Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 5280–5285

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Journal of Business Research

The effect of public policies on entrepreneurial activity and

economic growth☆
María Soledad Castaño a,⁎, María Teresa Méndez b, Miguel Ángel Galindo c
a
Facultad de CC. Económicas y Empresariales, Plaza de la Universidad, 1, 02071 Albacete, Spain
b
Facultad de CC. Económicas y Empresariales, Campus de Somosaguas, 28223 Madrid, Spain
c
Facultad de Derecho y Ciencias Sociales, Ronda de Toledo, s/n, 13071 Ciudad Real, Spain

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Policy makers' main interest is to avoid the problems resulting from the economic crisis. One way to avoid these
Received 1 February 2016 problems is to stimulate economic growth as well as the necessary economic activity to reduce unemployment
Received in revised form 1 March 2016 and to increase welfare. Specialized recent literature shows entrepreneurship as a key factor to enhance econom-
Accepted 1 April 2016
ic growth. Consequently, determining which economic policies could stimulate entrepreneurial activity and, in-
Available online 17 May 2016
directly, economic growth is relevant. This article's main goal is to analyze some of these policies' effects on
Keywords:
entrepreneurship and economic growth. To achieve this goal, the study performs an empirical analysis of 13
Innovation European Union countries, divided in two complementary methods: Partial Least Squares (PLS) estimation and
R&D fsQCA. fsQCA allows completing the results obtained by PLS estimation, by allowing to obtain causal recipes or
Economic policy sufficient conditions that help to determine the relevant relation between economic variables.
Entrepreneurship © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Economic growth

1. Introduction
The economic crisis that countries have experienced in recent years
has led to a research of the factors that could guide a successful econom-
ic growth, thus reducing economic problems such as unemployment or
inequality. Among these factors, entrepreneurship has an increasing im-
portance, especially thanks to the availability of quantitative data. The
study carries out this variable's analysis from two perspectives: Firstly,
from a microeconomic level that has emphasized entrepreneurs' psy-
chological characteristics and motivations. This perspective considers
the analysis of the survival rate of entrepreneurial activities and other
related aspects, such as kind of financing and type of business. Secondly,
from a broader perspective that has studied the influence of entrepre-
neurship on the economic growth of countries. This study contemplates
the possible effects on entrepreneurship of different quantitative and
qualitative factors, such as the formation and social climate (Castaño,
Méndez, & Galindo, 2015).
On the other hand, in recent decades research has also considered
the effects of public policies on entrepreneurship. Besides, researchers
should also determine what policies might affect entrepreneurship
and their more or less direct effect on economic growth, as mentioned
☆ The authors thank Professor Daniel Palacios, Universidad Politécnica de Valencia and
Professor Miguel-Ángel Sastre, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, for their careful read-
ing and suggestions.
⁎ Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: MariaSoledad.Castano@uclm.es (M.S. Castaño),
mmendezpi@ccee.ucm.es (M.T. Méndez), mgalindomar@orange.es (M.Á. Galindo).
previously. Therefore, tax changes and expenditure policies might en-
courage or discourage entrepreneurship.
Accordingly, the aim of this study is to analyze the effects of these
policies on entrepreneurship and indirectly on economic growth, con-
sidering the circumstances and problems of each country. The study
also aims to encourage the design of various measures to achieve
economic growth, like R&D policy, training, and the elimination of
administrative barriers to access financial support, and the promotion
of entrepreneurial culture. European Union countries will implement
some of these measures in the following years.
The next section briefly exposes the different policies that can have
some effect on entrepreneurship and on economic growth. Section 3
empirically analyzes 13 European countries through two methods:
Partial Least Squares (PLS) estimation and fsQCA. The study employs
fsQCA (Ragin, 2008) to observe the combinations of economic variables
that lie behind higher economic growth. Finally, Section 4 contains the
main conclusions.
2. Public policies, entrepreneurship, and economic growth
As noted earlier, when analyzing entrepreneurship, the policies that
can encourage or hinder this phenomenon are one of the main aspects
to consider. The literature has investigated this issue through different
aspects, such as the different types of policies (Gnyawali & Fogel,
1994; McMullen, Bagby, & Palich, 2008), or the impact of policy and
regulation on entrepreneurship (Campbell & Mitchell, 2012). Kreft
and Sobel (2005) argue that an environment with low taxes, low regu-
lations, and secure private property rights is necessary to encourage the

