ABSTRACT
In relation to available standards for comparison the contribution to employment by high growth firms appears modest regardless of how the analysis is conducted. A large number of studies from various countries have arrived at the conclusion that small and medium sized firms (SMEs) are of large and/or growing importance for new job creation. There are, however, opposing views as regards how small firms' job contributions are distributed across the population of business organizations. The two hypotheses have implications for the fundamental reasons behind a country's structure of business organizations and its (in)ability to create new employment. Taking Sweden's high unemployment during the late 1990s as an example, one reason may be that too few new firms were started. The limited in-flow of firms, rather than their subsequent development, would therefore be the cause for too few new jobs being created. Another possible reason would be a lack of growth firms in the Swedish economy.
