The Entry into and Exit out of Self-employment and Business Ownership in Canada

Entrepreneurial activity has long been argued as an important driver of innovation, job creation, and productivity growth. However, measuring entrepreneurial activity is not easy. Using a newly developed administrative database of firms and workers, the Canadian Employer–Employee Dynamics Database (CEEDD), over the period from 2001 to 2013, this paper distinguishes incorporated self-employment from unincorporated self-employment, and compares the entry and exit dynamics of the two types of self-employment by age, gender and province. The large number of observations in CEEDD and its longitudinal nature make this detailed analysis possible.