Entrepreneurial performance of the European Union – pivot of its economic security

Abstract 

The goal of the present paper is to demonstrate whether the varying performance of the European Union states in terms of business and entrepreneurial attractiveness and activity is diminishing the level of overall economic security. Accordingly, the particular objectives which are to be achieved include: firstly, structuring the EU countries by performance groups in terms of economic efficiency; secondly, development of an innovative approach through which it can be analysed the dynamics and present level of economic security across the identified groups; and thirdly, analysis of interdependence between the selected indicators within the developed approach and, as result, suggestion of relevant policy measures at the level of the European Union. The methodology applied to reach the goal and objectives of the research includes a throughout quantitative analysis of data regarding the discrepancies in the European Union in terms of innovation output, resource productivity, employees’ salary, business R&D expenditure, international investment positions, gross fixed capital formation, exports, energy efficiency and unemployment. The results reached expressively underline that the level of discrepancies among the performance groups in the European Union is high, these differences growing in the areas of business and entrepreneurial performance.