Motivation, Competences and the Moderating Role of Business Discontinuance on the Entrepreneurial Effect of Self-Employment

This paper interrogates the dynamic relationship between motivation, competences, business discontinuance and the entrepreneurial effect. Arguing that self-employment has the potential to reduce unemployment in subsequent periods, this study uses mixed models to exhibit the moderating role of business discontinuation on the entrepreneurial effects of self-employment. It depicts this with data from 2013 on 10,003 youth entrepreneurs from nine Sub-Saharan countries. The empirical results confirm the existence of a significant moderating effect on motivation and the entrepreneurial effect. We also find that this effect is higher in younger males with more years of formal education.