Older entrepreneurs-by-necessity using fuzzy set methods: differences between developed and developing countries

In this paper, we empirically analyze the individual characteristics that drive older workers to become entrepreneurs, more by necessity than desire, providing evidence of the differences between developed and developing countries. While OLS models do not provide any meaningful conclusions, Qualitative Comparative Analysis and fuzzy set logic, at the country level, using GEM 2014 Global Individual micro-data, show the importance of the various combinations of high and/or low values of skills, opportunities, entrepreneurial perceptions, peer effects, and satisfaction with life and income. This indicates how entrepreneurship may be a potential source of income for older workers, in a range of contexts. Further, we find that all the possible combinations of higher values of the latter features are necessity conditions.