Governance of Trade in the Labor Market: Poaching, Court, and Settlement in Early Twentieth-Century Japan

Abstract:     
Protection of claim transfer by the state court is an institutional basis of the modern market economy. In the labor market also, transportation cost or human capital investment could be willingly covered by the claimant under slavery or indenture. However, in order to facilitate better matching by free mobility, the modern judicial system does not allow a claim to an employee to be perfection by slavery or indenture. A device to balance claim protection and free mobility is private settlement indirectly governed by the state court. This paper focuses on this complementarity in experience of the Japanese silk-reeling industry.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 21

Keywords: judicial system in the labor market, private institution in the labor market, employment contract, strategic complementarity, Japanese textile industry

JEL Classification: L14, K31, J42, N65

working papers series