The role of buyers and suppliers has received little attention in the literature on research and development (R&D) spillovers and productivity, which has focused primarily on the moderating roles of technological and geographic proximity. In this study, we examine R&D spillovers that result from...

In this paper, we investigate the causes and impacts of the recent changes in the inter-firm business relationships in the Japanese automobile industry from 1994-2010. Our main results are the following: First, we find that buyer-supplier relationships in the automobile industry in Japan have...

By merging two newly created databases for the analysis of prefecture-level productivity—the R-JIP Database 2013 and the R-LTES Database 2013—with other regional statistics, we examine how and why "aged prefectures" differ from other prefectures. Our main findings can be summarized as...

In this paper, we investigate why information and communication technology (ICT) investment in Japan has stagnated since the 1990s. Given that a notable characteristic of Japan's economy is that small as well as older firms play a much greater role than in other economies, particularly that of...

In a country such as China, which maintains strict controls on foreign exchange and frequently intervenes in the currency market, it is not surprising that the local currency is persistently undervalued in nominal terms. Normally, one would expect such a policy of deliberate currency...

As the manufacturing sectors of developed economies increasingly outsource to developing economies, a serious measurement problem, or "offshoring bias" (Houseman et al. 2011), may arise. If a manufacturing industry or firm procures many parts and components from developing economies at...

The Great East Japan Earthquake of March 11, 2011 had a serious negative impact on the Japanese economy. The earthquake reduced production substantially not only in the regions that were directly affected but also throughout Japan via the disruption of supply chains. The meltdowns at the...

In a country such as China, which maintains strict controls on foreign exchange and frequently intervenes in the currency market, it is not surprising that the local currency is persistently undervalued in nominal terms. Normally, one would expect such a policy of deliberate currency...

This paper describes the construction of the Regional-Level Japan Industrial Productivity Database (R-JIP), which covers the period from 1970 through 2008 and comprises annual industrial output and factor input data of Japan's 47 prefectures classified by 23 industry. Output is measured in terms...

In this paper, geographical spillover potential is modeled and empirically examined using factory-level data from Japan's Census of Manufactures. First, the efficiency of each factory is estimated using a non-parametric data envelopment analysis (DEA) model for each industry. Second, the...