SSTI Digest

When it comes to new firm survival in the service sector, do regions that have above-average high school dropout rates fare worse than regions with higher percentages of their adult populations earning college degrees? The answer, according to a recent discussion paper by Zoltan Acs, Catherine Armington, and Ting Zhang, is it depends.

 

In The Determinants of New-firm Survival across Regional Economies, the authors find, that regardless of whether the economy is in recession or growth, the higher a region’s high school dropout rates, the lower its new-firm survival rate in the service sector. [Note: High school dropouts are such a drain on state and regional economies, in fact, that many states are raising the legal age from 16 to 18 before a student can excuse himself from school permanently. For example, several governors used their State of the State Addresses this year to call for the change.]

 

This week's issue of the SSTI Weekly Digest exposes just the tip of the iceberg of information available on entrepreneurship. That's where the TBED Resource Center comes in handy. The TBED Resource Center, developed by SSTI in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Commerce's Office of Technology Policy, is an interactive website providing a wealth of information for practitioners, policymakers, university faculty, and researchers alike. With links to more than 4,500 reports, the website features information in a variety of TBED-critical topics in the U.S. and abroad.



More than 290 reports can be found on the TBED Resource Center when the topic entrepreneurship is selected.  



SSTI staff selections include:

Nineteen states that applied for assistance under the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program in fiscal year 2005 saw an award-to-proposal conversion rate greater than the national average of 16.4 percent. Of those states, five experienced rates of greater than 20 percent ­- Nebraska (29%), Maine (27.3%), District of Columbia (25%), Montana (21.8%), and Washington (20%).



The top 10 states with the most awards in FY 2005 were California (816), Massachusetts (508), Virginia (242), Colorado (205), Maryland (204), Texas (198), Ohio (191), New York (186), Pennsylvania (176) and Michigan (111).

 

With Entrepreneurship Week, you and your colleagues may be more inspired to take steps to encourage entrepreneurship. But where to begin? What approaches should you consider? Or perhaps you are having problems developing an entrepreneurial culture?



Wouldn't it be great if there was one guide that you could turn to that captures the wisdom and experience of more than 50 experienced practitioners? One publication that would describe more than 14 ways that are being used across the country to encourage entrepreneurship? One publication that offers these suggestions from one seasoned practitioner:

The Georgia Department of Economic Development (GDEcD) is seeking a director to run its Innovation and Technology Office. The director is responsible for implementing and expanding a statewide technology and innovation-based economic development program that encompasses a full range of sales, marketing, business recruitment, business development, community development and public relations activities. A bachelor's degree in the life sciences, engineering or a closely related field is required; a master's degree in these fields is preferred. A full description of this opportunity and others is available through the SSTI Job Corner at http://www.ssti.org/posting.htm.