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Endogenous Hours and the Wealth of Entrepreneurs

Author

Listed:
  • Felix Wellschmied

    (Universidad Carlos III)

  • Emircan Yurdagul

    (Universidad Carlos III)

Abstract

US entrepreneurs typically work long hours in their firms and these hours form a large part of the firms' labor input. This paper studies the role of endogenous owner hours in shaping the wealth distribution among entrepreneurs. We introduce owners' endogenous labor supply into a model of entrepreneurial choice and financial frictions. The model fits well the levels and the dispersion of wealth among entrepreneurs. Long owner hours incentivize poor, highly productive individuals to be owners and help the most productive owners to accumulate large quantities of wealth. On net, owners working long hours decreases the median owner wealth and increase wealth dispersion among owners. Differently, the ability to work sufficiently short hours incentivizes owners to run low productivity firms with high wealth to income ratios. Finally, alternative calibrations ignoring the endogenous labor supply of owners lead to owners that are much richer than in the data and overstate the effect of financial frictions in the economy. (Copyright: Elsevier)

Suggested Citation

  • Felix Wellschmied & Emircan Yurdagul, 2021. "Endogenous Hours and the Wealth of Entrepreneurs," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 39, pages 79-99, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:red:issued:18-531
    DOI: 10.1016/j.red.2020.06.012
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Entrepreneurship; Wealth accumulation; Labor supply; Firm dynamics;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E23 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Production
    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply
    • J23 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Labor Demand
    • L26 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Entrepreneurship

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