The Role of Structural Transformation in Regional Productivity Growth and Convergence in Japan: 1874 - 2008

Saumik Paul and Kyoji Fukao

No 2016-12, CEI Working Paper Series from Center for Economic Institutions, Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University

Abstract: Japan’s regional convergence of productivity levels throughout the 20th century can be best described as a cumulative process of “catching up, forging ahead, and falling behind”. Using a novel dataset spanning 135 years (1874 – 2008), this study finds support for a crucial role played by structural transformation in convergence. The pace of productivity catch-up and convergence accelerated in the mid-1950s with the help of structural transformation, particularly in the period from 1955–1965. Structural transformation explains, on average, about 30% of the aggregate productivity growth, and its effect intensified in prefectures with faster movements of labor across sectors and larger sectoral productivity gaps. However, since the early 1970s, its contribution to the convergence was frequently offset by within-sector productivity growth, in turn thwarting the pace of convergence. These counter-balancing effects contributed to the diverse pathways of productivity catch-up at the prefecture level.

Keywords: Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity; Japan (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O10 O40 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 55 pages
Date: 2017-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eff, nep-his, nep-tid and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://hermes-ir.lib.hit-u.ac.jp/hermes/ir/re/28464/wp2016-12.pdf

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hit:hitcei:2016-12

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CEI Working Paper Series from Center for Economic Institutions, Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Reiko Suzuki (suzukicr@ier.hit-u.ac.jp this e-mail address is bad, please contact repec@repec.org).