Title: Modelling regional start-up activity in Austria and Germany: a comparison of traditional and spatial econometric methods

Authors: Robert J. Breitenecker; Antje Weyh

Addresses: Department of Innovation Management and Entrepreneurship, Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt, Universitätsstrasse 65-67, 9020 Klagenfurt, Austria ' Institute for Employment Research (IAB), IAB Regional Saxony, Paracelsusstrasse 12, 09114 Chemnitz, Germany

Abstract: Most studies dealing with determinants of new firm formation neglect a possible spatial dependency of the data. The aim of the paper is to compare the traditional statistical methods commonly used in previous literature with spatial econometric methods and to test if the more sophisticated methods lead to different results. Using methods of exploratory spatial data analysis (ESDA) we first detect and visualise the spatial character of new firm formation processes in Austria and Germany which are very different with regard to spatial aspects. Our econometric analyses reveal strong spatial interdependencies in both countries. The fit of models always improves when taking into account the spatial character of the data. However, the differences between simple OLS models and spatial models are relatively small.

Keywords: entrepreneurship; regional start-ups; start-up activity; spatial dependency; spatial autocorrelation; exploratory spatial data analysis; ESDA; spatial lag model; spatial error modelling; Austria; Germany; new firm formation; new firms; new ventures; venture creation; econometrics.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEV.2013.053594

International Journal of Entrepreneurial Venturing, 2013 Vol.5 No.2, pp.195 - 211

Received: 13 May 2011
Accepted: 07 Mar 2012

Published online: 30 Jan 2014 *

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