Unstable prices and income, stable employment and output, persistent wage differential and price scissors. between agricultural and capitalist sectors have dramatically characterized the former sector. The principal purpose of "agricultural macroeconomics" lies in clarifying these characteristics in terms of the general disequilibrium analysis in the framework of a dual economy consisting of capitalist firms and self-employing producers typically represented by agricultural households. "A dual economy model of Keynes' type including self-employed producers " due to Maruyama (1991) serves this purpose. The "equilibrium" of the economy is characterized by the equilibrium of commodity markets and the wage differential between the two sectors. The shortage of aggregate demand is expressed in the form of wage differential but not of unemployment as is the case with the original Keynes' model.
　The analysis of short-term fluctuations in the case of autonomous investment reveals the procyclical employment and output of capitalist sector as contrasted to the countercyclical employment but procyclical output of agricultural sector. Both aggregate employment and output prove to be procyclical. Prices are procyclical and so is the aggregate price level. However, agricultural prices fluctuate more widely than capitalist ones. Hence the agricultural terms of trade worsens, i. e., price scissors open during recession, whereas it improves (i. e., price scissors open the other way around) during expansion. Agricultural wage or marginal revenue product of labor is procyclical while the capitalist counterpart remains constant. Therefore, the average rate of wage is procyclical, but the wage differential proves to be countercyclical. Both full income and labor supply are procyclical, which imply that expansion is preferred to recession by agricultural households.
　These fruitful results endorse the crucial importance of the efficiency wage model and the theory of self-employing producers in analyzing agricultural economic problems.

View full abstract

　It is said that tenancy disputes in which rent reductions were demanded in the 1920s weakened Japanese landlordism. The aim of this paper is to examine this statement by clarifying why and how these disputes occurred and ended, and how they affected Japanese landlordism. The study is based on the case of the Bisai textile industrial area in Aichi Prefecture, one of the most industrialized prefectures in the prewar period.
　From 1917, tenant farmers in the Bisai area started a rent reducing movement. They succeeded in obtaining temporary or permanent reductions in rent. In the 1920s, levels of rent decreased by about 30 to 40 percent. However, after the latter half of the 1920s tenants could no longer effect such reductions in rent.
　During and after World War I, the textile industry grew rapidly; as a result, tenant farming became much less profitable compared with the labor in industry. Tenant farmers were absorbed into the non-agricultural labor market, reducing the competition in land market. Under such circumstances, tenants required a reduction in land rent, which permitted them to earn incomes equivalent with wages in factories. However, in the latter half of the 1920s, the labor market shrank and the revived competition for rented land, tenants were no longer in a position to make demands in the disputes.
　Through disputes, the economic position of landlords in this area declined. Rent ratios were reduced significantly, and the profit for landlords became smaller. The number of big landlords decreased notably. However, it should be pointed out that the case of Bisai was not typical. From the nationwide standpoint, there were not many areas where rent reducing disputes successfully weakened landlordism.

View full abstract

　A new, generalized single-product "dual-structure" spatial imperfect competition equilibrium model is developed which includes both perfect competition and monopoly as the two extremes. The model incorporates the "dual structure" in which there are oligopolistic consignment sellers (cooperatives) and perfectly competitive producers (farmers) with pooled returns given. The usefulness of the model is demonstrated by the case study of the Kyushu regional milk market in Japan. The model can easily incorporate both fluid and manufacturing milk markets, and in addition the manufacturing milk market can be easily divided in the model into the market within payment quotas and the over-payment-quota market. We show many spatial equilibrium solutions in the Kyushu milk market, assuming many sets of imperfectly competitive behavior with the "dual structure." It is proved that the current complicated interregional milk movements can be well explained by assuming some imperfectly competitive behavior. The model also provides spatial equilibrium solutions for perfectly competitive milk movements and monopoly milk allocations with the "dual structure," which has never been solved before. These solutions will be very useful for analyzing alternative milk marketing organization policies in detail.

View full abstract