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SHUNTARO WASHIZAKI Last modified date:2023.11.22

Associate Professor / Fields in Industry
Department of Industrial and Business System
Faculty of Economics


Graduate School
Undergraduate School


Homepage
https://kyushu-u.elsevierpure.com/en/persons/shuntaro-washizaki
 Reseacher Profiling Tool Kyushu University Pure
http://www.washizaki.org/
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Academic Degree
Ph.D. in Economics
Country of degree conferring institution (Overseas)
No
Field of Specialization
Economic History of Japan
Total Priod of education and research career in the foreign country
00years00months
Research
Research Interests
  • Modern Economic History on Nishi - Nippon Railroad Co., Ltd.
    keyword : Nippon Railroad Nishitetsu Modern history Economic History Fukuoka Kasuga Onojo Dazaifu Chikushino Ogori Kurume Mizuma Oki Yanagawa Miyama Omuta
    2022.10~2024.03.
  • The History of Interdisciplinary Research between Socio-Economic History and Historical Geography: Trends and Issues
    keyword : historical geography, socio-economic history, the Quantitative Economic History Association, Mataji Umemura, Chiharu Kurosaki
    2011.04~2012.01.
  • An analysis of asset market and investment in real estate in the Tokugawa and Meiji periods
    keyword : Edo, Tokyo, Mitsubishi, Land Market, Real Estate Management
    2009.04~2018.03An analysis of asset market and investment in real estate in the Tokugawa and Meiji periods.
Academic Activities
Reports
1. Shuntaro WASHIZAKI, Land Market and Real Estate Management in Japanese Cities, 1660-1870: An Analysis of Rents and Values of Real Estate in Edo Using the Income Capitalization Approach, M. Miyamoto and M. Sawai (eds), Towards a Reinterpretation of Japanese Economic History: Quantitative and Comparative Approaches (Kyoto: International Institute for Advance Studies), pp.69-70, 2012.03, 本研究の目的は,江戸の土地市場と不動産経営に関する長期時系列データを作成し,その収益性の推移を明らかにするとともに,江戸の土地投資に対するファンダメンタルズ・モデルの説明力を検討することにある。従来,徳川都市の土地研究は,土地収益市場と土地資産市場を切り離して議論してきたが,本研究は双方の関係性を重視して江戸の実質地価を求め,その変動要因をマクロ経済に求めてきた点に,最大の特徴を有する。
 分析結果により,以下に掲げる3点の事実が発見された。第1に,犬山屋神戸(かんど)家という商家が徳川前期の江戸に所有した地面を事例として,町屋敷経営の収支構造を解明し,商人資本による不動産投資の意義を検討した。それによれば,①当該期の不動産経営は健全だったが,その実現にあたっては収益最大化に向けた管理人の経営手腕や,低率・低額・逓減の方向性を伴った町人の租税負担を前提としたこと,とはいえ②町人の役負担が減免されても,その減額分を上家・土蔵の減価償却費が吸収するため,町屋敷経営は高利の運用を期待しにくいという資産的特徴を備えていたこと,③それにも関わらず当時町屋敷への投資が集中したのは,貨幣改鋳によって三貨相場が不安定化し,現金から土地へという資産選択が一挙に加速化したためであったことなどが主張されている。この結果として,江戸の不動産は,利子所得を期待する資産ではなく,資本利得を期待する資産と位置づけることに成功した。
 第2に,収益還元モデルを利用して,江戸の土地価格がファンダメンタルズ・モデルによって決定していたのかを検証した。その結果,一方では,それが経済合理的に説明された価格であった点が明らかとなった。なぜなら,徳川時代において都市の土地は唯一の長期金融資産だったため,現代と比較すると非常に高い流動性を有しており,実質的に証券化していたからである。実際のところ,町奉行によって定められた町触によって,町屋敷の売り手と買い手,あるいは抵当権設定者と抵当権者は,対象となる土地価格や抵当に関する情報を町名主に報告する義務を負っていた。それとともに,町名主は,町内における不動産経営に関する租税率,収支や利潤,抵当権の有無といった土地市場に関する情報を「沽券帳」と呼ばれる土地台帳に記録・管理していた。そうすることによって,それらの情報はいつでも不動産を売買したり,抵当に入れたりしたい町人に対して開示することが可能だったのである。したがって,地価は将来地代の割引現在価値として設定されるようになり,土地の生産性と利子率によって説明されたものだといえる。しかし他方で,土地価格が町人投資家の非合理的な期待や行動によって決定したであろう点も,看過できない事実である。たとえば,18世紀初頭に江戸の市街が拡張されたが,まだ不動産経営が行われていない時点で設定された土地価格は経済合理的だったと判断できず,売り手と買い手との間に情報の非対称性が存在していたはずである。また,1818年には文政の貨幣改鋳が実施され,全般的に物価は上昇したものの,土地価格は意図的に据置きとなり,物価に対して硬直的だった点は,物価に対する土地資産の過小評価に繋がったと考えられる。さらに,土地が質流れした場合,弁済時の価格が概算的に決まっていた点も少なからず存在していた。
