Summary :
Abstract
The main objective of this paper is to examine the impact of immigration on entrepreneurship with a particular focus on the Euro-Mediterranean (Euromed) Region. To address its objective, the study leverages a global country-level panel dataset that covers various entrepreneurship indicators including self-employment and the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) indicators on entrepreneurial activities during (2000-2023). A series of One-Step System Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) dynamic models are built to investigate the impacts of immigrant and refugee inflows along with a group of other control variables on necessity-based vs opportunity-based entrepreneurship.
Findings show that immigration contributes to increasing “self-employment”, as a proxy for “necessity-based entrepreneurship”, with no significant impacts on “opportunity-based” entrepreneurial activities. At the same time, the inflows of refugees do not significantly affect any type of entrepreneurship in host countries. While the Euromed region exhibits relatively high innovation among nascent businesses, it generally lags behind in self-employment and early entrepreneurial activity. Moreover, Female-to-Male early opportunity-based entrepreneurship ratios in Euromed countries are consistently lower than those observed in other countries analyzed. The results emphasize the need for an increasing integration of immigrants and refugees into the labor markets of their host economies, especially in wage employment. Moreover, strengthening networks of cooperation between countries in the north and south of the Euromed can help boost levels of innovation and trade and support opportunity-based entrepreneurship in the region.