Homeownership and investment for social capital in Japan: Dynamic Panel approach.

This paper explores how the rate of home-ownership and income inequality are related to the formation of social capital using panel data from Japan during the period 1986-2006. I have used Dynamic Panel estimation to control unobserved prefecture-specific fixed effects and an endogeneity bias. I have found through this estimation that the rate of home-ownership enhances the participation in voluntary activities, leading to social capital accumulation. This is in accord with findings from the United States (DiPasquale and Glaeser, 1999).