RESEARCH PAPER
Not All Are Equal: A Latent Profile Analysis of Well‑Being Among the Self‑Employed
Aleksandra Bujacz
1· Constanze Eib
2· Susanna Toivanen
3,4© The Author(s) 2019
Abstract
This study uses a person-centered approach to distinguish between subpopulations of self- employed individuals using multidimensional well-being indicators. Data were obtained from European Social Survey including a sample of 3461 self-employed individuals from 29 European countries. The analysis has empirically identified six distinct profiles named
‘unhappy’, ‘languishing’, ‘happy’, ‘satisfied’, ‘passionate’, and ‘flourishing’. The profiles were associated with significant differences in well-being, health and work-related vari- ables. The results highlight the heterogeneity of the self-employed population, and describe the complex—both hedonic and eudaimonic—character of the well-being concept in this population.
Keywords Well-being · Self-employment · Person-centered · Latent profile analysis
Thus far, little attention has been given to the heterogeneity among the self-employed in terms of their well-being. In general, the self-employed report high levels of well-being (Baron et al. 2016; Stephan and Roesler 2010; Uy et al. 2013). However, the positive rela- tionship between self-employment and well-being may be limited to the rich (Alesina et al.
2001), to the younger and highly educated (Rietveld et al. 2015), to those who became self-employed out of opportunity rather than necessity (van der Zwan et al. 2016), to self- employed with employees and to immigrant self-employed (Johansson Sevä et al. 2016).
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https ://doi.org/10.1007/s1090 2-019-00147 -1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
* Aleksandra Bujacz aleksandra.bujacz@ki.se
Constanze Eib
constanze.eib@psyk.uu.se
1
Division of Psychology, Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet, Tomtebodavägen 18a, 171 77 Stockholm, Sweden
2
Department of Psychology, Uppsala University, Von Kraemers allé 1A och 1C, 752 37 Uppsala, Sweden
3
Academy of Health, Care and Social Welfare, Mälardalen University, Västerås, Sweden
4