Effects of financial frictions on employment: Evidence from Japan during the Global Financial Crisis

•Examine the impact of a large credit shock on Japanese employment in the crisis.•Variations in long-term borrowings maturing in the crisis were used for identification.•A higher ratio of long-term borrowings maturing caused a greater negative impact.•The impact became greater as the period passed from the shock. This study examines the impact of a large credit shock on employment in Japan during the Global Financial Crisis in 2008–2009. To identify which firms faced a serious credit shock, we used variations in the long-term debt that must be repaid in the crisis. Because long-term debt takes more than one year to mature, it was determined independently of employment adjustments during the crisis. Therefore, using long-term debt maturing in a crisis, it is possible to identify the impact of exogenous tightening of the borrowing constraint on employment. We found that companies with a higher ratio of long-term debt maturing during the crisis had a greater negative impact on employment. In particular, the impact increased as the period passed from the shock, and this feature was most conspicuous in the group with the highest proportion of long-term debt maturing in the crisis.