Entrepreneurial Human and Social Capital in Small Businesses in Vietnam - An Extended Analysis -

Souksavanh Vixathep and Nobuaki Matsunaga
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Souksavanh Vixathep: Graduate School of Economics, Kyoto University
Nobuaki Matsunaga: Graduate School of International Cooperation Studies, Kobe University

No 29, GSICS Working Paper Series from Graduate School of International Cooperation Studies, Kobe University

Abstract: Entrepreneurship is viewed as an important mechanism for economic development. It helps entrepreneurs overcome most of the constraints in businesses, encourages innovation, and contributes to employment generation and welfare improvement. The paper addresses the issue of entrepreneurial contribution to economic development at the micro level in Vietnam. The study examines the impact of entrepreneurial human capital on firm's performance (value added, total factor productivity (TFP)) in micro and small enterprises (MSEs). The analysis reveals that owner's formal education (up to upper secondary education) contributes to enhancement of firm value added and TFP in micro businesses. Entrepreneur's technical specialization, including advanced vocational training, university and post-graduate education, enhances performance of small enterprises, but shows some sign of over-education for micro businesses. Accumulated entrepreneurial experience, in form of occupation and self-employment experience, proves crucial for firm performance. Geographical advantages favoring MSEs located in the major metropolitan areas and sectoral advantages favoring 'trade and services' prove to be significant. The findings highlight the importance of human capital in nurturing entrepreneurship and fostering economic development at the micro-level.

Keywords: entrepreneurship; human capital; social capital; small business; Vietnam (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C01 D22 L26 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 26 pages
Date: 2015-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cse, nep-ent, nep-ino, nep-sbm, nep-sea and nep-tra
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kcs:wpaper:29

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