Secular trends in the Japanese labour market during the lost decades: A reply to Andrew Gordon

Blind, Georg and Lottanti von Mandach, Stefania (2017): Secular trends in the Japanese labour market during the lost decades: A reply to Andrew Gordon.

Abstract

In a recent contribution (2017) Professor Gordon takes a very critical stance on our earlier article titled “Decades not lost, but won” (Blind and Lottanti von Mandach 2015), which he sees as ‘revisionist’ and as applying ‘too low a standard’. Professor Gordon provides a selection of granular data that might be understood as refuting two of our earlier findings, and attempts replication of the analysis underlying our third finding, but finds diverging evidence. While his labelling of our research is unpleasant, the implicit and explicit questioning of our results is troubling. This reply demonstrates that the evidence in Professor Gordon’s article does not challenge our earlier findings on aggregate developments during the ‘lost decades’ and provides explanation for the diverging results in Professor Gordon’s replication effort. We argue that the results of his replication only apply to the fraction of non-regular employees working full time, while ours applies to the large majority of part-time employees.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: Gender economics; labour force and employment; wage differentials; Japan
• Subjects: J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J1 - Demographic Economics > J16 - Economics of Gender ; Non-labor Discrimination; J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J2 - Demand and Supply of Labor > J21 - Labor Force and Employment, Size, and Structure; J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J3 - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs > J31 - Wage Level and Structure ; Wage Differentials

References

Abe, Y. (2011). “The Equal Employment Opportunity Law and labor force behavior of women in Japan.” Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, 25(1), 39-55.

Abe, Y. (2013). "Long-Term Impacts of the Equal Employment Opportunity Act in Japan." Japan Labor Review, 10(2), 20-34.

Abe, Y. (2013a). “Regional variations in labor force behavior of women in Japan.” Japan and the world economy, 28, 112-124.

Abe, Y. and K. Tamada (2008). “Regional patterns of employment changes in Japan: Evidence from the 1990s”. Working Paper. Available: http://www3.econ.fukuoka-u.ac.jp/~ktamada/regionalpattern.pdf.

Blind, Georg D., & Lottanti von Mandach, S. (2015). “Decades not lost, but won: increased employment, higher wages, and more equal opportunities in the Japanese labour market.” Social Science Japan Journal, 18(1), 63-88.

Chiang, H.-Y., and F. Ohtake. (2014). "Performance-pay and the gender wage gap in Japan." Journal of the Japanese and International Economies 34, 71-88.

Cooke, F.L. (2010). "Women's participation in employment in Asia: a comparative analysis of China, India, Japan and South Korea." The international journal of human resource management, 21(12),: 2249-2270.

Gordon, A. (1993). “Contests for the Workplace”. Postwar Japan as History. Andrew Gordon (Ed.). Berkeley: University of California Press, 373-394.

Gordon, A. (2017). “New and Enduring Dual Structures of Employment in Japan: The Rise of Non-Regular Labor, 1980s–2010s.” Social Science Japan Journal, 20(1), 9-36.

Hommerich, Carola (2016). “The Gap as Threat”. In: Chiavacci, D. and C. Hommerich (2016). ‘Social Inequality in Post-Growth Japan’. Milton Park: Routledge; pp. 37-54.

JIL (2015). 2015 Databook of International Labour Statistics. Tokyo: Japan Institute for Labour Policy and Training.

Kato, T., Kawaguchi, D. and H. Owan (2013). "Dynamics of the Gender Gap in the Workplace: An econometric case study of a large Japanese firm." Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry Discussion Paper.

Lise, J., Sudo, N., Suzuki, M., Yamada, K., and T. Yamada (2014). „Wage, income and consumption inequality in Japan, 1981–2008: from boom to lost decades.“ Review of Economic Dynamics, 17(4), 582-612.

Macnaughtan, H. (2015). "Womenomics for Japan: is the Abe policy for gendered employment viable in an era of precarity?." The Asia-Pacific Journal 13.13/1.

MHLW (Ministry of Health, Labour, and Welfare). (2015). Rōdōryoku chōsa. Shōsai shūkei. Hyō II-A-4 Nenrei kaikyū, genshoku no koyōkeitai ni tsuita omona riyū betsu hiseiki no shokuin/jūgyōin sū (Labor Force Survey. Detailed Statistics. Table II-A-4 Number of Non-Regular Employees by Age and Main Reason to Select Current Employment Form). Data file available at: http://www.e-stat.go.jp/SG1/estat/List.do?lid=000001153286.

MHLW (2015a). ‘Rōdōryoku chōsa. Chōki Jikeiretsu Dēta. Hyō 9’ (Labour Force Survey; Time Series Data. Table 9). Available at http://www.stat.go.jp/data/roudou/longtime/zuhyou/lt51.xls.

MHLW (2017). ‘Shokugyō antei gyōmu tōkei’. Hyō 14: Sei’shain rōdōshijō kankei shihyō’ (Statistics of the Employment Stabilisation Office. Table 14: Indicators pertaining to the market for regular employment)’. Tokyo: Ministry of Health Labour and Welfare. Available at: http://www.e-stat.go.jp/SG1/estat/List.do?lid=000001177203.

Nemoto, K. (2013). "Long working hours and the corporate gender divide in Japan." Gender, Work & Organization, 20(5), 512-527.

North, S. (2017). “Limited regular employment and the Reform of Japan’s Division of Labor.” The Asia-Pacific Journal Japan Focus, 12-15-1.

OECD (2017). “Gender Wage Gap”. Paris: OECD Statistics Division. Longitudinal data available at: http://stats.oecd.org/index.aspx?queryid=54751.

Ogura, K., Sakaguchi, N. (2004). “Nihon no chôrôdôjikan: Fubarai rôdôjikan ni kan suru kôsatsu” (Japan’s long working hours: an inquiry into unpaid working hours). JILPT Discussion Paper No. 04-001.