Roberta PIERGIOVANNI
Department of National Accounts, Statistics Italy, Rome
Enrico SANTARELLI
Department of Economics, University of Bologna
Luuk KLOMP
DG for Innovation, Ministry of Economic Affairs, The Hague
and A. Roy THURIK
Centre for Advanced Small Business Economics (CASBEC) - Tinbergen Institute, Erasmus University Rotterdam - EIM Business and Policy Research, Zoetermeer
GIBRAT'S LAW AND THE FIRM SIZE/FIRM
GROWTH RELATIONSHIP IN ITALIAN SMALL SCALE SERVICES
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Mots-clés : Croissance des entreprises, industries de service, Loi de Gibrat, Italie. Key words : Firm Growth, Service Industries, Gibrat's Law, Italy.
I. - Introduction
In a recent paper by Audretsch, Klomp, Santarelli and Thurik (2002) it is shown that, for a sample including both incumbent and new-born firms in the small scale services in The Netherlands, Gibrat's Law is generally valid, since the probability of a given proportionate change in size during a four-year period turns out to be the same for all firms - regardless of their size at the beginning of the period. This finding is at odds with those of recent studies based
(*) Acknowledgement : This paper is the result of a visit by Enrico Santarelli at the Tinbergen Institute and EIM Business and Policy Research in 2002. It is part of the research project « The post-entry performance of Italian firms : technology, growth and survival », co- financed by the Italian MIUR (year 2000; Prot. #MM13O38538_OO1 ; under the direction of E. Santarelli). A previous version was presented at the 1st International Industrial Organization Conference (Boston, 4-5 April 2003). We thank Switgard Feuerstein and an anonymous referee for their useful suggestions. The contribution by Luuk Klomp does not necessarily reflect the policies of the Ministry of Economic Affairs. A previous version of this paper has been circulated as Tinbergen Institute Discussion Paper No. TI-2002-080/3
REVUE D'ÉCONOMIE INDUSTRIELLE — n° 102, 1er trimestre 2003 69
