A Spatial Structural Decomposition Analysis of Chinese and Japanese Energy Demand: 1985–1990

This paper proposes a spatial structural decomposition analysis to measure the effects of the changes in intra- and inter-country linkages on the embodied energy demand in the concerned country. For the empirical analysis, we have used the China- Japan inter-country input–output tables for 1985 and 1990, expressed in constant prices of 1990. The empirical results reveal that (1) at least for the period between 1985 and 1990, the effects of the non-competitive input structural changes in China on the primary energy requirements of Japan were negligible, and (2) the contribution of the Japanese final demand shifts on the total change in Chinese primary energy demand was 40 times larger than that of the Chinese final demand shifts on the primary energy requirements of Japan. The Japanese policy makers should concentrate on the energy impacts of the changes in the domestic production structure rather than the changes in the Chinese production structure.     

Did Japan's shopping coupon program increase spending?

In March 1999, 31 million “shopping coupons” worth 20,000 yen each were distributed to Japanese families with children and to the elderly. The coupons expired after six months and could only be used within the recipient's local community. We use variation in the number of children across families and in the number of recipients across prefectures to measure the effect of the coupons on spending. We find that coupons had a positive effect on spending on semi-durables, but no effect on spending on nondurables or services. The marginal propensity to consume on semi-durables was 0.1–0.2 when the coupons were distributed in March. The results using regional variation provide stronger evidence that spending did not fall after the coupons had been redeemed.     

The effects of consumption externalities in an R&D-based growth model with endogenous skilled and unskilled labor supply

We examine the roles of consumption externalities in a variety-expansion growth model. By assuming that the R&D sector is more skilled labor intensive than the consumption goods sector, we extend the model of Doi and Mino (J Econ Dyn Control 32:3055?C3083, 2008) so that both the skilled and unskilled labor supplies are endogenously determined through the skill acquisition process. We show that some results of Doi and Mino are influenced by our modification. For example, in contrast to Doi and Mino who show that the R&D subsidy can have a negative growth effect in the presence of consumption externalities, we show that the R&D subsidy has unambiguously positive growth effects, regardless of the presence of consumption externalities. Further, it is shown that the presence of consumption externalities influences various aspects of the economy including the wage inequality and the incentive of skill acquisition.     

Beyond Brenner's investment overhang hypothesis: the case of the steel industry

This article challenges the way liberal economic governance has come to be theorised as a passive and depoliticised form of governance. Using the classic case of the gold standard, it shows how state intervention came to be shaped by considerations of state power and diverged considerably from the traditional emphasis on free markets and stable conditions of investments. As I argue, the gold standard was constructed through political struggles over monetary governance which involved significant constraints for capitalist investors. Its institutions helped establish a new structure for exerting control over finance. By resituating the gold standard in a broader historical perspective, I show how nineteenth-century monetary governance, far from leading to a retreat of the state, established in fact the foundations of a new form of state intervention: modern central banking.     

Is protection really for sale? A survey and directions for future research

This paper critically and selectively surveys the literature on protection for sale and discusses directions for future research in this area. It suggests that the standard approach needs to be augmented to provide more compelling tests of this model.     

Problems and lessons of Japanese technology policy

Statistics on Japanese R & D reveal various problems of policy and implementation. Some difficulties of Japanese technological development and possibilities for overcoming them are discussed. Among others a fundamental problem is the generation of technology with less reliance on Western support. The relationship between the need for self-generated technology and the fact of excessive reliance on technology imports is discussed in regard to superiority, inferiority and appropriateness of Japanese technology. Innovation in the Japanese automobile and iron and steel industries is characterized as integrative or combinatory innovation associated with managerial innovation. The conditions under which integrative innovation is effective are identified, and these conditions are expected to be valid for many other sectors. Finally, the mechanism of government–industry cooperation in Japan is identified as an informational control system in contrast to the financial control system in Western countries, and the major medium of control by the Japanese government is identified as technological forecasting information.
These characteristics of Japanese technology management can be held up as valuable lessons for other countries given certain conditions which are expected to hold in many fields.     

Competitive price paths of an exhaustible resource with increasing extraction costs

The paper analyzes the competitive growth paths of an economy with an exhaustible resource which is subject to increasing extraction costs, assuming perfect foresight. It establishes equivalence among the competitive present-value maximization condition for deposit holders, the generalized Hotelling rule, and the Ricardian royalty-price structure. It also proves uniqueness of a competitive growth path for the case where a backstop technology exists, in order to give some validity to the assumption of perfect foresight.     

Income convergence in Japan: A Bayesian spatial Durbin model approach

With the collapse of the bubble economy in the early 1990s, economic disparities among both people and regions have arisen in Japan. Although developments in spatial econometrics have provided regional convergence studies with highly effective tools to explicitly consider spatial dependence and heterogeneity, there has as yet been no significant research on Japan's economic disparity using spatial econometrics. Moreover, most conventional regional convergence studies on Japan study the post-war high economic growth period before the economic bubble.Hence, the objective of this study is to analyze regional income disparities in Japan in the period after the bubble burst. We use the Bayesian spatial Durbin model, which can consider both spatial dependence and heterogeneity. The data used in this research are annual data collected at the municipality level during 1989-2007. To the best of our knowledge, no research has been conducted to analyze Japan's regional income disparities at the municipality level, though some research has been done at the prefecture level.First, the study suggests that σ-convergence does not hold whether or not spatial dependence is considered. Second, it analyzes regional income convergence by applying the simplified Bayesian spatial Durbin model to the β -convergence approach. The results show that β-convergence holds over 1990-2007.