Immigrant self-employment in turbulent times

Mats Hammarstedt () and Per Skedinger
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Mats Hammarstedt: Linnaeus University, Växjö, Sweden, and Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN)

Small Business Economics, 2025, vol. 65, issue 2, No 14, 1023-1046

Abstract: Abstract We examine immigrant self-employment in Sweden during the turbulent decade 2011–2021. This is done for different cohorts of immigrants from Africa and Asia and for unincorporated and incorporated firms. Immigrants have lower business earnings and higher exit rates from self-employment than natives, which is in line with previous research. The period in which the immigrants arrived in Sweden and the type of business they are engaged in have important implications for outcomes. In most cases, outcomes are more favorable for those who came to Sweden up to the turn of the millennium, and less so for the latest arrivals. Even so, a closer look at outcomes by organizational form reveals that immigrants who arrived during 2011–2021 suffered less in terms of lower business earnings compared to earlier cohorts if they were in incorporated instead of unincorporated self-employment. Switching organizational form is not associated with catching up on business earnings for immigrant self-employed vis-à-vis Swedish-born.

Keywords: Self-employment; Immigrants; COVID-19; Refugee crisis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J15 J24 J71 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1007/s11187-025-01032-3

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