Management of rainfall-related environmental risks in urban area

Rainfall brings urban residents both benefits, such as water resources, but also adverse risks such as flooding. Additionally, it has been recognized that wet weather run-off discharges pollutants

and transfers chemicals and pathogen bacteria into the aquatic ecosystem. This causes not only deterioration of water quality but also environmental pollution risk. Both the flood risk and environmental pollution risk are treated here as ‘rainfall-related environmental risks’. Although these two kinds of risks are quite different in their characteristics, the main purpose of urban wet weather flow management is how to decrease these risks. Furthermore, these risks have a similar background which is concerned with both the urban structure and the life-style of urban residents. Recently, flood disaster has occurred in the Japanese urban area with increasing frequency causing damage due not only to rainfall intensity, but also the vulnerability of urban structures against heavy storms. Although there has been urban area expansion and a decline in substrate permeability, wet weather flow management in Japan is aimed simply to drain the increased run-off volume quickly. As for the management of hazardous chemicals which might be discharged together with rainfall run-off, this has not been implemented sufficiently. It is necessary to develop a methodology to reduce rainfall-related environmental risks in urban wet weather flow management. In this paper, the possible risk management process and control options of rainfall-related risks will be discussed after a summary of both the similar and differing points between inundation risk and environmental pollution risk. As a result, it is deemed necessary to operate a scheme to raise the rainfall-related environmental risk perception level of urban residents to ensure their participation in risk management.     

Welfare Analysis of Pension Reforms in an Ageing Japan

This paper uses a computable general equilibrium model with overlapping generations to explore the effects of different public pension schemes on economic welfare, and intergenerational and intragenerational equity. Besides the benchmark case based on the 2004 public pension reform, the present paper considers two alternative reforms: financing the basic pension benefit through a consumption tax, and eliminating the earnings‐related pension benefit. The simulation results suggest that even the consumption‐tax financing of only the basic pension, namely, the combination of both reforms, might not improve overall economic welfare, although it increases economic output by inducing capital formation.     

日本香菇产业的市场结构

香菇是日本主要的特用林产品，香菇产业为日本农业经济的发展，特别是山区经济的发展起到了十分重要的作用．近10多年以来，由于日本人口老龄化所导致的劳力不足，以及日元汇率的大幅上升和发展中国家的廉价香菇的大量进口，日本的香菇产业受到了较大冲击。但是，凭借其技术优势和产品质量优势，在日本的国内市场中，日本的香菇产业仍然具有较强的竞争力．日本是中国主要的农产品出口国，研究日本香菇产业市场结构的变化过程和变化原因，了解日本香菇产业发展的成功经验和不足之处，有利于提高我国农林产业的效益和农林产品在国际市场上的竞争力。     

Inefficiency and social exclusion in a coalition formation game: experimental evidence

This paper experimentally investigates the impact of reciprocal behavior in multilateral bargaining and coalition formation. Our results show that reciprocal fairness strongly affects the efficiency and equity of coalition formation. In a large majority of cases, inefficient and unfair coalitions are chosen when their coalition values are relatively high. Up to one third of the experimental population is excluded from bargaining and earns nothing. In monetary terms economically significant efficiency losses occur. We find that the interplay of selfish and reciprocal behavior unavoidably leads to this undesirable consequences. We also compare the predictions of recently developed models of social preferences with our experimental results. We find that some of these models capture the empirical regularities surprisingly well.     

An antinomy in the theory of comparative advantage

This paper shows that the usual bilateral rule of comparing relative prices under autarky to determine the pattern of trade is not valid for the multicommodity world. In addition, equilibrium world price ratios need not fall between the corresponding price ranges under autarky. Such a paradox disappears under gross substitutability when the third commodity is a nontradeable. For the case of tradeables, an alternative bilateral rule to determine the pattern of trade is proposed. Since the classical constant cost case has been heavily discussed in the literature, we confine ourselves to the neoclassical case.     

Simulating fundamental tax reforms in an aging Japan

This paper studies in a quantitative way the macroeconomic and welfare effects of introducing progressive expenditure taxation, in a situation of the aging of the Japanese population. It undertakes a simulation analysis taking account of the general equilibrium effects of intragenerational inequality, which increases with a transition to an aging society. The simulation results suggest that progressive expenditure taxation has advantages over progressive labor income taxation on the grounds of efficiency and equity. Thus, a shift to progressive expenditure taxation can overcome the large welfare loss that would occur under the current tax system as Japan ages.