Report: Young Entrepreneurs Create Jobs, Inspire Kids

In a recent report, EY Global shares the results and conclusions of the EY global job creation and youth entrepreneurship survey 2015.

The Survey

The annual global job creation survey intends to provide a “striking snapshot of what the world’s leading entrepreneurs are thinking, planning and doing for the year ahead.”

This year’s survey includes the ideas of more than 2,000 innovative business leaders from around the world -- including key global growth drivers like India, China and Brazil.

The Main Conclusions

Among the conclusions drawn from this year’s poll, EY Global highlights two points:

- “Job creation — the world’s economic lifeblood — remains in good hands.” 77 percent of the world’s most dynamic entrepreneurs — running for EY Entrepreneur Of The Year award — anticipate an increase in their total global workforce this year. This compares to only 47 percent when the responses of all of the entrepreneurs surveyed this year are taken into account.

Also noteworthy is a comparison to another report published by EY Global, the April 2015 Capital Confidence Barometer. The Barometer “tracks job creation in large public and privately held companies in 54 countries.” Only 29 percent of 1,600 senior executives polled said they “expect to create jobs or hire new talent in the next 12 months.”

- “Good spirits run high. Confidence in both domestic and global economic prospects remains relatively buoyant,” with 71 percent of global entrepreneurs polled feeling positive about the economic direction of their domestic markets. Moreover, 66 percent said they “feel good about the economic direction of the global economy on the whole.” Also to be highlighted, entrepreneurs in China, India, the Middle East and North Africa are almost twice as optimistic as the ones in France, Australia and Japan.

According to the report, entrepreneurs are not only solid job creators. They also "stimulate growth, challenge orthodox methods and create new markets for goods and services.”

Some famed examples of "transformative businesses in developed markets” are: Google Inc GOOG GOOGL, Facebook Inc FB, Virgin America Inc VA and GoPro Inc GPRO.

Entrepreneurs And Youth

In addition to becoming more and more global, entrepreneurs are increasingly young.  According to the EY Megatrends 2015 report, roughly half of the world’s entrepreneurs are aged 25 to 44.

The analysts at EY Global talked to more than 2,800 young people to try find out what their relation with these young entrepreneurs is. They learnt that “most young people are optimistic, in true entrepreneurial fashion, about their future:”

• 84 percent of youngsters are “either very or quite optimistic about fulfilling their career ambitions.
• 65 out of every hundred with to start their own business; 27 percent think about doing it immediately, another 38 percent want to first learn from someone else.
• “Interestingly, while we see a gender gap in so many other areas, both young men and women are almost equally confident they can achieve their entrepreneurial ambitions. A global, interconnected marketplace is providing increased opportunities for entrepreneurs — which both genders believe they can access.”

Most young people say that “what would most help them fulfill their ambitions is current entrepreneurs providing them with advice, support and job opportunities. This appears to be a win-win: young people and entrepreneurs would seem to share an affinity for energy, curiosity and a spirit of can-do.”