IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ehl/lserod/90264.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Curb your enthusiasm: optimistic entrepreneurs earn less

Author

Listed:
  • Dawson, Christopher
  • de Meza, David
  • Henley, Andrew
  • Arabsheibani, G. Reza

Abstract

This paper concerns the implications of biased beliefs on entrepreneurial earnings. Amongst self-employed business owners, income is decreasing in optimism measured whilst still an employee. Controlling for earnings in paid employment, self-employment earnings of those with optimism above the mean are some 30% less than those with optimism below the mean. For employees, it is optimists that have higher earnings. These and associated results suggest that mistaken expectations lead to entry errors. As a test of external validity, future divorcees turn out to be financial optimists, indicating our measure captures an intrinsic psychological trait associated with rash decisions.

Suggested Citation

  • Dawson, Christopher & de Meza, David & Henley, Andrew & Arabsheibani, G. Reza, 2019. "Curb your enthusiasm: optimistic entrepreneurs earn less," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 90264, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:90264
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/90264/
    File Function: Open access version.
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gervais, Simon & Odean, Terrance, 2001. "Learning to be Overconfident," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 14(1), pages 1-27.
    2. Erik Hurst & Benjamin Wild Pugsley, 2011. "What Do Small Businesses Do?," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 42(2 (Fall)), pages 73-142.
    3. de Meza, David & Southey, Clive, 1996. "The Borrower's Curse: Optimism, Finance and Entrepreneurship," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 106(435), pages 375-386, March.
    4. Robert W. Fairlie & Alicia Robb, 2007. "Families, Human Capital, and Small Business: Evidence from the Characteristics of Business Owners Survey," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 60(2), pages 225-245, January.
    5. Åstebro, Thomas & Chen, Jing, 2014. "The entrepreneurial earnings puzzle: Mismeasurement or real?," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 88-105.
    6. Kerr, Sari Pekkala & Kerr, William R. & Nanda, Ramana, 2022. "House prices, home equity and entrepreneurship: Evidence from U.S. census micro data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 103-119.
    7. Edward P. Lazear, 2004. "Balanced Skills and Entrepreneurship," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(2), pages 208-211, May.
    8. Martin C. Schmalz & David A. Sraer & David Thesmar, 2017. "Housing Collateral and Entrepreneurship," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(1), pages 99-132, February.
    9. Ross Levine & Yona Rubinstein, 2017. "Smart and Illicit: Who Becomes an Entrepreneur and Do They Earn More?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 132(2), pages 963-1018.
    10. Parker,Simon C., 2009. "The Economics of Entrepreneurship," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521728355, March.
    11. Das, Marcel & van Soest, Arthur, 1997. "Expected and realized income changes: Evidence from the Dutch socio-economic panel," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 137-154, January.
    12. Erik Hurst & Geng Li & Benjamin Pugsley, 2014. "Are Household Surveys Like Tax Forms? Evidence from Income Underreporting of the Self-Employed," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 96(1), pages 19-33, March.
    13. Arabsheibani, Gholamreza & de Meza, David & Maloney, John & Pearson, Bernard, 2000. "And a vision appeared unto them of a great profit: evidence of self-deception among the self-employed," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 67(1), pages 35-41, April.
    14. Nathalie Colombier & David Masclet, 2008. "Intergenerational correlation in self employment: some further evidence from French ECHP data," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 30(4), pages 423-437, April.
    15. Adelino, Manuel & Schoar, Antoinette & Severino, Felipe, 2015. "House prices, collateral, and self-employment," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(2), pages 288-306.
    16. Peter Schwardmann & Joël van der Weele, 2016. "Deception and Self-Deception," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 16-012/I, Tinbergen Institute.
    17. Hvide, Hans K. & Panos, Georgios A., 2014. "Risk tolerance and entrepreneurship," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(1), pages 200-223.
    18. Anh T. Le, 1999. "Empirical Studies of Self‐Employment," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(4), pages 381-416, September.
    19. Olivier Compte & Andrew Postlewaite, 2004. "Confidence-Enhanced Performance," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(5), pages 1536-1557, December.
    20. Thomas Astebro & Holger Herz & Ramana Nanda & Roberto A. Weber, 2014. "Seeking the Roots of Entrepreneurship: Insights from Behavioral Economics," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 28(3), pages 49-70, Summer.
    21. Bengtsson, Ola & Ekeblom, Daniel, 2014. "The Bright but Right View? New Evidence on Entrepreneurial Optimism," Working Papers 2014:1, Lund University, Department of Economics.
    22. Sari Pekkala Kerr & William R. Kerr & Ramana Nanda, 2015. "House Money and Entrepreneurship," Harvard Business School Working Papers 15-069, Harvard Business School.
