Smart rule-breakers make the best entrepreneurs

By Adam Millsap of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. Excerpts:

"A new paper in the Quarterly Journal of Economics (working version here) finds that the combination of intelligence and a willingness to break the rules as a youth is associated with a greater tendency to operate a high-earning incorporated business as an adult i.e. be an entrepreneur.

Previous work examining entrepreneurship that categorizes all self-employed persons as entrepreneurs has often found that entrepreneurs earn less than similar salaried workers. But this contradicts the important role entrepreneurs are presumed to play in generating economic growth. As the authors of the new QJE paper remark:

“If the self-employed are a good proxy for risk-taking, growth-creating entrepreneurs, it is puzzling that their human capital traits are similar to those of salaried workers and that they earn less.”

So instead of looking at the self-employed as one group, the authors separate them into two groups: those who operate unincorporated businesses and those who operate incorporated businesses. They argue that incorporation is important for risk-taking entrepreneurs due to the limited liability and separate legal identity it provides, and they find that those who choose incorporation are more likely to engage in tasks that require creativity, analytical flexibility and complex interpersonal communications; all tasks that are closely identified with the concept of entrepreneurship.

People who operate unincorporated businesses, on the other hand, are more likely to engage in activities that require high levels of hand, eye and foot coordination, such as landscaping or truck driving."

"On average incorporated business owners  earn more, work more hours, have more years of schooling and are more likely to be a college graduate than both unincorporated business owners and salaried workers based on two different data sets."

"people with high self-esteem, a strong sense of controlling one’s future, high Armed Forces Qualifications Test scores (AFQT)—which is a measure of intelligence and trainability—and a greater propensity for engaging in illicit activity as a youth are more likely to be incorporated self-employed.

Moreover, it’s the combination of intelligence and risk-taking that turns a young person into a high-earning owner of an incorporated business. As the authors state, “The mixture of high learning aptitude and disruptive, “break-the-rules” behavior is tightly linked with entrepreneurship.”

These findings fit nicely with some notable recent examples of entrepreneurship—Uber and Airbnb. Both companies are regularly sued for violating state and local ordinances, but this hasn’t stopped them from becoming popular providers of transportation and short-term housing.

If the founders of Uber and Airbnb always obtained approval before operating the companies would be hindered by all sorts of special interests, including taxi commissions, hotel industry groups and nosy neighbors. Seeking everyone’s approval—including the government’s—before operating likely would have meant never getting off the ground and the companies know this. It’s interesting to see evidence that many other, less well-known entrepreneurs share a similar willingness to violate the rules if necessary in order to provide their goods and services to customers."