Comparative analysis of self-employment intentions among university students in four Central and Eastern European countries

Abstract

It is of high interest of a society to explore and support self-employment which is a prerequisite for development of entrepreneurship and, consequently, the growth of economy. Keeping in mind political and economic differences in Croatia, Poland, Serbia and Slovakia, the level of self-employment intentions was investigated among students at agricultural or life science universities in these countries. The self-employment intention level (SEINT) was measured on a scale of 1 to 5. The total sample of 1,156 respondents involved students from Nitra, Warsaw, Zagreb and Novi Sad. The average SEINT value was 2.97, with students located in Novi Sad expressing significantly higher scores than the other three universities. It was found that some of socio-demographic factors are significantly related to the SEINT. However, the main reasons for significant difference in SEINT for Novi Sad students are believed to be due to the differences in macroeconomic conditions in the country.

Keywords

• self-employment
• students’ intentions
• cee countries
• agricultural universities