 第3に,徳川後期における江戸の商業地を事例に,実質地価の決定構造とその推移を分析した。その結果,18世紀中には実質地代の低下にもかかわらず,低金利政策と貨幣供給の増量,商品取引に対する貨幣需要の減退といった経済環境が土地不動産への資産選択を活発化させ,実質地価の上昇に貢献した。だが,19世紀初頭になると,貸手の商人・地主が,土地収益性を,表店でなく裏店のそれ程度と過小に評価したことで,実質地価は利子率の低下に反して暴落した。
 以上より,次の2点を結論づけることができる。ひとつは,徳川時代における都市の土地価格がファンダメンタルズ・モデルによって経済合理的に計算された価格を基盤としながら,町人投資家の非合理的行動によって説明された価格を加減して決定していた点であり,いまひとつは,徳川都市の土地不動産が投機的な長期金融資産として運用されていた点である。.
2. Symposium: Decline and Fall in Economic History, Closing Remarks and Comments.
Papers
1. Purchase of land in Uchisaiwai-cho by Mitsubishi and land utilization by its tenants in late Meiji Era: Focusing on the case of the office lease business by a lawyer, Rokuichiro Masujima.
2. Land Market and Real Estate Mortgage Loan in Edo: A Case Study at Tsukiji and Teppozu Districts during the Tokugawa Period.
3. Real Estate Business of Mitsubishi Goshi Kaisha in Meiji Era.
4. The purpose of this report is to study the significance of interdisciplinary approach between socioeconomic history and historical geography in the case of Mataji Umemura's relationship with Chiharu Kurosaki (1923-2007). Umemura (1921-2006),a professor emeritus at Hitotsubashi University specialized in labor economics and compiled “Long-term Economic Statistics" (LTES) with Kazushi Okawa and Miyohei Shinohara for a long time. He was also interested in economic history during Tokugawa period (1603-1867),be cause he convinced that Japan's industrialization had steadily started before Matsukata Deflation (1881-1885). Therefore he formed the Quantitative Economic History Association (QEH) in 1971 with Akira Hayami,Shunsaku Nishikawa etc. and contributed to analyze Japanese history by the use of the empirical framework and method. On the other hand,K urosaki, a former professor emeritus at Tsukuba University,specialized in historical geography and contributed to find various data of Meiji period and brought ground a quantitative approach in modern historical geography. Umemura frequently read Kurosaki' s article and invited him to attend QEH 1st conference on August,1972. The result of this conference was published in the QEH annals vol.1. Furthermore Kurosaki submitted a review of LTES vol.13,which Umemura had supervised for years..
5. Bunzo Washizaki's Memoirs, 1876-1930: Half a Life of a Railway Engineer in Modern Japan.
6. Land Market and Real Estate Management in Japanese Cities, 1600-1900: Trends and Isuues.
7. Land Market and Real Estate Management in the Second Half of the Tokugawa Period: A Case Study of the Someno Family in Toride Town in a suburd of Edo.
