- Belgium: the Babson College (USA) and the London Business School for the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) have published the results of an international survey comparing the economic performance of 29 countries in the world in 2001. Whereas Ireland is classified in the lead for entrepreneurial initiative, the red lantern is held by Belgium, classified last. They are indeed, only 4.6% of the working population to create their own business in Belgium, whereas that level reaches 12.1% in Ireland, 11.7% in the United States and 10.2% in Italy (1st, 2nd and 3rd respectively in the classification). The reasons are said to be both financial (difficulties in finding capital), social (a social security system that does to encourage risk-taking), linked to the system of education (which does not encourage students to launch themselves into company creation) and cultural (fear of failure, poor brand image of bosses).