Towards an Untrepreneurial economy: The Entrepreneurship Industry and the Veblenian Entrepreneur

Abstract

What is driving the declining quality of innovation-driven entrepreneur-ship? In this paper, we argue the growing entrepreneurship industry is an important yet overlooked explanation. This rapidly growing industry has transformed the nature of entrepreneurship and encouraged a particular form of low-quality entrepreneurship. It has done so by leveraging the Ide-ology of Entrepreneurialism to mass-produce and mass-market products that make possible what we term Veblenian Entrepreneurship. This is en-trepreneurship pursued primarily as a form of conspicuous consumption. Aside from lowering average entrepreneurial quality, Veblenian Entrepre-neurship has a range of (short-run) positive and (medium and long-run) negative effects for both individuals and society at large. We argue that the rise of the Veblenian Entrepreneur has contributed to creating an increas-ingly Untrepreneurial Economy. That is an economy which superficially appears innovation-driven and dynamic, but is actually rife with ineffi-ciencies and unable to generate economically meaningful growth through innovation.

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