著者

加藤 道也

出版者

大阪産業大学

雑誌

大阪産業大学経済論集 (ISSN:13451448)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.9, no.1, pp.37-60, 2007-10

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In the interwar years, Japan shared a concern common to many Western industrialized nations to seek balance of payments and employment stability on the basis of a gold standard system at the pre-war parity. In order to do so, governments introduced a mild deflationary policy but only to be suffered from stagnation of economy and employment. After Japan returned to the gold standard in 1930, exchange rate began to rise and it threatened a decrease of export level. Domestic demand declined and job losses spread to the chemical and heavy industries and to the mining industry. But with the government determined to continue fiscal and monetary restriction, merely awaiting a recovery from depression, both firms and farms lost their trading strength and unemployment grew. The combination of the Manchurian Incident and the Britain's decision to abandon the gold standard convinced Japan that maintaining the pre-war gold par was impossible and in December 1931, the Japanese gold standard was abandoned. After 1932, military expenditure was increased and it effected on employment of the skilled workers. But the improvement of employment was limited to the casual workers as the relatively poor recovery of agricultural production reversed the shock absorber effect of the agricultural sector pushing casual workers into industrial cities.