    23. Scott Shane, 2009. "Why encouraging more people to become entrepreneurs is bad public policy," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 33(2), pages 141-149, August.
    24. Malmendier, Ulrike & Tate, Geoffrey, 2008. "Who makes acquisitions? CEO overconfidence and the market's reaction," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(1), pages 20-43, July.
    25. Robert Shimer & Lones Smith, 2000. "Assortative Matching and Search," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 68(2), pages 343-370, March.
    26. Gordon K. Adomdza & Thomas Åstebro & Kevyn Yong, 2016. "Decision biases and entrepreneurial finance," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 47(4), pages 819-834, December.
    27. Matthew J. Lindquist & Joeri Sol & Mirjam Van Praag, 2015. "Why Do Entrepreneurial Parents Have Entrepreneurial Children?," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 33(2), pages 269-296.
    28. Erik G. Hurst & Benjamin W. Pugsley, 2016. "Wealth, Tastes, and Entrepreneurial Choice," NBER Chapters, in: Measuring Entrepreneurial Businesses: Current Knowledge and Challenges, pages 111-151, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    29. Bengtsson, Ola & Ekeblom, Daniel, 2014. "The Bright but Right View? A New Type of Evidence on Entrepreneurial Optimism," Working Paper Series 1008, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
    30. Souleles, Nicholas S, 2004. "Expectations, Heterogeneous Forecast Errors, and Consumption: Micro Evidence from the Michigan Consumer Sentiment Surveys," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 36(1), pages 39-72, February.
    31. William R. Kerr & Ramana Nanda & Matthew Rhodes-Kropf, 2014. "Entrepreneurship as Experimentation," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 28(3), pages 25-48, Summer.
    32. Puri, Manju & Robinson, David T., 2007. "Optimism and economic choice," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(1), pages 71-99, October.
    33. Parker,Simon C., 2009. "The Economics of Entrepreneurship," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521899604, March.
    34. Dan Lovallo & Colin Camerer, 1999. "Overconfidence and Excess Entry: An Experimental Approach," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(1), pages 306-318, March.
    35. Barton H. Hamilton, 2000. "Does Entrepreneurship Pay? An Empirical Analysis of the Returns to Self-Employment," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 108(3), pages 604-631, June.
    36. Manju Puri & David T. Robinson, 2013. "The Economic Psychology of Entrepreneurship and Family Business," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(2), pages 423-444, June.
    37. Hvide, Hans K., 2002. "Pragmatic beliefs and overconfidence," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 48(1), pages 15-28, May.
    38. repec:tiu:tiutis:bdbe10dd-649c-4521-ab28-7aa051a5bf82 is not listed on IDEAS
    39. Christopher Dawson & David de Meza & Andrew Henley & G. Reza Arabsheibani, 2014. "Entrepreneurship: Cause and Consequence of Financial Optimism," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(4), pages 717-742, December.
    40. Tobias J. Moskowitz & Annette Vissing-Jørgensen, 2002. "The Returns to Entrepreneurial Investment: A Private Equity Premium Puzzle?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(4), pages 745-778, September.
    41. Thomas Astebro & Scott A. Jeffrey & Gordon K. Adomdza, 2007. "Inventor Perseverance after Being Told to Quit : The Role of Cognitive Biases," Post-Print hal-00476770, HAL.
    42. Augustin Landier & David Thesmar, 2009. "Financial Contracting with Optimistic Entrepreneurs," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(1), pages 117-150, January.
    43. Victor Stango & Joanne Yoong & Jonathan Zinman, 2017. "The Quest for Parsimony in Behavioral Economics: New Methods and Evidence on Three Fronts," NBER Working Papers 23057, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    44. Black, Jane & de Meza, David & Jeffreys, David, 1996. "House Price, the Supply of Collateral and the Enterprise Economy," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 106(434), pages 60-75, January.
    45. Thomas Åstebro & José Mata & Luís Santos-Pinto, 2015. "Skewness seeking: risk loving, optimism or overweighting of small probabilities?," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 78(2), pages 189-208, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Michele Dell'Era & Luca David Opromolla & Luís Santos‐Pinto, 2023. "Can optimism solve the entrepreneurial earnings puzzle?," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 125(1), pages 139-169, January.
    2. Marco Caliendo & Alexander S. Kritikos & Daniel Rodríguez & Claudia Stier, 2023. "Self-efficacy and entrepreneurial performance of start-ups," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 61(3), pages 1027-1051, October.
    3. Sergio A. Contreras, 2019. "Self-Employment in Times of Crisis: The Case of the Spanish Financial Crisis," Economies, MDPI, vol. 7(3), pages 1-14, August.
    4. Guo, Shiqi & An, Jiafu, 2022. "Does terrorism make people pessimistic? Evidence from a natural experiment," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 155(C).
    5. Byun, Sang-Eun & Han, Siyuan & Kim, Hyejeong & Centrallo, Carol, 2020. "US small retail businesses’ perception of competition: Looking through a lens of fear, confidence, or cooperation," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 52(C).
