Increasingly ageing populations and a slowing rate of growth in the macroeconomy are forcing advanced countries to reconsider their social security programmes. The need for detailed examination of the possible reforms and initiatives has never been greater.
This book brings together internationally-renowned scholars to evaluate the effect of recent social security reforms in advanced countries (pension programmes in particular) and to suggest policy reforms for the future.
Including detailed studies of countries including Australia, Germany, Japan, Scandinavia, the UK and the USA, this book will be of essential interest to economists and policy-makers working in pension financing reform, and public economics more generally.

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The book examines the effect of labour markets on economic performance in an international perspective; Europe, Japan and the US. Labour markets are an important determinant of the performance of both national economies and individual firms, as well as employment rewards such as wages and satisfaction levels. Many countries in Europe suffer from a high level of unemployment. The US economy suffers from low real income growth and widening wage dispersions. The level of worker satisfaction in Japan is relatively low despite her relatively better economic performance. The purpose of this book is to investigate these issues, and to provide readers with explanations of these phenomena and the differences in the performance of labour markets in Europe, Japan and the US. The book includes both theoretical and empirical studies of various countries undertaken by leading labour and macro economists, and presents several policy suggestions.

Contents:
1. Introduction
2. General features of the labour and capital markets, and Japanese business
3. An analysis of labour mobility
4. The effect of individual characteristics and of parametric and non-parametric approaches on job duration
5. Theory of wage determination and its empirical test
6. Shareholding and lending activity of financial institutions
7. Dispatched directors: an aspect of the Japanese Main Bank system
8. Intercorporate shareholding and volatility in stock prices
9. Capital adequacy constraint for banks and the real economy: a general equilibrium evaluation under intercorporate shareholding
10. Stability of the Japanese company system
11. Concluding remarks

The nature of Japanese firms has come under intense scrutiny because of their international success and their distinct structure, employee relations and working practices. This book sheds light on the reasons for promotion within firms, the distribution of power within companies, business management methods and the relationship between shareholders, executives and employees.The authors use empirical data from comprehensive surveys to support their research on the nature of Japanese business. They survey 1,816 white-collar employees in several large corporate enterprises, and 2,246 shareholder appointed board members in listed corporations. The authors' primary concern is to explain the prerequisites for promotion to middle management and executive positions. Many criteria are analysed, including the extent of desire for promotion, working style, lifestyle, the effect of university education including the name of the university, the level of education attained, the effect of university education including the name of the university and the degree subject, the economic incentive behind severe competition for promotion and the role of trade unions. The book also deals with issues of corporate governance and the role of the incentive system and examines the popularity of labour managed firms in Japan. This detailed work will be of great interest to economists, businessmen and students wanting to learn more about Japanese business.

This book provides a comprehensive appraisal of social security in Japan, where traditionally the burden of welfare provision has been the main responsibility of the family and employers, rather than the state. However, an ageing population, changes in family structure and continued recession has led to an urgent reappraisal of this situation. The book begins by examining the social security system in Japan as a whole, before focusing on specific issues. These include public and occupational pensions, medical care and childcare, and the availability and accessibility of social infrastructure for the old and handicapped. In each case, the distinguished authors address the unique problems associated with Japan and propose practical policy recommendations for social security reform. The book also discusses the future path of Japanese welfare transition and explores the advantages and disadvantages of the private sector model for welfare provision compared to the public sector model. The expert contributors, including both Japanese and international specialists, provide a critical evaluation of social security reform in Japan, set against the background of future demographic and economic trends. This book will appeal to all scholars of public policy, welfare policy and public finance. It will also be of interest to anyone working on the merits and demerits of different social security systems.

The book examines the effect of various public policies on economic performance in Japan. Various public policies include tax policy, regulation, macroeconomic policy, labour policy and some others. Many fields regarding economic performance are covered in this book: savings, portfolio choice, housings, investments, cost of capital, taxes, unemployment, wages, inequality, etc. Emphasis is placed on the examination of the two factor markets, namely, the capital and labour markets in Japan.

This edited volume makes a contribution to the literature on happiness research by compiling studies based on cross-national research and from diverse academic disciplines. The book is distinctive in that it contains both theoretical and empirical analyses, investigating relationship between causes of happiness and economic behavior relating to employment, consumption, and saving. Most notably, it is one of the first studies in this subject area that analyzes micro data collected in Europe, US and Japan with information on respondents' attributes and their economic behavior, as well as in measuring inter-temporal happiness by principal factor analysis. Research findings in this volume shed new light on public policies for a number of areas such as employment, family, social welfare, urban and regional planning, and culture. The book draws on a collaborative research project between five institutions of higher education in France, UK, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, and Japan that lasted for two years.

This volume, the fourth to result from a remarkably productive collaboration between the National Bureau of Economic Research and the Japan Center for Economic Research, presents a selection of thirteen high-caliber papers addressing issues in the employment practices, labor markets, and health, benefit, and pension policies of the United States and Japan.
After an opening chapter assessing the recent ascendance of the U.S. economy, papers diverge to tackle a range of specific issues. Focusing less on international comparison than on the assembly of high-quality research, contributors hone in on a variety of individual topics. Chapters delve into issues of youth employment, participatory employment, information sharing, fringe benefits, and drug coverage in Japan, as well as the dynamics of medical savings accounts, private insurance coverage, and benefit options in the U.S.
Like previous volumes stemming from NBER/JCER collaboration, this book represents a valuable mass of empirical data on some of the most notable employment and benefits issues in each nation, information that will both anchor and provoke scholarly analysis of these topics well into the future.

The population base in both the United States and Japan is growing older and, as those populations age, they provoke heretofore unexamined economic consequences. This cutting-edge, comparative volume, the third in the joint series offered by the National Bureau of Economic Research and the Japan Center for Economic Research, explores those consequences, drawing specific attention to four key areas: incentives for early retirement; savings, wealth, and asset allocation over the life cycle; health care and health care reform; and population projections.
Given the undeniable global importance of the Japanese and U.S. economies, these innovative essays shed welcome new light on the complex correlations between aging and economic behavior. This insightful work not only deepens our understanding of the Japanese and American economic landscapes but also, through careful examination of the comparative social and economic data, clarifies the complex relation between aging societies, public policies, and economic outcomes.