Tetsuji Okazaki (Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo)
Abstract
This paper overviews the industrial organization in Japan between the two World Wars. In this period, the change in the industrial structure gave a substantial impact on the industrial organization. On one hand, development of the heavy industries, which had been highly concentrated, raised the average level of market concentration (between effect). On the other hand, market concentration of each industry declined, in particular for the heavy industries (within and covariance effects). Decline of market concentration in each industry reflected the change in firm dynamics. While "natural selection" shaking out inefficient firms weakened, new entries continued in many industries. This new pattern of firm dynamics was associated with the activities of cartels, which proliferated in this period. Cartels indeed restricted competition and enhanced profitability of industries in the short run, which in turn undermined natural selection and induced new entries in the long run.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
Publisher Info
Paper provided by CIRJE, Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo in its series CIRJE J-Series with number
CIRJE-J-212.