Equal Employment Opportunity Law and the gender wage gap in Japan: A cohort analysis

In this article, I perform a cohort-based analysis of the female-to-male wage gap using aggregate data in Japan from 1975 to 2005. While the inter-cohort closing in the gender wage gap is apparent, the convergence is smaller when the gap is calculated for each level of education. This pattern suggests that a certain portion of the gender wage convergence is due to changes in the educational composition of the workforce. I find that educational composition changes played a larger role in closing the pay gap for younger cohorts than it did for older cohorts. Highly educated women who entered the labor market after the enactment of the Equal Employment Opportunity Law gained in that they had more regular full-time employment but did not experience wage gains relative to their male counterparts.     

Employment response to supply and demand shocks under envy in wage formation

Summary We analyse the impact of wage envy on employment and on its sectorial allocation. A multi-sector general equilibrium model in which externalities among sectors arise through wage envy and decentralized bargaining is presented. In the no externality case, sectorial employment is a function of sectorial productivity and of the disutility of work. In the externality case, sectorial employment is additionally affected by union power in all sectors (with a negative sign even though bargaining is efficient), by the productivity in the other sectors (with an undetermined sign) and by the relative average propensity to consume goods of this sector (with a positive sign).Rijksuniversiteit Limburg, FNRS and Université Catholique de Louvain. I would like to thank Franz Palm for valuable comments on an earlier draft. This paper benefitted also from discussions with Torben Andersen, Jacques Drèze and Henri Sneessens (without implying them in any mistake). The detailed comments of the anonymous referee contributed to a large extent to clarify the exposition of the model.     

Productivity and technology in Nepal:: An analysis of foreign and domestic firms

This study uses plant level data from the census of manufacturing establishments to examine the production technology and labor productivity of foreign and domestic firms in Nepal. The results show that the capital intensity in foreign firms is higher than that in domestic firms. The statistical results also imply that foreign firms have higher labor productivity. A simultaneous equation model suggests that foreign firms are technically not more efficient than domestic firms. In fact, analysis indicates that foreign firms are technically less efficient. The foreign firms may have derived their competitiveness from capital intensive technology that is found to be one of the major factors to boost labor productivity.     

Structural characteristics of firms and industries and black and white wage inequality in the U.S. economy: 1988

The effects of firm and job characteristics on the wages of blacks and whites are analyzed using data from the 1988 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth [Bureau of Labor Statistics, 1997]. This study focuses on 2,370 full-time private sector employees. The results show that, first, blacks are disproportionately employed in large establishments despite their lower cognitive achievements. Second, blacks do not enjoy significant wage premiums associated with supervisory positions. Third, although the wage gap between blacks and whites is reduced considerably, controlling for education and cognitive skills, the gap increases significantly when structural attributes are included in the wage regressions despite the large wage premiums associated with employment in large establishments.     

The labor market in Tokugawa Japan: Wage differentials and the real wage level, 1727–1830

Tokugawa economic history provides quite an interesting example of the workings of the labor market: In the Tokugawa period a contraction in occupational wage differentials occurred concurrently with a rise in real wages. This paper deals with these aspects of wage change and a general set of problems which has arisen about them. The first section sets out these problems; the second deals with the evidence on wage differentials and real wages in Kinai from 1727 to 1830. The third provides a theoretical framework to explain the findings; finally the last section examines the implications of the findings.     

The evolution of the productivity dispersion of firms: a reevaluation of its determinants in the case of Japan

This paper contributes to the literature that empirically analyzes the evolution of productivity dispersion at the firm level and its determinants. We investigate the case of Japanese firms by using a firm-level panel dataset taken from a large-scale administrative survey for the years 1994–2003. We confirm that there was indeed an overall increase in productivity dispersion. Moreover, we find that the introduction of information and communication technologies (ICT) decreased the within-industry labor productivity dispersion, contrary to what has been found for some other countries. On the other hand, we find evidence of a significant and positive impact of internationalization on productivity dispersion.     

Employment and growth in South Africa: An agricultural perspective

South African agriculture is analysed with respect to labour‐related structural trends, the impact of a change in agricultural production on production in certain selected Individual sectors and its relative potential with regard to direct and indirect industry multipliers. The paper concludes with some policy aspects that stem from the different analyses.     

