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How do changes to taxation policy affect the organizational choices of firms? Using historical firm data constructed from Japanese corporate genealogies, we examine the short-run impact of introducing a personal income tax (PIT) in 1887 on tax-motivated incorporation. Between 1880 and 1892, we find that the introduction of PIT increased the share of incorporated firms by more than 3 percentage points, indicating firms chose their organizational structure to avoid new taxation. Furthermore, our results suggest that a corporate income tax may have acted as a backstop to maintain revenue collected through PIT. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Railroads in late nineteenth-century Japan are credited with facilitating factor mobility as well as access to human and financial capital, but their impact on firms has been unclear. Using a prefecture-level panel data set and a difference-in-differences model that exploits the temporal and spatial variation of railroad expansion, I investigate the relationship between railways and increased firm activity. Rail access led to higher average firm capitalization, particularly in manufacturing, and more populated and less accessible areas gained disproportionately more firms. By widening markets and allowing for agglomeration economies, Japanese railways promoted capital investment and more efficient resource allocation. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article analyzes how Japan financed its World War II occupation of Southeast Asia, the market-purchased transfer of resources to Japan, and the monetary and inflation consequences of Japanese policies. Occupation was financed principally by printing large quantities of money. While some Southeast Asian countries had high inflation, hyperinflation hardly occurred because of a sustained transactions demand for money and because of Japan's strong enforcement of monetary monopoly. Highly specialized Southeast Asian economies and loss of Japanese merchant shipping limited resource extraction. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Presents information on a study of the economic behavior of prewar corporate groups in Japan called zaibatsu, from 1915 to 1937. Types of prewar corporate groups in the country; Theories that have been advanced for the existence and growth of zaibatsu; Ways by which annual profitability was measured.

Deals with the problem of whether a shortage of natural resources has even been a serious problem in Japanese economic history. Increase in the per capital income of Japan; Exportation of commodities and importation of manufactured goods; Manchurian Incident of 1931; Military expansions in 1930s.