables related to innovative activity into single indicator, since there is uncertainty about the weighting of dimensions: principal component analysis (PCA), factor analysis (FA), data envelopment analysis and equal weights. Robustness checks were used to compare state rankings across indices. These indices were also compared to common entrepreneurship proxies and real GDP to demonstrate and justify their measurement of Schumpeterian activity.
Findings
The results show that the Schumpeterian Activity Indices (SAIs) similarly rank states and measure phenomena different from the common proxies of entrepreneurship. Furthermore, these indices better predict GDP than the common proxies. Lastly, state rankings based upon the SAIs support previous research suggesting that innovation and agglomeration economies are interrelated.
Originality/value
The paper demonstrates a methodology for constructing a measure of innovative activity, which is necessary to develop and evaluate entrepreneurship policy for economic development.
Keywords
Citation
Mann, J. and Shideler, D. (2015), "Measuring Schumpeterian activity using a composite indicator", Journal of Entrepreneurship and Public Policy, Vol. 4 No. 1, pp. 57-84. https://doi.org/10.1108/JEPP-07-2013-0029
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2015, Emerald Group Publishing Limited