The Entrepreneurship Gap: From Intention to Action. An International Comparative Analysis

The aim of this paper is to analyse and explain the differences between the rates of potential and actual entrepreneurship in the European and American context, which we call entrepreneurship gap. For this purpose, an institutional approach is used, particularly, the role of formal and informal institutions related with the entrepreneurial activity. The empirical approach includes eighteen countries both from the European and the American areas, covering the last decade. We use multi-source data set, Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) that measures the entrepreneurial intention and nascent entrepreneurial activity, the World Bank and the Index of Economic Freedom (The Heritage Foundation and The Wall Street Journal). Results show, in general, an influence of the institutional framework (formal and informal factors) on the gap between actual and potential entrepreneurship.