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2016.04.125
0148-2963/© 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
 M.S. Castaño et al. / Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 5280–5285
necessary entrepreneurial activity to produce economic growth.
Audretsch and Thurik (2004) and Audretsch, Grilo, and Thurik (2007),
distinguish between entrepreneurship policies, more focused on the
impact of individual behavior in the early stages of the entrepreneurial
process, and SME policies, which focus on existing SME. Stevenson and
Lundström (2007) consider that policies can create conditions that
allow emerging entrepreneurship; that is, a culture of promoting entre-
preneurship, opportunity to acquire business skills, experience, and
knowledge, facilitating the availability of financial and nonfinancial
resources, and decreasing obstacles to implementation. From a criti-
cal viewpoint, Jacquemin and Janssen (2015) analyze the distinction
between “supportive” policies and “constraining” regulations by
discussing the existence of “enabling” regulations and policies that
create opportunities for entrepreneurs.
In general terms, the design of policies should aim to create the right
environment to encourage individuals to startup, either by promoting
business opportunities generation, or by guaranteeing the property
rights of the startup activity. For example, the first area could include
those policies designed to facilitate access to finances and to promote
higher education and the culture of entrepreneurship and innovation
(De Clercq & Arenius, 2006; Gavron, Cowling, Holtham, & Westall,
1998; Reynolds, Hay, & Camp, 1999). This area should also include the
role of taxes, as their reduction would promote economic activity such
as increased consumption resulting from greater available income. Re-
garding the second level, and according to the European Commission
(2012), the administrative burden represents one of the fundamental
obstacles to business creation: almost three quarters of entrepreneurs
in Europe consider as too difficult the creation of their own company,
principally because of administrative complexity. Therefore, excessive
administrative or labor regulation is detrimental for entrepreneurship
(Begley, Tan, & Schoch, 2005; Grilo & Thurik, 2005; Hart, 2003;
Stephen, Urbano, & van Hemmen, 2009). However, it is important to
note the beneficial effects of an adequate rule of law and proper gover-
nance (Méndez-Picazo, Galindo-Martín, & Ribeiro-Soriano, 2012).
Another factor that the literature mentions to achieve sustainable
economic growth is the existence of a group of individuals (entrepre-
neurs) who can take risks and use the available financial resources to
create new business (Alpkan, Bulut, Gundy, Ulusoy, & Kilic, 2010;
Audretsch & Keilbach, 2004a,b). These individuals are the main intro-
ducers of innovations and technological advances that may increase
the economic productivity of a country and promote economic growth
(Abramovitz, 1986; Audretsch, 2005; Griliches, 1998).
Accordingly, an extensive literature focuses on studying the direct and
indirect effects of innovation on economic growth (Aghion, David, &
Foray, 2009; Cumming, Johan, & Zhang, 2014; D'Agostino & Scarlato,
2015; Galindo & Méndez, 2014; Wong, Ho, & Autio, 2005). The examined
literature introduces two different latent variables on the effects of inno-
vation policies: the expenditure on R&D and innovative economic
environment.
Taking into account the previous theoretical aspects, as well as
Castaño-Martínez, Méndez-Picazo, and Galindo-Martín's (2015)
empirical analysis, the current analysis aims to answer the following
questions:
Q1. Could the R&D policy positively affect entrepreneurial activity?
Q2. Do complex administrative processors and lack to access to
credit hinder entrepreneurial activity?
Q3. Do public policies that support human capital formation influ-
ence entrepreneurship and economic growth?
Q4. Do the capabilities of the entrepreneurs and successful entrepre-
neurs encourage entrepreneurship?
Q5. Does an innovative economic environment affect entrepreneur-
ship and economic growth?
Q6. Does entrepreneurship influence economic growth?
5281
Fig. 1. Determinates of entrepreneurship and economic growth.
Fig. 1 shows the different economic relations that the empirical anal-
ysis takes into consideration.
Different databases act as source for the study's variables. Table 1
includes various indicators from the Global Entrepreneurship Moni-
tor (GEM) database and from Eurostat. The analysis also uses World
Development Indicators from the World Bank database and United
Nations Development Programme (UNDP) indicators, concerning
13 European countries (Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France,
Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and
the United Kingdom) in 2012. This economic fact can measure of in-
complete way by different proxy variable that international organi-
zations calculate. However, PLS allows introducing several of these
indicators as latent variables. Besides, fsQCA enables an analysis of
complex economic relations that is not possible in traditional regres-
sion estimation.
Table 1
Constructs and indicators.
Constructs Indicators
R&D policy (GR&D) • Gross domestic expenditure on R&D (GERD) by
Government sector (Eurostat, 2014) (rdgover).
• Gross domestic expenditure on R&D (GERD) by
Higher education sector (Eurostat, 2014) (rduni).
Difficult to start (AF) • It is difficult to start one's own business due to the
complex administrative procedures. Options: Strongly
agree and Agree (European Commission, 2014)
(administrative).
• It is difficult to start one's own business due to a lack
of available financial support. Options: Strongly agree
and Agree (European Commission, 2014) (financial).
Characteristics of the • Percentage of 18–64 population who believe to have
entrepreneur (CE) the required skills and knowledge to start a business
(Gem, 2014) (capabilities).
• Percentage of 18–64 population who agree with the
statement that in their country, successful
entrepreneurs receive high status (status).
Human capital (HC) • Public expenditure in education (World
Bank-database, 2014) (hc).
• Mean years of schooling (UNDP, 2014) (meanhc).
Innovative economic • Product innovative enterprises in proportion to
environment (INN) innovative enterprises (Eurostat, 2014) (inv).
• Product innovative enterprises in proportion to total
enterprises (Eurostat, 2014) (innt).
Entrepreneurship (TEA) • Total early-stage entrepreneurial activity (tea) (X11).
• Percentage of those involved in TEA who (i) claim to
be driven by opportunity as opposed to finding no
other option for work; and (ii) who indicate the main
driver for being involved in this opportunity is being
independent or increasing their income, rather than
just maintaining their income (teaopp).
Economic growth (EG) • GDP per capita (World Bank-database, 2014)
(gdppc).
• Gross National Income (GNI) per capita (UNDP, 2014)
(gni).
5282 M.S. Castaño et al. / Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 5280–5285

