arXiv subjects

Tatsuki Inoue

Publications and source records attributed to Tatsuki Inoue.

5 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2023

Health Impacts of Public Pawnshops in Industrializing Tokyo

This study is the first to investigate whether pawnshops, financial institutions for low-income populations, have contributed to the decline in mortality in the early twentieth century. Using ward-level panel data from Tokyo City, this study revealed that the popularity of public pawnshops was associated with a 4% and 5% decrease in infant mortality and fetal death rates, respectively, during 1927-1935. The historical context implies that the potential channels of the relationships were improving nutrition and hygiene and covering childbirth costs. Moreover, a cost-effectiveness calculation highlighted that the establishment of public pawnshops was a cost-effective public investment for better public health. Contrarily, for-profit private pawnshops showed no significant association with health improvements.

econ.GN↗

arXiv2019

Particulate Air Pollution, Birth Outcomes, and Infant Mortality: Evidence from Japan's Automobile Emission Control Law of 1992

This study investigates the impacts of the Automobile NOx Law of 1992 on ambient air pollutants and fetal and infant health outcomes in Japan. Using panel data taken from more than 1,500 monitoring stations between 1987 and 1997, we find that NOx and SO2 levels reduced by 87% and 52%, respectively in regulated areas following the 1992 regulation. In addition, using a municipal-level Vital Statistics panel dataset and adopting the regression differences-in-differences method, we find that the enactment of the regulation explained most of the improvements in the fetal death rate between 1991 and 1993. This study is the first to provide evidence on the positive impacts of this large-scale automobile regulation policy on fetal health.

econ.GN↗

arXiv2019

The role of pawnshops in risk coping in early twentieth-century Japan

This study examines the role of pawnshops as a risk-coping device in prewar Japan. Using data on pawnshop loans for more than 250 municipalities and exploiting the 1918-1920 influenza pandemic as a natural experiment, we find that the adverse health shock increased the total amount of loans from pawnshops. This is because those who regularly relied on pawnshops borrowed more money from them than usual to cope with the adverse health shock, and not because the number of people who used pawnshops increased.

econ.GN↗

arXiv2018

Chain effects of clean water: The Mills-Reincke phenomenon in early twentieth-century Japan

This study explores the validity of chain effects of clean water, which are known as the "Mills-Reincke phenomenon," in early twentieth-century Japan. Recent studies have reported that water purifications systems are responsible for huge contributions to human capital. Although some studies have investigated the instantaneous effects of water-supply systems in pre-war Japan, little is known about the chain effects of these systems. By analyzing city-level cause-specific mortality data from 1922-1940, we find that a decline in typhoid deaths by one per 1,000 people decreased the risk of death due to non-waterborne diseases such as tuberculosis and pneumonia by 0.742-2.942 per 1,000 people. Our finding suggests that the observed Mills-Reincke phenomenon could have resulted in the relatively rapid decline in the mortality rate in early twentieth-century Japan.

stat.AP↗

arXiv2017

First demonstration of gamma-ray imaging using balloon-borne emulsion telescope

We promote the precise gamma-ray observation project Gamma-Ray Astro-Imager with Nuclear Emulsion (GRAINE), which uses balloon-borne emulsion gamma-ray telescopes. The emulsion telescope realizes observations with high angular resolution, polarization sensitivity, and large aperture area in the 0.01--100 GeV energy region. Herein, we report the data analysis of emulsion tracks and the first demonstration of gamma-ray imaging via an emulsion telescope by using the flight data from the balloon experiment performed in 2015 (GRAINE 2015). The emulsion films were scanned by the latest read-out system for a total area of 41 m$^2$ in three months, and then the gamma-ray event selection was automatically processed. Millions of electron-pair events are accumulated in the balloon-borne emulsion telescope. The emulsion telescope detected signals from a calibration source (gamma rays from the interaction of cosmic rays with an aluminum plate) with a high significance during the balloon observation and created a gamma-ray image consistent with the source size and the expected angular resolution in the energy range of 100--300 MeV. The flight performance obtained in the GRAINE 2015 experiment proves that balloon-borne emulsion telescope experiments with larger area are feasible while maintaining expected imaging performance.

astro-ph.IM↗