A Golden Opportunity: The Gold Rush, Entrepreneurship and Culture

Arbeitspapier

We study the origins of entrepreneurship (culture) in the United States. For the analysis we make use of a quasi-natural experiment – the gold rush in the second part of the 19th century. We argue that the presence of gold attracted individuals with entrepreneurial personality traits. Due to a genetic founder effect and the formation of an entrepreneurship culture, we expect gold rush counties to have higher entrepreneurship rates. The analysis shows that gold rush counties indeed have higher entrepreneurship rates from 1910, when records began, until the present as well as a higher prevalence of entrepreneurial traits in the populace.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: IZA Discussion Papers ; No. 14894

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Entrepreneurship ; Size and Spatial Distributions of Regional Economic Activity
• Subject: gold rush ; entrepreneurship ; culture

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Stuetzer, Michael ; Brodeur, Abel ; Obschonka, Martin ; Audretsch, David ; Rentfrow, Peter J. ; Potter, Jeff ; Gosling, Samuel D.
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
• (where): Bonn
• (when): 2021

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/250555
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:42 AM CET