• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.1-34
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• 2001

This study analyzes the male-female difference in self-employment rates in Korea using panel data constructed from the Economically Active Population Survey in 1999. Given that most studies on self-employment have focused on male self-employment and have not examined why self-employment rate is usually higher among males than females, this study certainly extends the existing literature on this subject This study consists of two parts. The first part deals with estimating self-employment rates for males and female within a Markov framework. The second part presents decomposition results of the male-female differential in self-employment rates. Major findings of the study are (1) self-employment rate is higher for males than females because entry into self-employment is larger but exit from self-employment is smaller for males than female, (2) higher entry probability for males is due to differences in coefficients of transition probability functions while lower exit probability for males is due to differences in characteristics, (3) a large part of male-female gap in self-employment rates results from differences in being a head of family, marital status and age between males and females.

• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.137-165
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• 2000

This paper empirically analyzes the behavioral patterns of the labor flows surrounding self-employment. One of the findings is that, while a substantial portion of the labor flows into (and from) the self-employment sector is a movement from (and into) the non-employment, such flows are largely confined to a relatively small group of marginal workers. Still, the share of those marginal workers among the self-employed has declined steadily at least until the outburst of the financial crisis in 1997, evidencing that the job stability has been increased in this sector. On the other hand, the expected duration of self-employment has shown a downward trend up until 1990 but has increased since then. Such a trend reversal is also observed in the proportion of the labor force self-employed, indicating that the former is at least partly responsible for the latter.

• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.1-27
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• 2004

The share of self-employment shows a downward trend until 1990 and then an upward trend since then. The upward trend is mainly due to more employers and more male self-employed, which implies that self-employment plays a significant role as an alternative form of employment. This paper examines whether self-employment can be a bridge between no work and wage work in the processes entering into or exiting labor market, and if so, what determines the choice of self-employment as a bridge, using the data from the Korea Labor and Income Panel Survey(Wave 1 to Wave 5). Empirical analysis employing the probit model shows that the older, female, the less educated, and persons with bad health are more likely to choose self-employment as a bridge in the exit process and that they are less likely to choose it as a bridge in the entry process. Business cycle has a statistically significant negative effect on its role of bridge employment in the exit process but not in the entry process. The result implies that, in the ageing society, labor market policy should consider self-employment as a better alternative than wage work for the aged.

• The Journal of Small Business Innovation
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.19-33
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• 2017

In this paper, we suggest proper policy directions through an analysis onthe impact of changes in self-employment on the national economy. In other words, we intend to identify the current status of self-employment jobs and present policy directions for supporting self-employed workers. In order to grasp the dynamic relationship of variables, we used a VAR model to measure the impact of self-employment job fluctuations and macroeconomic variables on each other. The analysis results demonstrate that an exogenous shock to the ratio of self-employed workers does not show a significant impact on the nominal growth ratio. However, when the analysis was done separately on an exogenous shock to the ratio of self-employed workers with employees and without employees, an increase in the ratio of self-employed workers with employees showed a positive impact on nominal growth. On the other hand, an increase in the ratio of self-employed workers without employees showeda negative impact on nominal growth. In future studies, it will be necessary to do additional analysis on quarterly data to estimate the short-term impact of macroeconomic variables on changes in the ratio of self-employed workers.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare Studies
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• v.43 no.2
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• pp.141-178
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• 2012

Although the rate of self-employment is high in Korean labor market and the rate gap between age groups is high, few studies have addressed on the effects of push factors on transition into self-employment across age groups. The goal of this research is to determine if push factors exert different effects on the self-employment decisions across age groups. There is interest in testing push hypothesis and pull hypothesis. The Korean Labor and Income Panel Study wave 6~11 is used to test this study's hypothesis. The main contribution of the paper is that in case of high unemployment, the probability of transition into self-employment increases. It is consistent with the push hypothesis. Many people are forced to become self-employed person due to the high rate of unemployment and limited occupational choice rather than the role of entrepreneurship. By age subgroup, the transition into self-employment of the ages of 30 and 49 is high. In addition, people at 40-49 years of age are more likely to become self-employed as a response of inadequate job opportunities. It provides the evidence that the self-employment is not a matter of special age group in that people in the 30 to 49 year old age group whose economic activities are vigorous move into marginalized labor market. Furthermore, it seems to be threatened the employment's stability of the prime age in that even people who are age 40-49 years of age are pushed into self-employment because of the recession.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.64 no.2
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• pp.55-83
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• 2012

Self-employment rate is high in Korean labor market, while the income gap within self-employed is also high. Although, there are very few studies that addressed on the income inequality of self-employed. Thus, this study has measured the earnings inequality of self-employed by generalized entropy indices and decomposed inequality factor and trend. The empirical study is based on Korea Welfare Panel Study wave 1~4. The main result from this analysis is summarized in three points. Firstly, earnings inequality of self-employed is severely high and the earnings polarization within self-employed has become more serious in Korea. Secondly, this study provides the evidence that the main factor of earnings inequality of self-employed is the status of self-employment, education level, age group, workplace scale and industry. Thirdly, the contribution of relative changes in the incomes of the status of self-employment is the largest to the inequality trend. In terms of education level, age group and industry, the increase of inequality within group(pure effect) mainly attributes to the rise of earnings inequality of self-employed and the change effect of group composition contributes to deterioration of inequality.