8. Investment and management of real estate in Tokyo by Mitsubishi, 1870-1905.
9. The Real Estate Business and Investment in Edo: 1695-1754 -A Case Study of the Kando Family-.
10. Asset market and investment in real estate in the second half of the Tokugawa period: an analysis of rents and real estate values in Edo using an income capitalization approach.
11. Business Relationships between Japanese Merchants and Western Firms in the Treaty Port Trade of Yokohama: 1869-1874.
12. Business relationships between Japanese marchants and Western firms in the treaty port trade of Yokohama: 1869-1874.
13. A Population History of Family Migration in the Country Town "Hachioji" -The Case of Yokoyama-shuku 1833-1842-.
14. Migration patterns in silk textile prodution centers in the late Tokugawa period: a case study of the town of Hachioji.
Presentations
1. Shuntaro WASHIZAKI, An Analysis of the Interest Rate for Loans to Direct Retainers of the Shogun in Early Modern Japan, 44th Annual Meeting of the Social Science History Association, 2019.11, The purpose of this report is to analyze the transition of the interest rate for loans to direct retainers of the Shogun in early modern Japan, taking the case of Edo from the first half of the 19th century to the Meiji Restoration in 1868.
I compared the time series transition of the interest rate of real estate mortgages in Edo with that for loans to Domain Lords in Osaka in previous studies. As a result, both interest rates showed a significant positive correlation with prices. However, the former increased, while the latter continued to decrease during the hyperinflation from the opening of the port in 1859 to the Meiji Restoration. From these fact findings, I concluded that financial markets were not yet unified nationally and were not arbitrated between East and West in modern Japan. On the other hand, there is also a problem that the two interest rates cannot be compared directly because the borrower's class and the financial market location were different. In order to solve this problem, I will analyze the transition of the interest rate for loans to direct retainers of the Shogun in Edo in this report. Therefore, I will clarify the difference of samurai finance in the money market between Edo and Osaka.
A financial institution that provided loans to him during the Tokugawa period was called the Fudasashi. He was supposed to be paid by the generals with rice produced at his place of control. However, even if he received all of his salary in rice, he did not consume it entirely as food. He would rather need cash to purchase the necessary goods for life. Furthermore, since rice was transported to Edo after autumn, he had to have cash from the Fudasashi when he needed funding in spring and summer. Most of Fudasashi set up stores in Asakusa where rice warehouses were accumulated in Edo City at that time. Then, Fudasashi received rice from the warehouse as a representative of the direct retainer, and paid a part of it to him. In addition, Fudasashi played the role of a financial institution that converted remaining rice into cash and passed it to the direct retainer, or lent cash to him using rice as a reserve.
There were about 100 Fudasashi in Edo from the first half of the 18th century to the end of the Tokugawa Shogunate in 1867. However, the Meiji new government stopped paying salaries for a samurai class and dismantled its status. Due to the effect, all Fudasashi closed without collecting the huge amount of debt they had been lending to direct retainers. Therefore, almost no historical material related to the management of Fudasashi remains today.
There are analysis by Kouda and Kitahara as prior researches on Fudasashi. Those studies include the background of the appearance of Fudasashi, the fund transfer system between Fudasashi and warriors, and the market intervention of the Shogunate for financial transactions of Fudasashi based on the historical materials of the Shogunate's legal system. However, there is no research that analyzed financial transactions quantitatively based on the books or borrowing documents of Fudasashi at that time. At present, these Fudasashi documents are only left in the Aochi family materials at Hitotsubashi University Library and in the Sumitomo Family documents. In this report, I will use the latter document recently published as historical material.
The Sumitomo family is one that has developed copper mining and refining industries as the core of family business since the early modern Japan. The Sumitomo family opened its first store in Edo in 1678, and advanced to Asakusa in 1702. They started to transfer funds to direct retainers as Fudasashi at the latest in 1755, and also made loans to domain lords and Edo townspeople. However, due to the influence of the Meiji Restoration, they decided to close two stores in Edo in 1868.