Employment burden, government ownership and soft budget constraints: Evidence from a Chinese enterprise survey

This paper investigates two competing theories of soft budget constraint (SBC), namely the ownership hypothesis and the policy burden hypothesis. While the ownership hypothesis attributes the SBC problem to government ownership, the policy burden hypothesis predicts that privatization would not eliminate the SBC problem, as long as the major policy burden – maintaining employment – is not removed from enterprises. Using a panel dataset from a survey of Chinese enterprises, I conduct empirical tests on these two competing hypotheses. I explicitly address endogeneity and data-censoring problems by using instruments and estimating a two-step tobit model. The test results support the policy burden hypothesis but not the ownership hypothesis. My finding emphasizes the importance of creating a sound social security system in the process of China's enterprise reform.     

The residential demand for electricity in Japan: An examination using empirical panel analysis techniques

This paper examines the residential demand for electricity in Japan, excluding Okinawa-prefecture, from 1975 to 2005 as a function of the disposable income per household and the overall unit price of electricity for general consumers, by using the empirical panel analysis techniques of a panel unit root test, a panel cointegration test, and group-mean dynamic ordinary least squares (DOLS) estimators to determine whether or not each variable is stationary. This study's contribution is twofold. First, for a more accurate empirical economic analysis, it divides Japan into a number of regions so that the estimation of coefficients becomes more powerful due to the increased degree of freedom from the utilization of the panel data. Second, the study chose Japan for this analysis on the basis of discussions regarding the deregulation of the residential electric power supply that is scheduled for the near future. All variables—sales per household, price, and income per household—can be assumed to have a unit root and cointegration relationship. The results determine that the price effect is negative and elastic and that the income effect is inelastic. These results correspond to other such studies on developed countries that are significant economic powers.     

Supplier density and at-home care use in Japan: Evidence from a micro-level survey on long-term care receivers

Following the introduction of the long-term care insurance scheme and deregulation of the market for at-home care services, Japan experienced a substantial increase in expenditure on care for the elderly. Using household-level survey data, we empirically examine whether the increase in care expenditure is associated with supplier density springing from the rise in the number of care providers following deregulation. We provide weak evidence that supplier density in the at-home care market is positively correlated with probability to use care or expenditure on care. Moreover, we find no link between the share of for-profit providers and the demand for at-home care services.     

International mobility of capital,wage indexation,and the cost of policy mistakes under ambiguity: a CGE evaluation

In this paper we focus on the role institutions and structural parameters play in macroeconomic policy design and test the differential effects of tax policies on two structural parameters: the degree of international capital mobility and the rules of wage indexation practiced in the economy. We evaluate counterfactual changes in taxation in the Argentine economy using a Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) Model with unemployment, calibrated with 2006 data, showing that policy mistakes (diagnosis failures) are costlier when the degree of capital mobility is greater and the rules to determine salaries could amplify the losses. Among other taxes, we evaluate the choice of export taxation, historically one of the preferred revenue sources of Argentine governments. We discuss the choice of taxes that an optimistic and a pessimistic policymaker will make under Knightian uncertainty and find that, in the case of our CGE, an optimistic policymaker prefers to tax export goods, while a more pessimistic one tends to tax imports or non-tradable goods.     

International relocation,difference in production costs,and welfare: An analysis based on a two-country model

This paper examines whether or not the globalization of Japanese companies is a problem for the Japanese economy. To examine this, using the theoretical model, the paper examines whether the globalization of home-located tradable goods firms provides a benefit to the home country from the perspective of welfare. Specifically, since globalization is thought to have begun based on the difference in production costs of the home and the foreign country, we examine how an increase of productivity in the foreign non-tradable goods sector, which is the principal factor in the difference in production costs between the two countries, affects the welfare of the home country. We show that such an increase of productivity not only induces enterprise relocation, but also improves the welfare of the home country. In particular, the latter is demonstrated by an increase in the real flow of dividends that results from holding equities in tradable goods firms located abroad, i.e., the improvement in the income account. Hence, since the prediction of the model indicates that the globalization of firms is not a problem, it can be said that the globalization of Japanese firms is not a problem for the Japanese economy.     

Impact of Market Concentration on Employment and Wages: a Look at the Insurance Industry

Atlantic Economic Journal - The falling share of labor in national income is a global concern. This study examined the impact of changes in market concentration ratios in the insurance industry on...     