3. Results Table 2
Reliability measurements.

3.1. PLS estimation AVE Composite R Cronbach's Communality Redundancy

reliability square alpha
PLS allows establishing a correlation between different latent vari- GR&D 0.72 0.84 0.63 0.72
ables because this method combines the characteristics of principal AF 0.86 0.93 0.84 0.86
component analysis and multiple regressions. Thus, PLS allows to ad- CE 0.61 0.73 0.58 0.61
HC 0.59 0.74 0.32 0.59
dress problems of collinearity (multivariate normality is not necessary).
INN 0.94 0.97 0.13 0.94 0.94 0.12
Collinearity is particularly important when comparing a large number EG 0.83 0.91 0.87 0.80 0.83 0.65
of predictors with the number of observations (the method is suitable TEA 0.88 0.94 0.58 0.86 0.88 0.37
for small samples) (Barclay, Higgins, & Thompson, 1995).
The analysis obtains estimates using the PLS method with the
SmartPLS 2.0.M3 program (Hair, Hult, Ringle, & Sarstedt, 2015). The re- To evaluate the statistical significance of the latent regression coeffi-
sults obtained for the sub-model support the choice of indicators. An cients, the analysis obtains t-statistics by bootstrapping.
item's individual liability, internal consistency, and discriminant validity The PLS estimation results try to answer the previous research
give value to the measurement model. Cronbach's Alpha value (Barclay questions:
et al., 1995; Nunnally & Bernstein, 1994) measures the simple relation-
Q1: public expenditure in R&D has significant positive effects on en-
ship between each item and its respective construct.
Convergent validity (AVE) shows the extracted variance of the indi- trepreneurship (β11 = 0.48) (Tables 2 and 3). This result confirms
cators, exposing the common variability absorbed by the latent variable. the approach by Audretsch and Fritsch (2003) and Autio, Kenney,
An AVE of at least 0.5 is acceptable as a reliable measure of goodness of Mustar, Siegel, and Wright (2014).
fit (Fornell, 1982; Fornell & Larcker, 1981). Q2: A significant negative correlation exists (β12 = −0.63) between
Cronbach's Alpha indicates the internal coherence of the indicators, complex administrative procedures and lack of financial support with
with a value of at least 0.7. Composite Reliability is the reliability of entrepreneurship (Tables 2 and 3) in accordance with Grilo and
the construct. Above 0.7 the construct is reliable (Barclay et al., 1995; Thurik (2005), Begley et al. (2005) and Stephen et al. (2009). Hence,
Nunnally & Bernstein, 1994). Redundancy measures the predictive ca- the Member States need to reduce and simplify the regulations and
pacity of the model.
procedures to create new companies and facilitate access to credit.
Regarding the structural sub-model, the measurement of the R2 co-
Q3: Policy makers' measures to promote human capital have posi-
efficients associated with latent variable regressions is only possible in
the endogenous constructs. R2 indicates the construct variance that tive effects on entrepreneurship. This result is in the same line as
the model explains. All the endogenous latent variables are significant, the theses of Lawson and Samson (2001) in the case of the EU coun-
with values greater than 0.1 (Falk & Miller, 1992). tries. The analysis also shows that countries investing more in
Fig. 2 and Tables 2 and 3 show the results achieved in Castaño- human capital achieve greater economic growth (Abramovitz,
Martínez et al. (2015): 1986; Audretsch, 2005) (β32 = 0.35).

