Using Japanese prefecture-level panel data, this paper examines how the crime rate is affected by formal and informal deterrents as reflected by police and social capital, respectively. Both, however, suffer from the endogeneity problem and therefore the estimation results are biased when...

Purpose – This paper aims to investigate whether natural disasters enhance efficiency improvement, capital accumulation and technological progress. Further, this paper examines whether the influence of naturals disasters depends on the legal origin. Design/methodology/approach – For this...

The lay judge system, a quasi-jury system, was introduced in Japan from May 2009. This paper attempts to analyze Japanese people’s attitude towards this system by examining whether they show a willingness to serve as a lay judge. The major findings from regression analysis are: (1) In general,...

Japan's prefecture-level panel data is used to examine how the demand for lawyers is affected by social capital after controlling for economic conditions. The main findings from a fixed effects model are: (1) The demand for lawyer is smaller when people live close and cohesively. (2) Conflicts...

This study explored how social pressure related to parental preference for the sex of their children affects fertility. Pre-war and post-war generations were compared using individual level data previously collected in Japan in 2002. In the pre-war generation, if the first child was a daughter,...

Using Japanese prefecture level data for the years between 1988 and 2001, this paper explores how and the extent to which social capital has an effect on the damage resulting from natural disasters. It also examines whether the experience of a natural disaster affects individual and collective...

Using individual data of Japan, this paper investigates how frequency of contact with foreigners is associated with the perceived outcomes of foreigner increases. Results showed that frequency of contact has a critical effect on perceptions and that its influence varies according to household...

This study attempts to explore how an industry evolves over time based on a case study of the motorcycle industry in Japan from 1948 to 1964. Using individual firm data, we estimate the determinants of technology improvement and firm growth separately for different development phases, after...

Using Japan’s prefecture-level panel data from 1989-2001, this paper examines the influence of the social norm on a person’s smoking behavior when the complementary relationship between smoking and drinking is taken into account. The key findings through a dynamic panel model controlling for...

This paper examined how and the extent to which human capital and social trust are associated with the learning process of a manager in making operations decisions through experience. To this end, using a data set originally and purposively constructed by the author, I investigate the...