    6. Kritikos, Alexander, 2022. "Personality and Entrepreneurship," GLO Discussion Paper Series 1137, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    7. Caliendo, Marco & Fossen, Frank M. & Kritikos, Alexander S., 2022. "Personality characteristics and the decision to hire," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 31(3), pages 736-761.
    8. Aymeric Bellon & J. Anthony Cookson & Erik P. Gilje & Rawley Z. Heimer, 2020. "Personal Wealth and Self-Employment," NBER Working Papers 27452, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Astebro, Thomas B. & Fossen, Frank M. & Gutierrez, Cédric, 2024. "Entrepreneurs: Clueless, Biased, Poor Heuristics, or Bayesian Machines?," IZA Discussion Papers 17231, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sari Pekkala Kerr & William R. Kerr & Tina Xu, 2017. "Personality Traits of Entrepreneurs: A Review of Recent Literature," NBER Working Papers 24097, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Ross Levine & Yona Rubinstein, 2018. "Selection into Entrepreneurship and Self-Employment," NBER Working Papers 25350, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Dawson, Christopher & de Meza, David Emmanuel & Henley, Andrew & Arabsheibani, Reza, 2015. "The Power of (Non) Positive Thinking: Self-Employed Pessimists Earn More than Optimists," IZA Discussion Papers 9242, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    4. Michele Dell'Era & Luca David Opromolla & Luís Santos‐Pinto, 2023. "Can optimism solve the entrepreneurial earnings puzzle?," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 125(1), pages 139-169, January.
    5. Christopher Dawson & David de Meza & Andrew Henley & G. Reza Arabsheibani, 2014. "Entrepreneurship: Cause and Consequence of Financial Optimism," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(4), pages 717-742, December.
    6. Aymeric Bellon & J. Anthony Cookson & Erik P. Gilje & Rawley Z. Heimer, 2020. "Personal Wealth and Self-Employment," NBER Working Papers 27452, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Martin Koudstaal & Randolph Sloof & Mirjam van Praag, 2015. "Are Entrepreneurs more Optimistic and Overconfident than Managers and Employees?," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 15-124/VII, Tinbergen Institute.
    8. Luca David Opromolla & Michele Dell'Era, 2018. "A General Equilibrium Theory of Occupational Choice under Optimistic Beliefs about Entrepreneurial Ability," Working Papers w201822, Banco de Portugal, Economics and Research Department.
    9. Sabrina T. Howell, 2017. "Reducing Information Frictions in Venture Capital: The Role of New Venture Competitions," NBER Working Papers 23874, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Matthew J. Lindquist & Theodor Vladasel, 2022. "Are entrepreneurs more upwardly mobile?," Economics Working Papers 1841, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
    11. Thomas Astebro & Holger Herz & Ramana Nanda & Roberto A. Weber, 2014. "Seeking the Roots of Entrepreneurship: Insights from Behavioral Economics," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 28(3), pages 49-70, Summer.
    12. Odermatt, Reto & Powdthavee, Nattavudh & Stutzer, Alois, 2021. "Are newly self-employed overly optimistic about their future well-being?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 95(C).
    13. Martin Koudstaal & Randolph Sloof & Mirjam van Praag, 2016. "Risk, Uncertainty, and Entrepreneurship: Evidence from a Lab-in-the-Field Experiment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(10), pages 2897-2915, October.
    14. Kerr, Sari Pekkala & Kerr, William R. & Nanda, Ramana, 2022. "House prices, home equity and entrepreneurship: Evidence from U.S. census micro data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 103-119.
    15. Åstebro, Thomas & Chen, Jing, 2014. "The entrepreneurial earnings puzzle: Mismeasurement or real?," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 88-105.
    16. Vladasel, Theodor & Lindquist, Matthew J. & Sol, Joeri & van Praag, Mirjam, 2021. "On the origins of entrepreneurship: Evidence from sibling correlations," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 36(5).
    17. Jensen, Thais Laerkholm & Leth-Petersen, Søren & Nanda, Ramana, 2022. "Financing constraints, home equity and selection into entrepreneurship," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(2), pages 318-337.
    18. Deepak Hegde & Justin Tumlinson, 2021. "Information frictions and entrepreneurship," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(3), pages 491-528, March.
    19. Harding, John P. & Rosenthal, Stuart S., 2017. "Homeownership, housing capital gains and self-employment," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 120-135.
    20. Ross Levine & Yona Rubinstein, 2017. "Smart and Illicit: Who Becomes an Entrepreneur and Do They Earn More?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 132(2), pages 963-1018.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    financial optimism; expectations; entrepreneurs;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D84 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Expectations; Speculations
    • M13 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - New Firms; Startups

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:90264. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: LSERO Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.