|
on South East Asia |
| By: | Keisuke Kondo (Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry and Research Institute for Economics & Business Administration, Kobe University, JAPAN) |
| Abstract: | This study examines the relationship between total fertility rates and urban agglomeration in Asia through a comparative descriptive analysis of subnational data from Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Thailand. Against the backdrop of a nationwide decline in fertility, the study asks whether low fertility is systematically associated with population density within Asian countries and region, rather than constituting a national-level demographic outcome solely. The empirical analysis is based on explanatory spatial data analysis, combining maps of population density and total fertility rates. The empirical analysis finds that, within each country examined, fertility tends to be lower in denser and more urbanized areas, particularly in major metropolitan areas such as Tokyo, Seoul, Taipei, Ho Chi Minh City, Jakarta, and Bangkok. Although the strength and dispersion of the relationship vary across national contexts, a broadly similar negative density–fertility gradient is observed throughout Asia. These findings suggest that low fertility in Asia should be understood not only as a demographic transition, but also as a spatial phenomenon closely associated with urban concentration. |
| Keywords: | Total fertility rate; Population density; Urban agglomeration; Population decline |
| JEL: | J11 J13 R12 R23 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kob:dpaper:dp2026-14 |
| By: | Sri Susilawati Islam ("Industrial Engineering Department, Sampoerna University, Raya Pasar Minggu Street, 12780, South Jakarta, Indonesia" Author-2-Name: Arum Githa Putri Author-2-Workplace-Name: Visual Communication Design Department, Sampoerna University, Raya Pasar Minggu Street, 12780, South Jakarta, Indonesia Author-3-Name: Kenny Fernando Author-3-Workplace-Name: Accounting Department, Sampoerna University, Raya Pasar Minggu Street, 12780, South Jakarta, Indonesia Author-4-Name: Antonius Siahaan Author-4-Workplace-Name: Accounting Department, Sampoerna University, Raya Pasar Minggu Street, 12780, South Jakarta, Indonesia Author-5-Name: Budi Kurniawan Author-5-Workplace-Name: Accounting Department, Sampoerna University, Raya Pasar Minggu Street, 12780, South Jakarta, Indonesia Author-6-Name: Author-6-Workplace-Name: Author-7-Name: Author-7-Workplace-Name: Author-8-Name: Author-8-Workplace-Name:) |
| Abstract: | " Objective - Unemployment is a major issue in developing countries, including Indonesia, particularly among young people aged 15–24. One government initiative to address this is the Early-Stage Independent Workers (Tenaga Kerja Mandiri Pemula, TKMP) program by the Ministry of Manpower, which provides business mentoring and support to first-time entrepreneurs. Methodology - However, the program's effectiveness remains debated, as the needs of young entrepreneurs vary widely and are often unmet by general training and support structures. This study aims to identify the key factors influencing the success of TKMP participants, using quantitative and qualitative methods. Findings - The analysis employed descriptive statistics and linear regression to examine the impact of five independent variables, such as business capital, business location, brand, promotion, and entrepreneurial commitment, on business success. Using linear regression, the results indicate that Business Promotion has the strongest influence on business success, with a coefficient of 0.338, followed by Entrepreneurial Commitment at 0.201 and Business Location at 0.139. Conversely, business capital and brand identity had no statistically significant impact on business success. Novelty - However, other factors such as motivation, marketing skills, networking capabilities, and geographical conditions demonstrated notable contributions to entrepreneurial performance. The primary challenges identified in the program include bureaucratic complexity in the fund-disbursement process and participants' limited understanding of the program's operational mechanisms. Type of Paper - Empirical" |
| Keywords: | Linear factors, Success factors, TKMP, young entrepreneurs |
| JEL: | L26 M13 |
| Date: | 2026–06–30 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gtr:gatrjs:jber277 |
| By: | Hiroyuki Oi (Economist, Institute for Monetary and Economic Studies, Bank of Japan (E-mail: hiroyuki.ooi@boj.or.jp)); Shigenori Shiratsuka (Professor, Faculty of Economics, Keio University (E-mail: shigenori.shiratsuka@keio.jp)); Shunichi Yoneyama (Director, Institute for Monetary and Economic Studies (currently, Research and Statistics Department), Bank of Japan (E-mail: shunichi.yoneyama@boj.or.jp)) |
