Overview

In this chapter we describe the changes in the wage and employment structures of large and medium-sized Japanese firms during the 20 years from the mid-1970s to the mid-1990s, using the data contained in volume 3 of the Survey on the Wage Structure (Chingin Kouzou Kihon Chosa), published annually by the Japanese Ministry of Labor, including information on wages, age, tenure, and employment classified by age group, rank, industry, and firm size. Our purpose is to summarize these data into stylized facts, and use these facts to guide the analysis in the final part of the book.

Data and definitions

As already mentioned in chapter 4, the data published in the Basic Survey are classified in such a way that the information on educational attainment is available only for the aggregate of all industries. This information is not available in the industrial data. Since we are interested in how wages and employment vary not only over time but also across industries, we use industrial data and select the following three sectors: manufacturing, finance and retail, and wholesale distribution.

While manufacturing has attracted considerable international attention because of its innovative practices and competitiveness, the distribution sector has often been blamed for being protected and hostile to foreign competition and the finance sector was particularly affected by the burst of the bubble in the early 1990s.