ABSTRACT

This chapter looks at all the interactions between demographic, household relationship, location and sector variables. It is a statistical analysis of all the individual records for 1851–1911 that allows the key influences on entrepreneur choices to be identified whilst at the same time taking account of their interactions with each other. This provides the key dimensions for the following chapters. Entrepreneur age, gender and marital status are key influences; household position relative to the ‘head’ of household, location and transport access are also of significance. The estimates compare different types of entrepreneur: sole own-account proprietors, employers and the directors of corporations. Business sector is a key feature for all groups reflecting ease of market entry, scalability and levels of competition.