| Abstract: | Shadow short-term interest rate (SSR) models are expected to provide effective monetary policy indicators under the effective lower bound (ELB) constraint on nominal interest rates. This paper revisits the SSR models using yield curve data from the prolonged ultra-low interest rate environment in Japan. Specifically, this paper compares the various specifications of the SSR models based on the Nelson-Siegel model by focusing on a trade-off between estimation performance and theoretical consistency. This paper highlights the importance of evaluating monetary policy easing effects using the entire yield curve fluctuations, rather than relying solely on SSR estimates, especially in the ultra-low interest rate environment in Japan. |
| Keywords: | Effective lower bound constraint, Shadow short-term interest rates, Nelson-Siegel model, Monetary policy indicators |
| JEL: | E43 E44 E52 G12 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ime:imedps:26-e-06 |
| By: | Jisoo Hwang; Inkyung Yoo |
| Abstract: | Across developed countries, women's earnings decline sharply following childbirth while men's earnings remain unaffected. But how will the "motherhood effect" evolve as more women choose not to have children? We examine changes in the motherhood effect on earnings amid rising childlessness in South Korea, the country with the world's lowest fertility rate. Using an event study framework and administrative data covering the entire population, we find that earnings losses after childbirth have increased across recent cohorts of mothers. We provide suggestive evidence that the expansion of parental leave and a stronger positive selection into motherhood contributed to this trend. |
| Keywords: | Motherhood effect, child penalty, selection into motherhood, parental leave |
| JEL: | J16 J13 |
| Date: | 2025–08 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:2557 |
| By: | Satoko Kojima (Director, Institute for Monetary and Economic Studies, Bank of Japan (Email: satoko.kojima@boj.or.jp)); Toshiyuki Sakiyama (Director and Senior Economist, Institute for Monetary and Economic Studies, Bank of Japan (Email: toshiyuki.sakiyama@boj.or.jp)) |
| Abstract: | Liquidity in government bond markets is critical for the functioning of financial markets. This paper studies the determinants of market liquidity, measured by price dispersion, by constructing various bond features using high-granularity data from the Bank of Japan Financial Network System and applying machine learning approaches. The main findings are threefold. First, the decomposition of the liquidity indicator into bond features reveals that the historical volatility of benchmark prices of Japanese government bonds has been the main driver of the liquidity indicator, while the contributions of the share of non- clearing participants' transactions and the share of the central bank's transactions and holdings have increased since around 2022. Second, some bond features affect the liquidity indicator non-linearly. For bond features such as the share of foreign financial institutions' transactions, the number of trading financial institutions, and the share of the central bank's holdings, the liquidity indicator improves as the values of these bond features increase, but deteriorates once they exceed certain thresholds. Third, bond features such as maturity, the historical volatility of benchmark prices, and the number of trading counterparties per institution affect the liquidity indicator by strongly interacting with other bond features. |
| Keywords: | Market liquidity, Government bond markets, Bond features, Machine learning approach |
| JEL: | C59 G12 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ime:imedps:26-e-03 |
| By: | Tetsuji Okazaki (The University of Tokyo) |
| Abstract: | This paper explores the impact of the Production Capacity Expansion Plan during World War II on steel production. We trace the construction progress of individual facilities included in the implementation plans and show that many of them—particularly blast furnaces and both open-hearth and converter furnaces—were completed during the war. The production capacity of facilities constructed under the Production Capacity Expansion Plan accounted for high percentage in the total production capacity not only at the end of the war, but also at the middle of the 1950s. Furthermore, a regression analysis using plant-level data on steel products shows that the plants for which the expansion of rolling facilities was included in the implementation plans exhibited higher output from 1942 onward, compared with other plants, relative to the pre- implementation period. This relationship remains statistically significant in 1950, 1955, and 1960. Taken together, these results suggest that the Production Capacity Expansion Plan had a positive impact on Japan’s steel production from the wartime period through the early phase of postwar high economic growth, primarily through the expansion of production facilities. |
| Date: | 2026–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tky:jseres:2026cj317 |
| By: | Taisuke Nakata (The University of Tokyo); Yoshiyuki Nakazono (Yokohama City University); Kento Tango (Economic and Social Research Institute, Cabinet Office) |
