China–Japan–United States integration amid global rebalancing: A computable general equilibrium analysis

Using a global general equilibrium trade model, this paper assesses the long-term implications of global rebalancing for Asian economies and explores the benefits of China–Japan–United States (US) integration. The analysis suggests that consumption evaporation, a growth slowdown in the US, and the consequent current account correction would force China, Japan, and other East Asian economies to undergo substantial structural adjustments. A combination of domestic reform aimed at boosting service sector productivity and external liberalization aimed at fostering broader economic integration will be critical for East Asian economies to facilitate their economic rebalancing and sustained growth. Our global computable general equilibrium (CGE) analysis suggests that China and Japan need to strengthen their economic ties with the US while at the same time bringing other East Asian economies into this integration process.     

The co-movement of stock markets in East Asia: Did the 1997–1998 Asian financial crisis really strengthen stock market integration?

This paper examines the integration and causality of interdependencies among seven major East Asian stock exchanges before, during, and after the 1997–1998 Asian financial crisis. For this purpose, we use daily stock market data from July 1, 1992 to June 30, 2003 in local currency as well as US dollar terms. The data reveal that the relationships among East Asian stock markets are time varying. While stock market interactions are limited before the Asian financial crisis, we find that Hong Kong and Singapore respond significantly to shocks in most other East Asian markets, including Shanghai and Shenzhen, during this crisis. After the crisis, shocks in Hong Kong and Singapore largely affect other East Asian stock markets, except for those in Mainland China. Finally, considering the role of the USA shows that it strongly influences stock returns in East Asia – except for Mainland China – in all periods, while the reverse does not hold true.     

The J-Curve and Japan–China commodity trade

Previous studies that have tested the J-Curve phenomenon for Japan or China employed either aggregate trade data between each country and the rest of the world, or aggregate bilateral data between two trade partners. These studies have found no support for the J-Curve. Suspecting that their models could suffer from aggregation bias, in this paper, we disaggregate bilateral trade flows between the two countries and examine trade by 73 industries. We find evidence of the J-Curve phenomenon in 24 industries, a unique finding for trade between Japan and China.     

The other trade war: Quantifying the Korea–Japan trade dispute

In mid-2019 a new trade war between Korea and Japan started heating up, while the U.S.–China trade war held the spotlight. This paper documents the recent Korea–Japan trade dispute and quantifies its economic impacts. We consider a set of non-tariff distortions—Japanese export controls combined with Korean boycotts of Japanese goods. We simulate the impact of these actions using a multi-region general equilibrium model calibrated to the GTAP version 10 accounts and observed trade responses in the Korea Customs Service data. We find a welfare loss of 0.144% ($1.0 billion) for Korea and 0.013% ($346 million) for Japan. Sectoral impacts include a 0.25% reduction in chemical production in Japan. In Korea the reduction in imports from Japan is offset by increases in domestic production and imports from other countries.     

An asymmetric and DCC analysis of two stock markets returns＇ volatility： An evidence study on the Hong Kong and Japan＇s stock markets

This paper discusses the model construction and the association between the Hong Kong and the Japanese stock markets. The data period is from January 4, 1999 to December 30, 2005. This paper also utilizes student＇s t distribution to analyze the proposed model. The empirical results show that the bivariate asymmetric-GARCH （1, 2） model with a dynamic conditional correlation （DCC） seemed to be appropriate in evaluating the relationship between them. The empirical result also indicates a positive relation between the Hong Kong and the Japanese stock markets returns. The average estimation value of DCC coefficient equals to 0.5196, which implies that these two stock markets＇ return volatility had synchronized influence on each other. In addition, the empirical results also show that the Hong Kong and the Japanese stock markets have an asymmetrical effect. Based on the idea of the good and bad news, the explanatory ability of proposed model is better than the model of the bivariate GARCH with a DCC.     

The health national project: A progress analysis 2006–2007

The course of realization of the most important measures foreseen by the Health National Project in 2006–2007 is analyzed in this article. Key problems that appeared in the national project are shown, and approaches to their solution are formulated.     

