Entrepreneurs and businessmen in Greece during the Long Nineteenth Century

This paper examines what part, if any, businessmen played in the slow and erratic growth of the later nineteenth century Greek economy. A data set of most of the principal Greek businessmen of the period has been created. By specifying and estimating a simple model of the determinants of the supply and demand for entrepreneur’s capital, the productivity of different entrepreneurial characteristics can be demonstrated. Greece took advantage of opportunities to borrow business and technological knowledge from abroad; businessmen disproportionately originated from other countries relative to the population as a whole and many others gained foreign experience. Moreover, the demand for capital showed that experience abroad and operating both inside and outside Greece were marks of greater entrepreneurial ability. Had the Greek economy been able to attract more people with these characteristics, it would have been better off. As it was the corporate sector grew too slowly to do very much for the economy as a whole. The constraints on economic growth were those of the institutions of the domestic economy, especially the state