A demographic and nutritional analysis of urban lower-class dwellers in modern Japan revised version: the case of one Saimin-chiku in Tokyo, ca.1930

* Revised：Kenichi Tomobe, Minori Oshidari, Keisuke Moriya [22-06, 2022]This study aims at investigating a method to measure the standard of living, nutritional status, and physical condition of the saimin (“the poor") who suddenly appeared in the modern age and settled there despite their poverty. In the study of social science, the mainstream theories of poverty are Charles James Booth's stratification theory based on income level and Benjamin Seebohm Rowntree's minimum cost of living theory based on the cost of living; both have their merits and demerits. This paper will measure the poverty levels in terms of income and cost of living using data from a specified sub-district located in Tokyo (the results of an on-site survey of approximately 180 households). Many households living in the Saimin-chiku faced poverty both income levels and cost of living. In addition, observation of the health status of the saimin households showed that roughly half of the community had a disease of some sort, or a tuberculosis patient in the household. This provides a perspective which illuminates the difference in situation between the saimin households, who made a living based on an economy of mutual support, and the small farmer households, who had a communal consumption lifestyle but had the capacity to be self-supporting

Higher-Order Misspecification and Equilibrium Stability

*Revised：[DP-2023-E-002, August 2]This paper considers a Bayesian learning problem where strategic players jointly learn an unknown economic state, and show that one's higher-order misspecification (i.e., one's misspecification about the opponent's misspecification) can have a significant impact on the equilibrium outcome. We consider a simple environmental problem where players' production, as well as an unknown state, affects the quality of the environment. Crucially, we assume that one of the players is unrealistically optimistic about the quality of the environment. When this optimism is common knowledge, the equilibrium outcome is continuous in the amount of optimism, and hence small optimism leads to approximately correct learning of the state. In contrast, when the optimism is not common knowledge and each player is unaware of the opponent having a different view about the world, the equilibrium outcome is discontinuous, and even vanishingly small optimism leads to completely incorrect learning. We then analyze a general Bayesian learning model and discuss when such discontinuity arises

エド コバン ロクジュウメ

November 2022, Revised February 2023, Secondly Revised July 2023.The title of this study, "Edo Koban 60-me (/ɾokuʒuːme/)" means the following: in "Edo," one ryo (a unit of gold currency) of "Koban" (a middle-sized oval gold coin) was equal to "60-me" (me: the abbreviation of a unit of silver currency, momme, in round numbers) as the fixed exchange rate. This is a phenomenon seen only in the Edo commodity market, and the fixed exchange rate was used only when Edo citizens bought silver-denominated commodities from Kamigata (Osaka and Kyoto area) in gold coins. Osaka and Edo were the two major markets in early modern Japan. Osaka was the center of commerce, and exported large volumes of goods mainly to Edo. Edo was the political center and the largest consumer of goods from the Kamigata region. The early modern monetary system was a bimetallism of gold and silver coins, with copper coins used as small denominations. In Osaka, the pricing of goods and settlement of accounts was conducted in silver denomination. Contrarily, in Edo, transactions were handled in gold and copper coins. Gold and silver had fluctuating market prices. The shogunate set the r ate at 60 momme per one ryo in 1700, but the Edo commodity market was the only one that adhered to this rate. The Kamigata market and the Edo financial market continued with the existing fluctuating prices. A unique phenomenon occurred. Kamigata merchants manipulated silver prices before shipping goods to Edo. In the mid-Edo period, silver usually had a high price, and the Edo selling price had already caused a price spike in Osaka before exporting. Thus, "Edo Koban 60-me" was a sociocultural phenomenon that could not have been created unless all the following conditions were met: a fixed exchange rate in the Edo commodity market, floating market prices in the Kamigata market, transactions in gold denomination in Edo, settlements in silver denomination in Kamigata, goods shipped to Edo being denominated in silver, and the pricing method in futures of Kamigata merchants. These historical commercial facts are readily apparent in the documents of merchant families in the early modern period, and are also discussed in early modern books. Even ukiyoe woodblock prints depict "Koban 60-me" in scenes of buying and selling inside Edo stores. However, this has not become common academic knowledge in modern Japan, and is hardly known to the general public even though the Japanese love their own history. For instance, in the academic world, the current understanding is that, despite the shogunate's effort to fix an exchange rate between gold and silver, in effect, they floated against each other in all markets. The specific circumstances of the Edo market are not recognized. Thus, the understanding of East-West trade also assumes only a unitary floating exchange rate; that when silver was high, the purchasing power of gold would decline, leading to a decrease in Edo's imports, which would, in turn, increase demand for the Edo market and lead to higher prices. This does not recognize that prices had been raised prior to exportation. The purpose of this study is to incorporate the "Edo Koban 60-me" phenomenon into the common knowledge of early modern Japanese history