Regional patterns of employment changes of less-educated men in Japan: 1990–2007

We investigate regional patterns in employment of less-educated men in Japan from 1990 to 2007. The employment–population ratio of junior high school graduate men (9 years of compulsory schooling) decreased from 1990 to 2007. Wage growth across regions had a unique pattern during this period: it was high in the low-wage regions in the 1990s but high in the high-wage regions in the 2000s. We use these regional variations in wage growth to identify the labor supply elasticity of less-educated men. The estimated elasticity of the employment-to-population ratio of junior high school graduate men is around 0.15.     

Does a large loss of bank capital cause Evergreening? Evidence from Japan

Using the real estate lending share of the bank’s loan portfolio at the peak of the land-price bubble as an instrument for bank capital, we identify the impact of capital adequacy on the allocation of bank lending under the Basel regulatory framework. We find that, in Japan, a large loss of bank capital caused by the regulator’s excessively tough stance towards banks not only induced the contraction of the bank lending supply but also the banks’ reallocation of their lending portfolios to financially unhealthy industries with a higher concentration of non-performing loans.     

The liquidity trap: Japan, 1996–2001 versus the United States, 1933–1940

Keynes’ “liquidity trap” rarely occurs. But when it does, it has a tremendously adverse effect on the economy concerned. Such was the case of the United States in the 1930s and now that of contemporary Japan. In a liquidity trap, monetary policy pushes the money interest rate to the zero level while expanding the money supply (M1) at a faster rate than nominal GDP. Conventional theory explains this phenomenon as the result of money demand that becomes infinitely interest-elastic at the zero rate, rendering ineffective the rapidly expanding money supply established by the monetary authorities.In this paper, we show that the liquidity trap is a multifaceted phenomenon not limited to the money market. It involves the bank loan market, the bank deposit market, and the bond market interacting together. Of these, the most important is the bank loan market and the least important is the bank deposit market, whose deposit supply becomes horizontal at the zero rate. They are met by relatively interest-inelastic bank loan demand and bank deposit demand. Hence, the causality is completely reversed from the conventional understanding.We give empirical evidence in support of our theory based on data from the United States, 1933–1940 and Japan, 1996–2001. Far apart in time and space, the two cases are remarkably alike and, hence, provide strong supporting evidence.     

The takeover and selection effects of foreign-owned establishments: an analysis using linked employer–employee data

We provide the first estimates of the effect of foreign ownership on wages in Germany, controlling for the observed and unobserved characteristics of workers and plants. We also test whether the wage gains from joining a foreign-owned firm are subsequently lost when leaving that firm, and we examine whether wage gains vary across the sample. We find large selection effects in terms of worker and plant components of wages. Once the selection effect is taken into account, the takeover effect is small and in some cases insignificantly different from zero.

Changing factor market conditions in South Africa: The capital market – a sectoral description of the period 1970–97

This article explores changing conditions in South African real capital markets. Noteworthy is the evidence of strong restructuring in this market during the 1990s. Whereas the 1970s and 1980s showed the best investment performance among primary commodity sectors and sectors with strong parastatal involvement, the highest investment rates of the 1990s have been associated with the manufacturing industry. We show that the real user cost of capital and capital productitivity contribute plausible determinants of investment rates in South Africa. The extent to which market forces are allowed to bring in line marginal cost and marginal return on capital appears to influence the sustainability of investment.     

Voluntary disclosure of intellectual capital items in?roadshows and investor conferences: an empirical analysis of DAX30-companies

We analyze firms’ voluntary disclosure of intellectual capital in a setting of presentations to analysts and investors. Firms use presentations to analysts and investors as an additional means of reporting. Due to lesser restrictions of this kind of reporting and also due to the private channel disclosure setting of such presentations, firms are able to highlight certain issues which they think to be important for interpretation and forecasting of firm success. In such a setting we can assess the benefit-cost relation underlying these disclosure decisions. The sample consists of German DAX30 firms, which are analyzed for the years 2001, 2003, 2005, and 2007, resulting in a total of 271 observations. We calculate quantitative and qualitative disclosure indices and also analyze whether time, industry and type of presentation influence intellectual capital disclosure. Findings show that customer capital, human capital, and process capital are reported more often than other intellectual capital categories. Industry and type of presentation are strongly related to disclosure indices. There is also a weak significant relation between time and disclosure index. Overall, firms tend to prefer qualitative voluntary disclosure of intellectual capital and only carefully disclose quantitative data. This suggests that the benefit-cost relation of quantitative reporting is negative.     

