This chapter presents a range of data on the self-employment and entrepreneurship activities by women in European Union and OECD countries. This includes reporting the proportion of employed women who are self-employed and indicators on their sector of activity, the proportion that introduce new products and services or have employees. The chapter also presents recent evidence on the barriers that women face in entrepreneurship, including the proportion of women that report that they lack the skills for entrepreneurship and the proportion that report that a fear of failure is a barrier to business creation. Data are reported at the country level, and averages are repeated for European Union and OECD countries.

Data on self-employment and entrepreneurship activities by youth are presented in this chapter. These data include self-employment rates for youth and the proportion of youth involved in starting a business. The chapter also presents data on the characteristics of the businesses operated by youth, including the sector, the proportion of new businesses that offer new products and services, and the proportion of new entrepreneurs who expect to create a substantial number of jobs. Data are also presented on some of the key barriers to entrepreneurship for youth such as a lack of entrepreneurship skills and fear of failure. Data are presented for the European Union and OECD averages, as well as at the country level.

This chapter presents evidence on self-employment and entrepreneurship activities by seniors, including data on the proportion of seniors that are active in self-employment and entrepreneurship. Data are also presented on the characteristics of businesses operated by seniors, including the industry, proportion that introduce new products or services, and the proportion that expect to create a large number of jobs. The chapter also presents data on the key barriers to business creation for seniors such as a lack of entrepreneurship skills and fear of failure. These indicators are presented at the European Union and OECD levels, as well as at the country level.

Data on the proportion of unemployed people who seek to return to work through self-employment are reported in this chapter, as well as the proportion that are successful at transitioning from unemployment to self-employment. Data on the unemployed are presented by gender and age at both the European Union and Member State levels.

This chapter presents self-employment data on immigrants, covering those born in European Union Member States but outside of their current country of residence as well as those born outside of the European Union. The data presented in this chapter include the proportion of self-employed people who were born outside of their country of residence, self-employment rates and the proportion of self-employed immigrants who have employees. Data are presented at the European Union and country levels.