• Korea journal of population studies
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.69-105
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• 2002

This paper is aimed at three points. Firstly the size and trend of women self-employed in korea are analysed during 30 years. Second the demographic characteristics and labor condition like working hour, income and etc. of them are presented. Last, when did they begin or end their own work as their life stages were changed.

• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.1-30
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• 2003

The recent experience about self-employment shows three main trends: first, its share out of the total workers has steadily increased, recording 37.6% in 2001, implying its prevalence and importance; second, its share out of male workers has caught up female workers', implying its importance to males as well as females; and finally, during the recent Economic Crisis when there was mass layoff and large scale bankruptcy, its share rapidly increased, reflecting its role of a buffer to economic fluctuation. However, there have been few studies on self-employment, mainly focusing on what makes someone choose it as an alternative to being employed. This study analyzes the determinants of the duration to terminate self-employment, by applying the proportional hazard model to the Korea Labor and Income Panel Survey(KLIPS) by the Korea Labor Institute. The KLIPS started the first wave in 1998 with the 5,000 household sample (and about 12,000 individual sample of household members aged 15 and more). In this study, the first four waves are used for analysis. The average duration of 5,357 spells of self-employment is 130 months. It shows slight difference between males(124 months) and females(138 months) while it widely ranges over industries (296 months for agriculture industry while 50 months for restaurant and hotel industry). Estimates of the proportional hazard model of the self-employment duration show that females are more likely to terminate self-employment while it is not statistically significant. The effect of age at starting self-employment on the hazard shows the inverse V-shape, which implies that, until a certain age(47 years), the hazard become higher as aging while, since then, it become lower as aging. The level of education has a positive effect on the hazard, implying that more education is related to the higher probability to be employed. The measures of economic performances, annual sales and earnings, are positively related to continuing self-employment while hardship at the start of self-employment measured by several ways has a negative effect. Training before opening business has a positive effect on keeping on self-employment and its effects are different over its providers, significantly positive for public providers while insignificant for private providers. More and further research on self-employment is urgent in the rapidly ageing society. To help workers to be self-employed, more public assistance is necessary for education, training, financing, marketing, management, and human resource management in order to make the olders consider self-employment as a good alternative rather than an inevitable one.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.247-257
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• 2020

In recent years, the proportion of youth's self-employed is steadily increasing, and government policy also actively encourages youth to become an entrepreneur. However, most of the domestic precedent studies on the self-employed labor market focus on the middle-aged and the elderly, and previous studies on the self-employed labor market of young people are hardly ever studied. Above all, the study that examines the factors of entry into self-employment of young people is not sufficient and researchers usually utilize the study about for all ages to explain the self-employment market of young people. However, because the young and middle-aged people differ in labor market conditions, family backgrounds, and the level of accumulation of human capital, separate explanations and theories are needed. Therefore, this study explored the factors of entry into self-employment by separating the age group from 15~29 years old. The data used in the analysis was the 9th to 20th data of the Korea Labor Panel Survey. The youth unemployment rate and employment rate were referred to the Economically Active Population Survey of Statistics Korea. The analysis subject was limited to young people who are currently performing economic activities, and the analysis method used multi-level logit model. The main results are summarized as follows. First, the lower the unemployment rate and the higher the employment rate, the younger people tend to enter their own businesses on the structural level. Second on the individual level, young people who possess enough financial capital or pursuit personal aptitude or interest tend to enter self-employment. However, there are no statistical effects of human capital and entrepreneur capital.

• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.161-182
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• 2002

The self-employment can provide work time flexibility. Work time flexibility would be a critical factor for married females' labor supply considering allocation of their time to market work and household work. This study used the 1998 and 2000 Korea Labor and Income Panel Survey for the empirical analyses. Applying the bivariate probit model with partial observability, this study analyzed factors related to the choice of participation in labor market and choice of self-employment. Also, this study examined the effects of marriage and the presence of younger children on changes in decisions related to labor supply using the multinomial logit model: exit from the labor market, increasing and decreasing work hours. The presence of the younger children showed a significantly negative effect on the participation in labor market while positive, but insignificant, effect on self-employment. Compared with females working for others, self-employers without employees and unpaid family workers are less likely to exit labor market rather than increasing work hours. The self-employment would be a good alternative to evade females' career interruption and therefore to enhance the potential human resources.