Comparative Studies of Long Term Employment in the Japanese and the US large firms : A Comparative Historical Analysis of Employment Management

在本研究中，研究者对大型企业的雇佣行为进行了历史研究，特别是在以下三个方面。(1)美国和日本大型企业的长期雇佣波动数据分析：通过对20世纪50年代至90年代的长期雇佣数据的分析，发现了这三个显著的事实。(1)即使是被认为具有比美国同行更强的工作保障倾向的日本大型制造企业，也在相对较短的时间内出现了许多就业数量的减少。当然，对美国公司来说，裁员的情况要频繁得多。(2)无论是日本公司还是美国公司，员工总数的变化都与销售额(产出)的波动有显著的相关性，而不是与收益相关。这一事实要求我们重新审视对这种关系的预设主流理解，比如‘Two-c…更具连续不断的年份效应。(3)总的来说，与日本企业相比，美国企业的雇佣情况似乎对销售额的变化更加敏感。(2)对美国制造业企业资历形成过程的历史分析表明，资历规则最初不是来自工会实践，而是来自20世纪20年代非工会时代的管理劳动政策和雇佣实践。资历规则在20世纪40年代和50年代变得更加正式和明确。在这一过程中，不仅工会活动发挥了重要作用，就业承诺也发挥了重要作用。美国制造业工作场所的资历规则使男性蓝领工人得以长期受雇，这与日本公司的终身雇佣有一些共同之处，这意味着这些规则是建立在管理层和工会互动承诺的基础上的。这就提出了探寻长期承诺对劳资双方的意义的重要性。(3)美国人力资源管理与雇佣关系的持续变化及其对劳资关系的影响。从20世纪80年代中期开始，美国进行了大规模的重组和人力资源管理改革。非典型用工的日益增多和基于绩效考核的新型薪酬体系的推广，给传统的雇佣关系和劳资关系带来了严重的冲击。对于预测日本人力资源管理改革和劳动力市场放松管制的未来结果的人来说，这些结果提供了重要的教训。较少

In this research, the investigator pursued historical studies of the employment practices of the large size firms, particularly in the following three areas.(1)An analysis of the long term employment fluctuation data of the large firms in the US and Japan : As a result of the analysis of the long term employment data from 1950s to 1990s, these three significant facts are founded. (1)Even in the Japanese large manufacturing firms, which were considered to have stronger orientation for the job security than the US counterparts, there took place many reductions in the amount of employment within a relatively short time period. Of course the occasions of employment reduction were far more frequent for the US firms. (2)Both Japanese and the US firms the changes in the total number of employees had a meaningful correlation to the fluctuations of the amount of sales (out put), not to earnings. This fact asks us to review the preset prevailing understanding about this relationship, like ‘two-c … More onsecutive years' effect. (3)Generally speaking, compared to the Japanese firms, the US firms' employment seems to have been more sensitive to the changes in the amount of the sales.(2)The historical analysis of the formation process of the seniority in the US manufacturing firms shows the seniority rules originally came, not from the union practices, but from the management labor policies and the employment practices in the non-union era of 1920s. The seniority rules became more formal and clear ones in the 1940s and 1950s. Not only union activities, but also the employment commitment played important roles in this process. The seniority rules in the US manufacturing workplace, which enabled the long term employment for the male blue collar workers, has a somewhat common features with Japanese firms' life long employment in the meaning that the rules were build on the interactive commitment of the management and the union. This poses the researchers the importance of searching the meaning of the long term commitment both for the management and labor.(3)The third are is on ongoing changes in the HRM and employment relationship in the US and the impact of this changes on the industrial relations. From the mid 1980s, the drastic restructurings and HRM reforms took places in the US. Increasing use of atypical employment and the spread of new pay system based on the performance evaluation brought serious impact on the traditional employment relationship and industrial relations. These outcomes pose important lessons for one who predicting the future results of the HRM reforms and the labor market deregulations in Japan. Less