Data for "Temperature Interference in Improved FBG Pressure Sensor for Towing Tank Test"

The data used in Suzuki, K., Iwashita, H., Kashiwagi, M. et al. Temperature interference in improved FBG pressure sensor for towing tank test. J Mar Sci Technol 28, 351–369 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00773-023-00925-w

A Study on the Level of Market Efficiency in Five Markets

* Revised： [21-24 , 2021]This paper examines the weak form market efficiency in five stock markets, China (CSI 300 index), Hong Kong (HSI), Japan (Nikkei 225), the US (NASDAQCOM) and Germany (DAX) from the perspective of random walk hypothesis. The methods for testing random walk are autocorrelation, runs test, strategy. This paper also examine three calendar effects in all stock markets: January effect, the-turn-of-the-month effect (the TOM effect), the day-of-the-week-effect (the DOW effect). The results are: (1)From the viewpoint of autocorrelation, the most efficient market among five stock markets is the market in Hong Kong while strong evidence of autocorrelation is found in China, CSI 300 and The US, NASDAQCOM. (2) The results of runs tests do not found evidence against randomness in daily returns for CSI 300, HSI from 2006 to 2020 but find a little evidence for Nikkei 225, NASDAQCOM, DAX. The higher level of efficient markets among five stock markets are the markets in China and Hong Kong. (3) The strategy analyzed in this paper does not find evidence indicating inefficient market for five indexes. (4) January effect did not exist in five indexes. (5) All five indexes are characterized with a TOM effect in different level and therefore the hypothesis of an efficient market is rejected for five markets. (6) All five indexed are found the-day-of-week effect which also indicates inefficient stock markets. we conclude that all five market are not efficient from 2006 to 2020. (7) After the consideration of time-varying volatility, we found January effect in Nikkei 225 in returns. Except Nikkei 225 all the other indexes are verified with the turn-of-the-month-effect and only CSI 300 are verified with the day-of-the-week-effect in returns

Electoral Commitment in Asymmetric Tax-competition Models

* Revised： [20-21 , 2020]This study examines the political process of tax competition among asymmetric countries, highlighting the role of the commitment to the electoral promises.The median voters deliberately elect a delegate whose preferences differ from their own (strategic delegation), which is self-enforcing under symmetric countries. We first show that the outcome of strategic delegation is replicated when the candidates do not make binding campaign promises in both countries, and the opposite scenario of the binding commitments to the platforms leads to the self-representation by the median voters. We then amplify the model by adding the pre-election stage where the citizens choose whether the credibility of election promises is critical, through subscription numbers of newspapers and social media which determine the cost of betrayal of the proposed platforms (or the lack of the proposal). We then show that, depending on the type of asymmetries under consideration, sufficient asymmetry or sufficiently equal income distribution generates the commitment to the election campaign promises as the equilibrium outcome

Die Wahl der Schriftsprache im öffentlich-administrativen Bereich im mehrsprachigen Luxemburg. Der Sprachgebrauch in Gemeindeblättern der kleineren Gemeinden

批判的社会言語学の探

An Experimental Study on Information Acquisition and Disclosure in a Cournot Duopoly Market

* Revised： [13-01 , 2013]This study experimentally investigates the interaction between firms’ information acquisition decisions and disclosure. In particular, I focus on a Cournot duopoly market under industry-wide demand uncertainty. The results demonstrate that acquiring industry-wide demand information improves firms’ production decisions in that firms can adjust their quantity levels depending on the market demand. However, disclosure diminishes a firm’s incentive to acquire such information. This is because once the information, which a firm acquired at a cost, is subsequently disclosed, a rival firm can take a free ride on the disclosed information and make a more informed decision. Hence, disclosure decreases the benefit of acquiring information for the disclosing firm. Taken together, although acquiring information improves production decisions, disclosure decreases the incentive to do so and thus, deteriorates a firm’s internal information environment. This leads to inefficient production, which in turn might have a substantial impact on market outcomes

Effects of Monetary Policy in a Model with Cash-in-Advance Constraints on R&D and Capital Accumulation

February 2020. Revised June 2020.To examine the effect of monetary policy on economic growth, we formulate an endogenous growth model with cash-in-advance constraints on R&D and capital accumulation as endogenous growth engines. Within this framework, we show that the relationship between economic growth and the nominal interest rate can be an inverted-U shape. Moreover, we demonstrate that the welfare-maximizing level of the nominal interest rate is larger than the growth rate-maximizing level of the nominal interest rate