The importance of the entrepreneurship for modern economies has been studied widely. This paper investigates the relationship between self-employment and SMEs and unemployment rate in Slovakia. The link between the labour market and the business environment is very close one. The researches made in this field found out that high unemployment rates may lead to start-up activity of self-employed individuals (the "refugee" effect), or on the other hand, higher rates of self-employment may indicate increased entrepreneurial activity reducing unemployment in subsequent periods (the "entrepreneurial" effect) (Thurik, 2008). The situation in the Slovak republic proves that small and medium enterprises, together with the self-employed persons, plays a crucial role in the employment, with their contribution of 69,6% to the total employment. The research based on the secondary statistical data allowed us to describe the situation of SMEs, hand in hand with the situation on the labour market. This analysis was strengthened by the correlation analysis. The relation between unemployed and start-up business motivation was proved. Only the group of long-term unemployed shows very low correlation. The findings of this paper may serve as a contribution to the discussion searching for the effective solutions to improve the situation on the Slovak labour market.
