Family Structure of Farm Households Covered by the MAF Survey of Farm Household Economy (1931-41):

An Examination of Sample Bias

Abstract

    This study consists of a report on a sample bias in farm households covered by the MAF Survey of the Farm Household Economy (1931-41).
    Saito (2022b) highlighted the possibility of sample bias in family structure and proposed a method to confirm this. He compared the MAF Survey with the results of the first census sample and studies based on village population registers of the Tohoku region during the late Tokugawa period. Using this method and a database constructed by the Institute of Economic Research at Hitotsubashi University, we examine the family structure of farm households. The results are as follows:
    (1) Very few households deviate from the typical stem family life cycle.
    (2) The incidence of simple family households within the stem family life cycle is underestimated. These findings suggest that vulnerable farm households as labor organizations are underrepresented.
    (3) Regional differences exist in the sample bias of family size; relatively large farm households (presumably those with more children) may be overrepresented in the North Kyushu and Shikoku regions.