Arbeitspapier

Wealth inequality, uninsurable entrepreneurial risk and firms markup

This paper examines the effect of wealth concentration on firms' market power when firm entry is driven by entrepreneurs facing uninsurable idiosyncratic risks. Under greater wealth concentration, households in the lower end of the wealth distribution are more risk averse and less willing (or able) to bear the risk of entrepreneurial activities. This has implications for firm entry, competitiveness, and market power. I calibrate a Schumpeterian model of endogenous growth with heterogeneous risk averse entrepreneurs competing to catch up with firms. This model is unique in that both household wealth distribution and a measure of firm markup are endogenously determined on a balanced growth path. I find that a spread in the wealth distribution decreases entrepreneurial firm creation, resulting in greater aggregate firm market power. This result is supported by time series evidence obtained from the estimation of a structural panel VAR with OECD data from eight countries.

Language
Englisch

Bibliographic citation
Series: Queen’s Economics Department Working Paper ; No. 1476

Classification
Wirtschaft
Investment; Capital; Intangible Capital; Capacity
Aggregate Factor Income Distribution
Monopoly; Monopolization Strategies
Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
Intellectual Property and Intellectual Capital
Subject
Wealth inequality
market power
growth
Schumpeterian
endogenous growth
entrepreneur

Event
Geistige Schöpfung
(who)
Brien, Samuel
Event
Veröffentlichung
(who)
Queen's University, Department of Economics
(where)
Kingston (Ontario)
(when)
2021

Handle
Last update
10.03.2025, 11:44 AM CET

Data provider

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Object type

  • Arbeitspapier

Associated

  • Brien, Samuel
  • Queen's University, Department of Economics

Time of origin

  • 2021

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