IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/dpr/wpaper/0682.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

A Comment on Nishimura, Nakajima, and Kiyota's "Does the Natural Selection Mechanism Still Work in Severe Recessions? Examination of the Japanese Economy in the 1990s"

Author

Listed:
  • Tae Okada
  • Charles Yuji Horioka

Abstract

Nishimura, Nakajima, and Kiyota (2005) analyze the entry/exit behavior patterns of Japanese firms during the 1990s and find that relatively efficient (high total factor productivity (TFP)) firms exited while relatively inefficient (low TFP) firms survived during the banking-crisis period of 1996-97. They conclude from this finding that the natural selection mechanism (NSM) apparently malfunctions during severe recessions, but we offer a much more plausible interpretation: the NSM continued to function effectively even during this period, but aberrant banking practices (in particular, "forbearance lending" ("evergreening") and the "forcible withdrawal of loans" and/or the "reluctance to lend") caused a shift in the type of natural selection from "directional selection" to "disruptive selection," with the most efficient (highest TFP) firms as well as the least efficient (lowest TFP) firms being favored and firms of intermediate efficiency and TFP being selected against.

Suggested Citation

  • Tae Okada & Charles Yuji Horioka, 2007. "A Comment on Nishimura, Nakajima, and Kiyota's "Does the Natural Selection Mechanism Still Work in Severe Recessions? Examination of the Japanese Economy in the 1990s"," ISER Discussion Paper 0682, Institute of Social and Economic Research, Osaka University.
    • Handle: RePEc:dpr:wpaper:0682
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.iser.osaka-u.ac.jp/library/dp/2007/DP0682.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nishimura, Kiyohiko G. & Nakajima, Takanobu & Kiyota, Kozo, 2005. "Does the natural selection mechanism still work in severe recessions?: Examination of the Japanese economy in the 1990s," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 58(1), pages 53-78, September.
    2. Joe Peek & Eric S. Rosengren, 2005. "Unnatural Selection: Perverse Incentives and the Misallocation of Credit in Japan," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(4), pages 1144-1166, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Dan Andrews & Filippos Petroulakis, 2017. "Breaking the Shackles: Zombie Firms, Weak Banks and Depressed Restructuring in Europe," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 1433, OECD Publishing.
    2. Masami Imai, 2009. "Political Influence and Declarations of Bank Insolvency in Japan," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 41(1), pages 131-158, February.
    3. Olivier Mesly & David W. Shanafelt & Nicolas Huck, 2021. "Dysfunctional Markets: A Spray of Prey Perspective," Journal of Economic Issues, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 55(3), pages 797-819, July.
    4. Uchida, Hirofumi, 2020. "Natural selection: A review of studies on firms’ exit and efficiency," MPRA Paper 103938, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Piotr Ciżkowicz & Andrzej Rzońca & Andrzej Torój, 2019. "In Search of an Appropriate Lower Bound. The Zero Lower Bound vs. the Positive Lower Bound under Discretion and Commitment," German Economic Review, Verein für Socialpolitik, vol. 20(4), pages 1028-1053, November.
    2. Sakai, Koji & Uesugi, Iichiro & Watanabe, Tsutomu, 2010. "Firm age and the evolution of borrowing costs: Evidence from Japanese small firms," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(8), pages 1970-1981, August.
    3. Ogura, Yoshiaki & Okui, Ryo & Saito, Yukiko Umeno, 2015. "Network-Motivated Lending Decisions," HIT-REFINED Working Paper Series 29, Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University.
    4. Hoshi, Takeo & Kawaguchi, Daiji & Ueda, Kenichi, 2023. "Zombies, again? The COVID-19 business support programs in Japan," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 147(C).
    5. Dan Andrews & Filippos Petroulakis, 2017. "Breaking the Shackles: Zombie Firms, Weak Banks and Depressed Restructuring in Europe," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 1433, OECD Publishing.
    6. Kneller, Richard & McGowan, Danny & Inui, Tomohiko & Matsuura, Toshiyuki, 2012. "Globalisation, multinationals and productivity in Japan’s lost decade," Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 110-128.
    7. Yasushi Hamao & Kenji Kutsuna & Joe Peek, 2012. "Nice to be on the A-list," Working Papers 12-13, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    8. Iichiro Uesugi, 2008. "Efficiency of Credit Allocation and Effectiveness of Government Credit Guarantees: Evidence from Japanese Small Businesses," Bank of Japan Working Paper Series 08-E-2, Bank of Japan.
    9. Uchida, Hirofumi & Miyakawa, Daisuke & Hosono, Kaoru & Ono, Arito & Uchino, Taisuke & Uesugi, Iichiro, 2013. "Natural Disaster and Natural Selection," Working Paper Series 25, Center for Interfirm Network, Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University.
    10. Ogawa, Kazuo, 2011. "Balance sheet deterioration and credit allocations: Japanese evidence from the short-term economic survey of enterprises," Japan and the World Economy, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 86-96, March.
    11. Uchida, Hirofumi, 2020. "Natural selection: A review of studies on firms’ exit and efficiency," MPRA Paper 103938, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Kazuo Ogawa, 2007. "Credit Allocation of Japanese Banks in the 1990s: Evidence from the Short-term Economic Survey of Enterprises," ISER Discussion Paper 0680, Institute of Social and Economic Research, Osaka University.
    13. Kazuo Ueda, 2011. "Japan's Deleveraging since the 1990s and the Bank of Japan's Monetary Policy: Some Comparisons with the U.S. Experience since 2007," CARF F-Series CARF-F-259, Center for Advanced Research in Finance, Faculty of Economics, The University of Tokyo.
    14. Keiichiro Kobayashi & Daichi Shirai, 2012. "Debt-Ridden Borrowers and Productivity Slowdown," CIGS Working Paper Series 14-005E, The Canon Institute for Global Studies.
    15. Toyofuku, Kenta, 2013. "Stability or restructuring? Macroeconomic dynamics under soft budget constraint problems," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 625-649.
    16. HOSONO Kaoru & TAKIZAWA Miho, 2019. "Dynamic Productivity Decomposition with Allocative Efficiency," Discussion papers 19069, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    17. Keiichiro Kobayashi & Daichi Shirai, 2017. "Debt-Ridden Borrowers and Economic Slowdown," CIGS Working Paper Series 17-002E, The Canon Institute for Global Studies.
    18. HOSONO Kaoru, 2009. "Financial Crisis, Firm Dynamics and Aggregate Productivity in Japan," Discussion papers 09012, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    19. Takeo Hoshi & Daiji Kawaguchi & Kenichi Ueda, 2021. "The Return of the Dead? The COVID-19 Business Support Programs in Japan (Forthcoming in Journal of Banking and Finance)," CARF F-Series CARF-F-513, Center for Advanced Research in Finance, Faculty of Economics, The University of Tokyo.
    20. Deng Ming & Wang Jinbo, 2022. "Why do zombie firms seldom die or resurrect? The effect of government subsidies on the survival duration of China’s zombie firms," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment Journal, De Gruyter, vol. 16(1), pages 212-228, January.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D21 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Firm Behavior: Theory
    • D24 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Production; Cost; Capital; Capital, Total Factor, and Multifactor Productivity; Capacity
    • L11 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Production, Pricing, and Market Structure; Size Distribution of Firms
    • O47 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - Empirical Studies of Economic Growth; Aggregate Productivity; Cross-Country Output Convergence

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:dpr:wpaper:0682. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Librarian (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/isosujp.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.