Overview
This project plans to contribute to theoretical and empirical research of labor economics and behavioral economics by utilizing internal business data such as personnel records and field experiments in workplaces. We also aim to identify important research questions in light of the current policy issues and explore for new approaches in both theoretical and empirical domains. Specifically, the following thirteen research questions will be investigated.
1. What practices are causing gender disparities?
2. What impact do interpersonal skills training or transfers within organization have on productivity and innovation?
3. How workers’ personality affect their mental health?
4. How much and in what way can process rationalization through visualizing business flows affect productivity?
5. How do managers affect their teams' productivity?
6. What effect do placements of senior employees under the continuous employment system have on them and their colleagues?
7. How does quitting smoking affect the productivity and satisfaction of workers and colleagues?
8. How do better food content and more exercise affect workers' health and productivity?
9. What is the relationship between management and human capital of sake breweries and their innovation?
10. What kind of working style reforms have been done at Japanese firms and what are their effects?
11. How do workers’ working schedule characteristics and supervisors’ behavioral characteristics affect workers' mental health?
12. Whether workers who voluntarily move to other positions internally perform better than those who are transferred by fiat?
13. What is the overall effect of expatriate staffing, and what conditions influence the effectiveness of knowledge transfer from the parent company in multinational corporations?
These studies would lead to more insights into the relationship between differences in management and productivity differences, the causes of gender disparities, the value of non-cognitive ability in the labor market, and peer effects in the workplace. We also discuss what labor policies are effective and what policy incentives need to be offered to encourage firms to adopt them.
1. What practices are causing gender disparities?
2. What impact do interpersonal skills training or transfers within organization have on productivity and innovation?
3. How workers’ personality affect their mental health?
4. How much and in what way can process rationalization through visualizing business flows affect productivity?
5. How do managers affect their teams' productivity?
6. What effect do placements of senior employees under the continuous employment system have on them and their colleagues?
7. How does quitting smoking affect the productivity and satisfaction of workers and colleagues?
8. How do better food content and more exercise affect workers' health and productivity?
9. What is the relationship between management and human capital of sake breweries and their innovation?
10. What kind of working style reforms have been done at Japanese firms and what are their effects?
11. How do workers’ working schedule characteristics and supervisors’ behavioral characteristics affect workers' mental health?
12. Whether workers who voluntarily move to other positions internally perform better than those who are transferred by fiat?
13. What is the overall effect of expatriate staffing, and what conditions influence the effectiveness of knowledge transfer from the parent company in multinational corporations?
These studies would lead to more insights into the relationship between differences in management and productivity differences, the causes of gender disparities, the value of non-cognitive ability in the labor market, and peer effects in the workplace. We also discuss what labor policies are effective and what policy incentives need to be offered to encourage firms to adopt them.
July 1, 2019 - June 30, 2021
Major Research Results
2021
RIETI Discussion Papers
- 21-E-071
"Temporary Work Contracts and Female Labor Market Outcomes" (ASAI Yukiko and Dmitri K. KOUSTAS) - 21-E-046
"Do Japanese Expatriates Matter for Foreign Subsidiary Performance? A Role-Based Analysis of Three-Wave Panel Data" (Jesper EDMAN and Riki TAKEUCHI) - 21-E-040
"Enhancing Team Productivity through Shorter Working Hours: Evidence from the Great Recession" (Ruo SHANGGUAN, Jed DEVARO and OWAN Hideo) - 21-J-021
"The Spread and Effectiveness of Work Style Reforms" (TAKAHASHI Kohei, AIRTA Kentaro, OWAN Hideo, KAZAMA Haruka, KODAMA Naomi, SAKAI Saisuke and TAKEUCHI Masaya)
