Revisiting Export-Output Growth Nexus: Findings from Granger Causality and Leveraged Bootstrap Approach for Japan

The study investigates the causal nexus between export and output growth of Japan to identify the validity of the export-led growth (ELG) hypothesis in a modified theoretical setting. The study is unique in the sense that it takes the Japanese crisis of 1992 into account and also addresses the possible income identification problem that most of the earlier studies largely ignored. The direction and extent to which the explanatory variables, namely, exports, imports, capital expenditure, total labor productivity and a dummy representing the crisis affect the industrial output are investigated employing both Granger causality and Leveraged Bootstrap Simulation Techniques. Both of the approaches suggest that the relationship between exports and output growth is not unidirectional which implies that export promotion cannot be regarded as a tool to promote economic growth for Japan that has important implications for policymakers to set suitable strategies to boost its economic growth.