There are 267 borrowing certificates in the Sumitomo family documents. In other words, the Sumitomo family established business relationships as a Fudasashi with at least 267 direct retainers of the Shogun in Edo. Of these, the certificates that described the interest rate clearly are 73, which were prepared in 1825-66. All 73 borrowing certificates contain information such as the amount of rice received as salary, principal for borrowing, repayment and interest per year, etc.
Based on this information, analyzing the nominal interest rate reveals two features. As the first feature, the direct retainers who received the funds transfer from the Sumitomo family were classified into the following two groups based on the loan interest rate. The first group was the ones who were in debt at an annual interest rate of 10-12%. Since the amount of rice as their salary and the principal for borrowing were relatively large, it is presumed that the annual interest rate on lending was high. The second group was the others who were in debt at an interest rate of 1-3% a year. Because the amount of rice as their salary was relatively small compared to that of the first group, they were judged to be minor retainers. In this way, the interest rates were divided into two groups, probably because there was a risk of being loaned off when the interest rate of the same rate as the market interest rate in Edo was imposed on a tiny retainers’ group. The land mortgage interest rate in Edo was 6-8% a year at that time. It is speculated that the Sumitomo family was forced to lend funds to the small retainers class with low interest, but that they were lending with a slightly higher interest rate to the relatively high paid retainers class. .
The second feature is that the interest rate on loans by Sumitomo family did not change for 40 years. Meanwhile, the Shogunate issued a decree to reduce the annual interest rate of general public loans from 15% to 12% in 1842. However, the Sumitomo family did not reduce the interest rate on loans. In other words, the government's policy of intervention in the financial markets did not affect the Fudasashi loan for direct retainers. Since this fact has already been confirmed from the land mortgage interest rate in Edo, it can be said that this law did not lower the interest rate regardless of the lender's class.
On the other hand, despite the rise in prices triggered by the opening of the port in 1859, the nominal interest rate on the Sumitomo family remained unchanged. This trend was contrary to that of the land mortgage interest rate in Edo, but it was in common with that of the daimyo loan interest rate in Osaka. The reason is probably due to the pressure to maintain the nominal interest rate for funding for direct retainers. With the opening of the ports, trading in import and export goods and the development of new businesses benefiting from the trade could be expected to increase profits for the townspeople. However, a drop in disposable income due to price increases was expected for retainers. Therefore, Fudasashi were not able to raise the loan interest for retainers. However, it is not known at present whether it was decided by the market intervention of the Shogunate or by the demand-supply relationship of the financial market. We would like to consider further proving this question in terms of historical sources.
It is thought that the profit of Fudasashi fell considerably at the end of the Tokugawa Shogunate. The reason is that the real loan interest rate was lowered by the sustained inflation rather than the legal pressure of the Shogunate that ordered the interest rate reduction. Furthermore, in the early modern Japanese financial markets, no arbitrage relationships were seen between regions or between lenders. The fact seems to be a great motivation to establish banking business nationwide after the Meiji Restoration. This is because the development of correspondent contracts was essential in order to carry out lending and remittance operations at the national level..
2. Shuntaro WASHIZAKI, An Analysis of Estimated Interest Rates in Early Modern Japan: Loans to Domain Lords in Osaka and Land Mortgage Finance in Edo, 43rd Annual Meeting of the Social Science History Association, 2018.11.
3. Shuntaro WASHIZAKI, A Reanalysis of Estimated Interest Rate in Early Modern Japan: Loans for Domain Lords in Osaka, The 6th Asian Historical Economics Conference, 2018.09.
4. This is a Joint International Workshop by JSPS Kaken Research Project on the Global Trade Expansion and Local Market Institutions in 19th-Century Asia and North America, Keio/Kyoto Global COE Program on Raising Market Quality and Integrated Design of ‘Market Infrastructure’, and Faculty of Economics, Kagawa University.
5. Migration and Gendered Networks -A Case Study of the Shimoda Merchants in Yokohama 1854-1867.
Membership in Academic Society
  • Railway History Society of Japan
  • The Socio-Economic History Society
  • Business History Society of Japan
  • The Political Economy and Economic History Society
  • The Association of Historical Geographers in Japan
Educational
Other Educational Activities
  • 2021.03.