Fig. 2. Model estimated by PLS estimation.

 M.S. Castaño et al. / Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 5280–5285
Table 3
Regression coefficients of the structural model.
Original sample (O) Standard deviation (STDEV)
AF → TEA −0.63 0.08
CE → TEA 0.26 0.07
GR&D → TEA 0.48 0.21
HC → EG 0.78 0.04
HC → INN 0.36 0.09
HC → TEA 0.24 0.10
INN → EG 0.24 0.02
INN → TEA 0.23 0.13
TEA → EG 0.15 0.06
Q4: Entrepreneurial activity is greater in a society where entrepre-
neurs have startup skills. Societies consider successful entrepreneurs
to be in possession of high economic and social status. The European
Commission (2012) proposes stimulating the entrepreneurial cul-
ture as another line of action.
Q5: A positive correlation exists between innovative economic envi-
ronment and entrepreneurial activity (β15 = 0.22), but this correla-
tion is not significant (Table 3).
Q6: Entrepreneurship has a positive correlation with economic
growth (β31 = 0.15) (Tables 2 and 3). Consequently, these results
confirm the theses of Audretsch (2005), Audretsch and Keilbach
(2004a,b) and Alpkan et al. (2010), in the case of the European coun-
tries under study.
3.2. Results with fsQCA
To complete the former empirical analysis, the fsQCA analyzes the
relationships considered in Fig. 1. Namely, fsQCA is a program that
uses combinatorial logic, fuzzy set theory, and Boolean minimization
to work out what combinations of characteristics may be necessary or
sufficient to produce an outcome (Kent & Olsen, 2008, p. 3).
For its part, fsQCA allows identifying causal configurations in several
steps (Berg-Schlosser, De Meur, Rihoux, & Ragin, 2009; Ragin, 1987):
(1) identification of all possible causal configurations, (2) analyzing
the distribution of cases according to such configurations, (3) detection
of sufficient configurations according to a consistency criterion, and
(4) reduction of sufficient configurations by applying counterfactual
analysis. Obviously, if the condition or the combination of them is suffi-
cient, this does not mean that it will be necessary to generate a certain
outcome.
In addition, fsQCA requires transforming variables into sets cali-
brated via three meaningful thresholds: full membership, full non-
membership, and the crossover point. The crossover point refers to
“the point of maximum ambiguity in the assessment of whether a
case is more in or out of a set” (Ragin, 2008, p. 30). Based on these
qualitative thresholds, variable raw scores can become set measures
using the direct method of calibration. Calibration draws on theoret-
ical and substantive knowledge of the context (Fiss, 2007). This anal-
ysis employs the direct estimation method, based on descriptive
statistic and economic literature. Thus, the indicators of Table 1 be-
come fuzzy variables expressing the degree of membership, where
value 1 represents full membership and value 0 represent full non-
membership. The variables are the same as the estimate PLS, but
Table 1 incorporates fs_ to indicate a calibrated variable.
The qualitative analysis uses fsQCA 2.0 software, taking as depen-
dent variable entrepreneurial activity (fs_tea) in the first equation,
and GDPpc (fs_gdppc) in the second equation. Afterwards, the
study proceeds to calculate the truth table to identify sufficient causal
configurations. The truth table allows selecting one of the characteris-
tics as the “outcome,” explaining two or more membership scores or
5283
Standard error (STERR) T statistics (|O/STERR|)
0.08 7.68
0.07 3.67
0.21 2.34
0.04 2.22
0.09 4
0.11 2.28
0.02 9.84
0.13 1.8
0.06 2.67
“conditions” that may potentially be necessary or sufficient for the out-
come to happen. The truth table now treats each case as a combination
of the characteristics selected (or “configuration” in fsQCA terminology)
(Kent & Olsen, 2008, p. 3). Additionally, the truth table calculates all
the possible 2k combinations of potential causal conditions (where k
is the number of causal conditions); the truth table records the number
of cases with that configuration and whether or not the outcome
happened.
However, this method requires the identification of the different
causal configurations with positive cases and removal those causal con-
figurations that are theoretically possible but do not respond to real
cases collected in the study sample (Ragin, 2006).
After the selection of causal configurations, depending on the distri-
bution of the cases in the sample, the study selects a threshold for the
level of consistency, 0.8 according to Ragin's (2008) approach.
The calculation of the truth table offers three alternative results:
complex, parsimonious, and intermediate solution. The complex solu-
tion does not simplify sufficient configurations, and therefore is the so-
lution that offers the most details. The parsimonious solution performs
the maximum simplification possible based on the consideration that
all counterfactual leads to the outcome of interest. Finally, the interme-
diate solution assumes that only some of the possible causal configura-
tions that do not collect actual cases have led to the results analyzed in
Ragin and Sonnett (2005). Ragin (2008) recommends the use of the in-
termediate and the parsimonious solution, even though intermediate
solutions are usually the most interpretable. On the other hand, parsi-
monious solutions show which conditions are essential to distinguish
between positive and negative cases. Additionally, to calculate the
truth table, the analysis uses the Quine–McCluskey algorithm.
The Eq. (1) to answer the analysis' research questions is as follows:
Model 1 : fs tea ¼ fðfs rdgover; fs administrative; fs financial; fs hc;
fs meanhc; fs innt; fs capabilities; fs statusÞ:
In Model 1, entrepreneurship (fs_tea) is a function of public ex-
penditure in R&D (fs_rdgover), complex administrative procedures
(fs_administrative), lack of financial support (fs_financial), public
expenditure in education (fs_hc), mean years of schooling
(fs_meanhc), innovative enterprise (fs_innt), capabilities of entre-
preneur (fs_capabilities), and successful entrepreneurs receive
high status (fs_status).
One of the differences between the two methods of estimation
employed in this analysis is that to build the latent variables in PLS
estimation, the method needs several indicators, but in fsQCA only
one variable defines the outcome.
In Table 4, the parsimonious solution shows two sufficient configu-
rations. The first indicates that public expenditure on R&D, in conjunc-
tion with the skill and knowledge of entrepreneurs, explain 0.71 of the
positive cases. The second configuration indicates that capabilities,
successful entrepreneurs, and the absence of administrative procedures
explicate 0.63 of the positive cases.
On the other hand, intermediate solution provides the following
sufficient configurations: the conjunction of successful entrepreneurs,
5284 M.S. Castaño et al. / Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 5280–5285

