This paper investigates the role of R&D policy in Japanese pharmaceutical industry. This paper principally addresses the following three questions. First, R&D policy is analyzed in a general economic theory relating R&D investment to the value of the firm. Second, economic characteristics of various pharmaceutical R&D policies are examined. Third, present Japanese R&D policy is summarized in terms of its strengths and weaknesses. This paper classifies R&D policy into subsidy, taxation, competition policy, patent policy, M&A, price control, drug approval, and basic science policy. By using the general economic model, one can evaluate economic impact of each R&D policy on pharmaceutical industry.
Several conclusions are drawn from the study. First, priority of R&D promotion was not high as shown by the fact that drug price control is not intended to promote R&D. Second, when the government fails to incorporate the reaction of the firms, price control would lead to less innovative R&D. Third, various policy instruments were not effectively coordinated. Fourth, several R&D policy instruments including taxation, price control, approval, and M&A were not well suited for R&D promotion. Finally, the present structure of Japanese government was not appropriate for the promotion of basic science. These conclusions provide additional methods for R&D promotion.

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Recent developments in biomedical science have tremendous impact on the economy and society as well as medical practices. Various policies have been implemented in industrialized countries with regard to the promotion, evaluation and regulation of biomedical sciences.
The principal features of such policy developments in four countries (United States, U. K., Germany and France) are reviewed and analized, and an agenda for Japan is presented.

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This study, which classifies pharmaceutical“R”activities as the production of intellectual values in organizations, explores the possible effectiveness of information sharing and knowledge creation supported by rapidly advancing information technology on the productivity of pharmaceutical R&D. Specifically, this study proposes the Enacted Schema Theory, which claims that the continuous processes of information sharing, knowledge jamming, and knowledge creation are nothing but the processes of structured knowledge body possessed by the individual, or schema, being enacted and integrated into a more complex one through group communication. The ensuing conclusion is that the dynamism of knowledge jamming which encourages the flow of information and knowledge among organizational members is more critical for organizational knowledge creation than simple information sharing. The rapidly spreading computer-mediated communication technology incomparably expands the space of the knowledge creation activities by freeing the spatial and time limits of traditional human-based networks.
Organizational information sharing includes communities where organizational members voluntarily and informally interact with those who share professional and intellectual interests, in addition to the formal and informal intra and interorganizational information sharing. In knowledge-intensive pharmaceutical R&D, interdisciplinary interaction among basic research scientists like molecular biologists, genetic engineering researchers and medical clinicians play important roles, thus there are advantages and requirements for R&D utilizing people's active and voluntary participation in worldwide information sharing and knowledge jamming. Some examples are shown as anecdotal evidence.

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Drug formularies-telling what drugs are on the“menu”in health care plansare used in one form or another by most providers in the US. Despite the best intentions of formulary committees, the formulary decision-making process typically oversimplifies the problem by assuming a population of homegeneous patients and by focusing on the relative efficiency of drugs within a given therapeutic class. If the objective is to maximize expected healthcare outcomes subject to a constraint on formulary expenditures, these two oversimplifications lead to suboptimal formularies. Even if patient choices could be dictated, the menu will contain the wrong drugs. Beyond this, in a traditional challenge of menu-setting problems, self-interested patients (or their physician agents) may choose drugs that are expensive relative to the therapeutic value they offer. The optimal formulary seeks to avoid such cost-ineffective choices. We present a mathematical model that explicitly accounts for patient heterogeneity, takes a global perspective of the formulary, and recognizes that patient choices will be self-interested. The model is flexible enough to accommodate a variety of different objectives and cost structures, and it can be used as a decision support tool to aid formulary decision makers. Menu-setting problems appear more generally in health care, perhaps most importantly in determining the services a healthcare plan or insurance arrangement should offer.

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This paper estimates the relationship between labor participation of the pre-retirement age group and co-residence with the cared for elderly and welfare policy for the elderly utilizing the Basic Survey on the Life of the People in 1986,1989and 1992. The results show that an increase in public day service significantly and robustly increases labor participation, but conversely, an increase in public home helper service significantly and robustly decreases labor participation. According to the estimated relationship, the rate of their labor will rise by at least 20% if the“New Gold”Plan is fully implemented.

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