2017 Fiscal Year Annual Research Report
Educational Credentialism and Elite Formation in Japan: A Long-term Perspective
| Project/Area Number |
15K03504
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| Research Institution | Hitotsubashi University |
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Principal Investigator |
小野 浩 一橋大学, 大学院国際企業戦略研究科, 教授 (80747981)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2015-04-01 – 2018-03-31
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| Keywords | educational credentials / human capital / university education / elite formation / corporate executives |
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| Outline of Annual Research Achievements |
During AY2017, we completed constructing our dataset. Our database of executives consists of Toyo Keizai’s Directory of Executives from 1990 to 2016. During 2017, we merged the executive data with university data. Specifically, for each executive, we used information on (i) name of the graduating university, and (ii) year of university entry. We then matched each executive with university enrolment data for the entry year, and “degree of difficulty in entering university (hensachi)” to control for the supply-side of university education.
We conducted statistical analyses using our newly constructed database, and made a number of striking discoveries. For example, when we examine the faction of executives from selected universities by survey year, we find that this fraction did not change dramatically between survey years 1990 and 2016, with the exception of the University of Tokyo. In other words, the probability of becoming an executive among University of Tokyo graduates declined between 1990 and 2016. However, when we rearrange the executives by birth year, and control for university enrolment, we find that the graduates of the top 7 universities all witnessed a significant decline in the probability of becoming executives. We thus surmise that the massive expansion of university education in the postwar period diluted the labor supply of university graduates, which intensified the competition to become executives. Overall, we conclude that educational credentialism weakened in postwar Japan.
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