Table 4
Result equation 1.

Equation 1. outcome: fs_tea

Parsimonious solution
Frequency cutoff: 1.000000
Consistency cutoff: 0.805714
Sufficient configuration Raw coverage Unique coverage Consistency
fs_rdgover*fs_capabilities 0.7148 0.2262 0.7121
~fs_administrative*fs_capabilities*fs_status 0.6330 0.1444 0.8409
Solution coverage: 0.859316
Solution consistency: 0.695385

Intermediate solution
Frequency cutoff: 1.000000
Consistency cutoff: 0.805714
Sufficient configuration Raw coverage Unique coverage Consistency
fs_status*fs_capabilities*fs_rdgover 0.684411 0.309886 0.756303
fs_status*fs_capabilities*fs_innt*fs_hc*~fs_administrative 0.496198 0.121673 0.909408
Solution coverage: 0.806084
Solution consistency: 0.749117

Notes: *conjunction ~absence. Consistency is the approximated degree to sub-set relationship of necessity. Coverage indicates the proportion of membership (coun-
tries, in this case) in the outcome explained by the solution. The intermediate solution presents following assumptions: fs_status (present), fs_capabilities (present).
fs_pinnvte (present), fs_meanhc (present), fs_hc (present), ~fs_financial (absent), ~fs_administrative (absent), fs_rdgover (present).

