Recent studies have established that the Japanese stock market had a substantial size in the pre-war period, and played an important role in financing economic development. The pre-war stock market in Japan, however, did not achieve its size and status quickly. Indeed, the market capitalization...

This study examines the impact of a technological change on employment and wages, focusing on the adoption of power looms in the silk-weaving industry. Exploiting plant-level panel data from 20th century Japan, we demonstrate that at the plant level, the power loom adaption increased the...

As a result of the Asian financial crisis of 1997, the issue of corporate governance has attracted the attention of researchers as well as policy authorities. Much of the literature on the Asian crisis focuses specifically on the exploitation of minority shareholders by core members of...

We explore how changes in ownership and managerial control affect the productivity and profitability of producers. Using detailed operational, financial, and ownership data from the Japanese cotton spinning industry at the turn of the last century, we find a more nuanced picture than the...