Demographic changes, saving, and current account: An analysis based on a panel VAR model

This paper empirically investigates the macroeconomic effects of demographic changes, focusing on saving rates and current account balances. The econometric investigation based on the panel VAR model shows substantial demographic effects on national saving rates and current account balances in the major advanced (G-7) countries. An increase in the dependency rate significantly lowers saving rates, especially public saving rates. Further, a higher dependency rate significantly worsens current account balances.     

Unemployment risk and buffer-stock saving: An empirical investigation in Japan

The purpose of this paper is to investigate, using micro data, the strength in Japan of the precautionary saving motive. While numerical simulations suggest the economic importance of precautionary saving, the empirical evidence is mixed. In this paper, we apply the buffer-stock saving model and focus on the effect of unemployment risk on wealth accumulation. We find that uncertainty has a positive and statistically significant effect on the wealth-to-income ratio, and that buffer-stock savings account for 6 or 15 percent of net financial assets. Housing loans and expenditures associated with children decrease this ratio.     

Innovation of renewable energy generation technologies at a regional level in China: a study based on patent data analysis

This paper is a pioneer study which examines the innovation of renewable energy generation technologies based on residential patent applications in 30 regions of China between 2006 and 2015. Wind power, solar energy, geothermal energy, ocean energy, hydro power, and biomass & waste energy are the subject technologies for this analysis. Different indicators such as absolute numbers, growth rates and revealed technology advantages are used to measure the various green innovation dynamics in different regions. The results show that some regions with a higher number of patent applications or growth rates did not show stronger technological advantage (specialization) in such technologies. On the other hand, the region of Inner Mongolia shows a very strong specialization but with a much smaller number of patent applications.     

Health insurance reform and economic growth: Simulation analysis in Japan

This paper evaluates the drastic reforms of Japanese public health insurance initiated in 2006. We employ a computable general equilibrium framework to numerically examine the reforms for an aging Japan in the dynamic context of overlapping generations. Our simulation produced the following results: first, an increase in the co-payment rate, a prominent feature of the 2006 reform, would promote economic growth and welfare by encouraging private saving. Second, the ex-post moral hazard behavior following the increase in co-payment rates, however, reduces economic growth. Third, Japan's trend of increasing the future public health insurance benefits can mainly be explained by its aging population, and increasing the co-payment rate does little to reduce future payments of public health insurance benefits. Fourth, the effect on future economic burdens of reducing medical costs through efficiencies in public health insurance, emphasis on preventive medical care, or technological progress in the medical field is small. Finally, a policy of maintaining public health insurance at a fixed percentage of GDP will require reducing public health insurance benefits, perhaps up to 45% by 2050. Such a policy also reduces economic growth until approximately 2035. Our simulation indicates that the reform does not significantly reduce future public health insurance benefits, but it can enhance economic growth and welfare by encouraging private saving.     

中国服务贸易的异质劳动力就业效应——基于行业面板数据的经验研究

文章利用2004~2011年中国服务业面板数据,首先从整体上实证分析了服务贸易对异质劳动力就业的影响,然后分性别、分行业检验了服务贸易的异质劳动力就业效应,以考察服务进、出口对异质劳动力就业影响的性别和行业差异。整体估计结果表明,服务进、出口显著地促进了中国服务业异质劳动力就业,且对熟练劳动力就业的促进作用更大,说明服务贸易对不同技能劳动力就业的影响有所差异;从分性别和分行业视角的进一步研究发现,服务进、出口的异质劳动力就业效应存在显著的性别和行业差异。     

Foreign direct investment by Japanese firms and corporate governance: in relation to the monetary policies of China, Korea and Japan

Reflecting upon the lessons from the Asian currency crises, more attention is being paid to the importance of consolidation for the domestic financial and capital markets, as well as international cooperation to avoid disturbing factors from abroad, such as massive inflows of speculative capital. The aim of financial reforms being executed in the East Asian countries, such as Japan, Korea, and China, is to improve the managerial efficiency of the business corporations and financial institutions.Recently, foreign direct investment by Japanese firms in the rest of the East Asia has been recovering. However, the existence of a financial system to realize optimal corporate governance is indispensable for the enhancement of direct investment. Namely, it is necessary to improve corporate profitability, and to distribute the increment of such profits between the host and the investor countries, in order to boost the welfare of the respective citizens, notwithstanding the type of foreign direct investment.