the entrepreneur's capabilities, and the public expenditure of R&D.
These configurations present a raw of coverage of 0.68. Besides, the con-
junction of skill and knowledge, successful entrepreneurs, innovative
economic environment, investment in human capital, and absence of
complex administrative procedures explain 0.49 of the positive cases.
Therefore, the results of Model 1 complement the results from the
PLS estimate. The fsQCA results indicate the path that countries with
more entrepreneurship have followed. However, the latent variable
characteristics of entrepreneurs have a low significance threshold in
PLS estimation. Instead, the fsQCA analysis confirms that the capabilities
and success of entrepreneurs are important with the R&D expenditure
and the absence of complex administrative procedures.
The equation for Model 2 to answer the previous research questions
is the following:
Model 2 : fs gdppc ¼ f ðfs meanhc; fs hc; fs innt; fs teaÞ:
In Model 2, economic growth (fs_gdppc) is a function of mean
years of schooling (fs_meanhc), public expenditure in education
(fs_hc), innovative economic environment (fs_innt), and entrepre-
neurship (fs_tea).
In the results of Model 2, only the parsimonious solution presents
public expenditure as a sufficient configuration to explain economic
growth. In this case, the intermediate solution obtains the most interest-
ing result: the conjunction of innovative economic environment, public
expenditure on education, and entrepreneurship has an influence on
economic growth. This sufficient configuration presents a raw coverage
of 0.55 and a high consistency of 0.94. The result confirms the previous
PLS estimations, and is consistent with the theoretical approaches the
such as increasing expenditure on R&D and on education, stimulating
entrepreneurial culture, reducing complex administrative, and increas-
ing financial support to SMEs, especially to entrepreneurs due to their
capacity to create jobs. The empirical analysis of the relationships be-
tween entrepreneurship-related factors and economic growth using
PLS and fsQCA leads to the following conclusions:
First, higher public expenditure on R&D, public investment in educa-
tion, and measures to stimulate entrepreneurial culture have a positive
effect on entrepreneurship. Second, countries with complex legal sys-
tems (which regulate the startup of an economic activity), and countries
that present a complicated access to credit, show lower levels of entre-
preneurship. Third, societies with a greater number of innovative enter-
prises, higher human capital, and higher levels of entrepreneurial
activity present higher economic growth. The fsQCA method allows to
complement the results obtained with PLS estimation, because fsQCA
calculates causal configurations that countries with higher entrepre-
neurial activity and economic growth have followed. Thus, the empirical
analyses stress the following causal configurations in relation to coun-
tries with more entrepreneurship: firstly, successful entrepreneurs, ca-
pabilities of entrepreneurship, and public expenditure of R&D; and
secondly, knowledge, successful entrepreneurs, innovative economic
environment, investment in human capital, and the absence of complex
administrative procedures. In addition, causal configurations explain
the economic performance by investing in human capital, innovative
economic environment, and entrepreneurship. Thus, fsQCA allows to
Table 5
Results equation 2.

study obtained earlier. The fsQCA analysis also completes the results Equation 2. outcome: gdppc
of the PLS estimation, because the countries with innovative enterprise, Parsimonious solution
public expenditure on education, and entrepreneurship at the same Frequency cutoff: 1.000000
Consistency cutoff: 0.917526
time have better economic results. Sufficient configuration Raw coverage Unique coverage Consistency
Woodside (2013) stresses the importance of achieving high consis- fs_hc 0.842857 0.117871 0.849476
tency over high coverage. In addition, Schneider and Wagemann Solution coverage: 0.842857
(2010) consider that a condition is necessary for the outcome when Solution consistency: 0.849476
its consistency value is “much higher” than 0.75. According to these au- Intermediate solution
thors' consideration, Eqs. (1) and (2) present high consistency values Frequency cutoff: 1.000000
(Tables 4 and 5). Consistency cutoff: 0.917526
Sufficient configuration Raw coverage Unique coverage Consistency
fs_mean*fs_hc* 0.707792 0.205195 0.976703
4. Conclusion fs_innt*fs_hc*fs_tea 0.550649 0.048052 0.946429
Solution coverage: 0.755844
European governments consider entrepreneurship as an essential Solution consistency: 0.943274
factor to create economic growth and new jobs. Nowadays, the The intermediate solution presents the following assumptions: fs_meanhc (present),
European Commission makes some suggestions to European countries, fs_innt (present), fs_hc (present), and fs_tea (present).
 M.S. Castaño et al. / Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 5280–5285
observe these variables together to achieve a higher entrepreneurship
and economic growth.
A possible limitation of this study is that the analysis takes a small
number of cases, but the study aims to complete PLS results with the
fsQCA. For this reason, this article opens possible futures lines of re-
search, such as selecting all European countries and analyzing necessary
and sufficient conditions with fsQCA.
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