Published papers

This article introduces, in Japanese, the research presented in the following paper, previously published in an English-language peer-reviewed journal: Kawabata, M., Naoi, M., Yasuda, S. (2025). “The impact of urban redevelopment for mitigating earthquake damage risk on land values.” Regional Science and Urban Economics, 115, 104144. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.regsciurbeco.2025.104144

We examine the impact of urban redevelopment for mitigating earthquake damage risk on land values using a spatial regression discontinuity (RD) design. Our analysis exploits the risk discontinuity at the boundaries of dense urban districts with extremely high earthquake damage risk (high-risk DUDs) in Tokyo, using data on high-risk DUDs in 2012, 2017, and 2020. The cross-sectional RD estimates demonstrate that land values are consistently higher just outside than just inside the boundaries of high-risk DUDs that existed in 2012 but were removed by 2017 under urban redevelopment initiatives. The RD estimates further reveal that the discontinuous gap in land values at the boundaries of the former high-risk DUDs diminished over time. The differences in the RD estimates before and after the removal of high-risk DUDs between 2012 and 2017 indicate that this removal reduced the discontinuity at the former high-risk DUD boundaries, leading to a relative increase in land values of 1.5% by 2017 and 2.0% by 2020. These findings suggest that mitigating earthquake damage risk through urban redevelopment contributes to a progressive appreciation in land values.

We explore intra-metropolitan spatial patterns of female labor force participation, and examine how they relate to commute times in Tokyo. The spatial patterns differ markedly by marital status and the presence of children. For married mothers, the spatial clusters of low participation and regular employment rates are largely located in the inner suburbs, many of which overlap with the spatial clusters of long male commute times. The spatial regression results indicate that for married mothers, a longer commute time is significantly associated with lower participation and regular employment rates, while for unmarried and childless married women, these associations are mostly nonsignificant. Among married mothers, the magnitude of the negative associations is greater for college graduates than for those with a high school education or less, suggesting that highly educated mothers are especially sensitive to commute times. We argue that the spatial transportation constraint intensifies the household division of labor, resulting in unique patterns for married mothers.

This article presents an empirical study on childcare accessibility and the importance of access to childcare in attaining preferred employment among women with preschool-aged children in Tokyo. The age-wise childcare accessibility of this study takes into account spatial variations in the supply and demand of childcare, as well as "spatial competition," based on spatially micro areas - blocks. The accessibility reveals a considerable geographic mismatch between childcare center supply and demand, particularly for children aged up to two years. Empirical results show that access to childcare is closely associated with a higher probability of attaining preferred employment among women with preschool-aged children. The association is remarkably strong when a woman has a very young child aged up to two years and when the childcare center is one that is desired. Adequate childcare provision, particularly for children under the age of three, helps to augment active female participation in the labor market.