Page 108 - 1-Entrepreneurship and Local Economic Development by Norman Walzer (z-lib.org)

The Drivers of Regional Entrepreneurship in Rural and Metro Areas 97

tionships between educational attainment and high-value entrepreneurial
activity are stronger in metropolitan areas, educational attainment is more
positively correlated with the quantity of entrepreneurs in rural places.
Communities may want to focus on educational training and develop-
ment as a mechanism to promote entrepreneurship while noting that it is
not necessary to generate a mass of doctorate holders to build entrepre-
neurial regions. In comparing the educational attainment of the self-
employed to government and private sector workers, the self-employed
have moderate levels of educational attainment. They have more educa-
tional attainment than private sector workers but less education than gov-
ernment workers (Henderson 2004a). The self-employed are not necessar-
ily people with graduate or professional degrees, but they are more likely to
be people with some college or technical education.
Educational institutions are quickly becoming more engaged in entre-
preneurial education. More colleges and universities are offering more
courses and supporting new entrepreneurship centers. According to Inc.com,
more than 1,600 colleges and universities offer courses and programs in en-
trepreneurship, up 533 percent since the 1980s (Adkins 2006a). The Rural
Community College Initiative has identified entrepreneurship and small
business development as a key economic development role for community
colleges (Rubin 2001) Entrepreneurship education is also moving into
K–12 education. The National Federation of Independent Business has cre-
ated the Youth Entrepreneur Foundation, which has spurred the creation of
curriculum for teachers (Adkins 2006b). Youth entrepreneurship is also re-
ceiving strong support from foundations such as the Kauffman Foundation
(Blumberg 2006).
The findings also suggest that regional quality of life is related to high-
value entrepreneurship, as is the proportion of the foreign-born popula-
tion. Counties with higher levels of natural or scenic amenities, creativity,
and diversity had more entrepreneurs who produced more income and
added more value. Counties may want to focus on boosting the quality of
life in their communities to spur entrepreneurs. By being known as an
amenity-rich, creative place open to the diversity of people and ideas, com-
munities can help foster local entrepreneurs and attract those that are foot-
loose. In rural places, natural amenities seem to have an especially large im-
pact on entrepreneurial development.
Yet, even accounting for these features, high-depth entrepreneurship still
appears concentrated in metropolitan counties. The value-added indicator re-
veals that rural entrepreneurs generate less value from their activities than
their urban counterparts. Entrepreneurs in urban centers may especially ben-
efit from proximity to the variety of high-value marketplaces in urban areas,
high population density, and transportation nodes. This generation of high-
value entrepreneurs in urban areas is reinforced by the greater impacts of hu-
man capital and infrastructure in such regions relative to rural places.