| Abstract: | We analyze how household inflation expectations respond to macroeconomic news using a daily survey in Japan in 2023-24, around the transition from a low- to high-inflation regime. The responses of inflation expectations vary widely across news events. responses of inflation expectations to news are sometimes correlated with surprise components of the news implied by private-sector inflation forecasts or financial markets. Long-run inflation expectations are no less responsive to inflation data releases—but are less responsive to monetary policy announcements—than short-run inflation expectations. |
| Date: | 2026–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cfi:fseres:cf624 |
| By: | Cheon, EunJeong,; Lee, Hee Rin, |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the gap between what nurses need and what actually gets built, through a three-month ethnographic study at Mirae Hospital (MH) in Seoul, South Korea, combining interviews, ward observations, and participatory design workshops with hospital staff and union nurses. Our findings reveal three persistent patterns: technologies that succeeded eliminated acknowledged problems through collaborative design; technologies that failed attempted to model volitional human behavior or assumed laboratory conditions that clinical environments cannot provide; and high-impact automations that nurses explicitly requested were never developed, displaced by technically sophisticated investments aligned with institutional prestige rather than frontline need. We further show that AI adoption differs systematically between unionized and non- unionized hospitals, with union representation playing a meaningful role in ensuring AI serves workers rather than institutions. Together, these findings point to a structural problem: bedside nurses – those most directly affected by clinical AI – remain least likely to shape what gets built. Addressing this requires not only better design methods, but institutional reform in how technology priorities are set and whose needs are treated as authoritative. |
| Keywords: | nurse, information technology, artificial intelligence, hospital |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ilo:ilowps:995697769302676 |
| By: | Shin, Seonho (Ajou University & IZA) |
| Abstract: | The impact of sudden asylum seeker inflows on host residents’ mental health is largely unexplored. The present study addresses this research gap and provides the first causal evidence from the non-Western context by exploiting the unexpected influx of Yemeni asylum seekers to Jeju Island, South Korea. The influx affected the island ‘locally’ due to its region-specific visa-free entry policy and the host government’s immediate restrictions on the asylum seekers’ post-arrival cross-region movement off the island. Such a unique combination of entry policy, post-arrival containment, and geographic separation provides a well-defined quasi-experimental setting for causal investigation. Difference-in-differences estimates based on nationally representative, government-collected data suggest that the influx shock worsened host residents’ mental health outcomes—with higher depression and anxiety and lower life satisfaction. Furthermore, this study provides the evidence on the possible mechanisms linking the influx to hosts’ mental health, revealing heightened public safety worries and diminished trust in government. |
| Keywords: | asylum seekers, refugees, host residents, mental health, life satisfaction, difference-in-differences |
| JEL: | F22 I12 |
| Date: | 2026–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18586 |
| By: | Kim, Pyung (University of California, Santa Barbara) |
| Abstract: | This study exploits South Korea's unique dual-policy framework to evaluate the comparative effects of carbon pricing and command-and-control regulation on firm-level environmental performance. Using a difference-in-differences design with firm-level panel data from 2011 to 2022, I compare outcomes between firms regulated under a command-and-control program (Target Management System, TMS) and those subject to a market-based carbon pricing mechanism (Emissions Trading Scheme, ETS). The results show that ETS-regulated firms reduced energy use by approximately 5.8% to 8.8% and carbon emissions by 7.3% to 8.5% across model specifications. However, the effects on carbon intensity were inconsistent. Event-study analyses suggest that these differing effects are driven by the heterogeneous timing of firm responses: immediate but short-lived reductions in energy use, persistent declines in carbon emissions, and gradual improvements in emissions efficiency. Phase-specific estimates further indicate that more market-oriented ETS phases were associated with stronger reductions in carbon emissions and intensity, underscoring the role of incentive-based policy design in enhancing environmental outcomes. |
| Date: | 2026–04–30 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:socarx:ac4wb_v1 |