Asset price fluctuations in Japan: 1980–2000

In this paper, we try to account for the recent fluctuations in asset prices in Japan using a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model. In our model, a key to explain the land-price fluctuation is how people's expectations about future productivity growth evolve over time. Specifically, by assuming adaptive learning on the growth rate of productivity, our model can replicate the Japanese land-price fluctuations over the period 1980–2000. However, even with adaptive learning, habit persistence, and costly capital accumulation, a substantial portion of the stock-price fluctuation is left unexplained, and a puzzle remains.     

The separation of information and lending and the rise of rating agencies in the USA (1841–1907)

This paper provides a new interpretation of the early rise of rating agencies in the USA (initially known as ‘mercantile agencies’). We explain this American exceptionality through an inductive approach that revisits the conventional parallel with the UK. In contrast with earlier narratives that have emphasised the role of Common Law and the greater understanding of American judges that would have supported the rise of an ethos of ‘transparency’, we argue that Mercantile Agencies prospered as a remedy to deficient bankruptcy law and weak protection of creditor rights in the USA. The result was to raise the value of the nationwide registry of defaulters which the mercantile agencies managed. This ensured the Agencies' profitability and endowed them with resources to buy their survival in a legal environment that remained stubbornly hostile.     

The Life Cycle of Daily Newspapers in The Netherlands: 1848–1997

In 1848 freedom of the press was written into the Constitution of the Kingdom of The Netherlands. This paper investigates the life cycle characteristics of the market for daily newspapers in The Netherlands since then. Life expectancy depends on the cyclical evolution of the number of daily newspapers through time. The life cycle of the competitive newspaper industry in The Netherlands is characterized by a turning period of turmoil during World War II. Models that aim at estimating the expected lifetime of newspapers should acknowledge the cyclical characteristics of the industry.     

The Role of Monetary Policy in Japan: A Break in the 1990s?

This article documents time series evidence suggesting the case for a possible structural break in the role of Japan's monetary policy during the 1990s. It uses a simple vector autoregressive framework and offers some suggestive results: While a persistent effect of monetary policy on real output is detected over the full sample of 1975–1998 and the subsample that ends in 1993, such effect disappears with the recent subsample of the 1990s. The stability analysis also provides more specified evidence that there is a break in the reduced form dynamic system in 1995. Some interpretations are offered to intuitively support these findings. J. Japan. Int. Econ., December 2000, 14(4), pp. 366–384. Research Institute for Economics and Business Administration, Kobe University, Rokko, Nada, Kobe 657-8501, Japan Copyright 2000 Academic Press.Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: E52, E32.     

The Empirical Study on Affecting Factors of Cultivated Land Productivity in Shandong Province

China is a country with a huge population but scarce cultivated land. The productivity of cultivated land must be improved to meet the increasing domestic demand for agricultural products. Taking Shandong as the example and utilizing X2D production function, the paper furthers the study on affecting factors of cultivated land productivity. Empirical study finds that technology progress especially that of land-saving bio-chemical technological improvement is the most important factor to improve land productivity.     

The dynamics of capital assets in the economy of the Russian Federation over the post-Soviet period (1992–2015)

The authors have considered methods for an alternative assessment of the dynamics of capital assets over 1992–2015, which fundamentally differ from those employed by the Russian Federal State Statistics Service (Rosstat), and have presented the results obtained on their basis. Losses of fixed assets incurred by the economy over this period in value terms have also been estimated. The reasons for the current crisis of the Russian economy have been shown in connection with the exhaustion of the Soviet material heritage and ways of handling the crisis have been proposed based on the reduction in household consumption and sharp increase in the share of accumulation and savings.