为什么日本是一个“创业真空”国度

日本的创新水平处于全球前列,而日本社会创业的比例却很低,被称为“创业真空”国家。作为创业领域非常重要的概念和变量,一个国家新生创业者比例对于其经济发展至关重要。使用全球创业观察2014年的数据,采用个人层面是否为新生创业者和创业意愿作为主要因变量,分析国家层面的变量对于个人成为新生创业者的影响。结果发现,国家层面单一因素,如文化上的不确定性规避意识,对新生创业者并不产生显著影响,宏观经济的稳定性则会影响个人是否成为新生创业者。在加入年龄这一调节变量后,发现三者之间的交互项显著。这说明日本低创业率不仅仅是单方面因素导致的,而更是宏观经济不稳定性、不确定性规避以及老龄化三者之间共同影响的结果。研究结果对于正确理解日本创业现状以及制定促进创业的相关政策具有重要意义。

Why Japan is a Country of Entrepreneurship Vacuum: Evidence from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor

Innovation in Japan is always leading the world, but the entrepreneurial percentage in Japan is far below the average, which is called the entrepreneurship vacuum. This article intends to investigate the reason of low entrepreneurship rate in Japan empirically. As an important variable in entrepreneurship research, the nascent entrepreneur rate has a significant meaning for all countries. Using the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) 2010's data, we investigate the determinants of nascent entrepreneur and entrepreneurial intention in the personal level and incorporate the country/regional-level variables into our empirical model. Analyses showed that a simple country-level factor such as macroeconomic stability and uncertainty avoidance level cannot determine the probability of becoming a nascent entrepreneur. After considering age as a moderator, we have found that the three-way interaction effect is especially significant, meaning that the entrepreneurship vacuum in Japan is not simply caused by one single factor, but rather a combination of this country's aging population, macroeconomic instability and the high level of uncertainty avoidance in its cultural dimension. These results can help us better understand the Japaneses entrepreneurship and have implications for both the Japanese and Chinese government for policy making.