We investigate the impact of friction-reducing labor market reforms on regional high-growth entrepreneurship (HGE) through the effects of reduced legal enforceability of noncompete agreements (NCAs). We draw on new institutional economic theory and the external enablement framework, with insights from the theory of market-preserving federalism, to explore how these reforms enable (disable) HGE within the context of other, concurrent institutional changes at different governance levels. We assemble a novel multi-level longitudinal dataset and employ staggered difference-in-differences estimation to assess causal effects. Our findings suggest that while reducing the enforceability of NCAs can foster regional HGE, the effectiveness of such reforms is heavily influenced by concurrent federal and local institutional changes. In sectors facing significant federal regulatory expansion, the benefits brought by the reduction of NCA enforceability are negated. However, local pro-market institutional changes can counteract the disabling effects of federal regulatory expansion. This highlights the need to consider how the evolving institutional environment influences potential enablers of HGE, cautioning against claims that these labor market reforms (or other exogenous environmental changes) universally yield positive entrepreneurship outcomes.

中文翻译：

---

劳动力市场改革作为高增长创业的外部推动力：多层次的制度权变视角


我们通过竞业禁止协议 （NCA） 的法律可执行性降低的影响，研究了减少摩擦的劳动力市场改革对区域高增长创业 （HGE） 的影响。我们借鉴新的制度经济理论和外部赋能框架，并结合市场维护联邦主义理论的见解，探讨这些改革如何在不同治理层面的其他同时发生的制度变革的背景下启用（禁用）HGE。我们组装了一个新的多级纵向数据集，并采用交错双重差分估计来评估因果效应。我们的研究结果表明，虽然降低 NCA 的可执行性可以促进区域 HGE，但此类改革的有效性在很大程度上受到同时进行的联邦和地方机构变化的影响。在面临联邦监管大幅扩张的行业中，降低 NCA 可执行性带来的好处被抵消了。然而，地方亲市场的制度变化可以抵消联邦监管扩张的致残作用。这凸显了需要考虑不断发展的制度环境如何影响 HGE 的潜在推动因素，并警告不要声称这些劳动力市场改革（或其他外生环境变化）普遍产生积极的创业结果。