Entrepreneurship and its Link to Corruption: Assessment with the Most Recent World and Country-Group Data

Entrepreneurship is an important intangible asset of nations. The relatively recent progress in its measurement, mainly with the Global Entrepreneurship Development Index (GEDI), suggests that previous questions related to its determinants and mainly its relationship to corruption namely the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) be re-addressed. The objective of the present paper is to assess the links between GEDI and CPI using the most recent (2013-2014) published data on world countries included in the GEDI. The relationships are estimated overall countries included in the GEDI and over groups of countries in relation to geographical continents and other subgrouping of economies. The attained results show consistently the positive effect of corruption reduction on GEDI and thus the positive relationship between an intangible good that is entrepreneurship and an intangible bad that is corruption. These results confirm that the recent available data are supportive of anti-corruption policies that are likely to favor the growth of entrepreneurial activities with promoting market development and hence ensuring the growth of both tangible and intangible components of the wealth of nations.