This study uncovers the fact that Korean companies have been purchasing a large amount of land from households for about 40 years using various statistics such as national accounts and corporate financial data and examines empirically the incentives of corporations to purchase land.

We argue that the accumulation of land assets over a long period of time by Korean corporations is an unusual phenomenon. From 1975 to 2018 in which South Korea's sectoral national accounts statistics exist, the large net purchases of land by Korea's non-financial corporations from the household sector have been observed every year except before and after the foreign exchange crisis in 1998 and the global financial crisis in 2008. We find that among OECD countries Japan in the 1960s to early 1990s is the only case where the non- financial corporations had purchased a large amount of land from the household sector every year such as South Korea.

Firms can purchase land for either productive or speculative activities. In the case of productive activities, we investigate a hypothesis that companies' demand for land could have increased significantly, especially since the 2000s, due to the changes in the industrial structure of South Korea. We use the Economic Census by Statistics Korea (2010, 2015) to show that firms in the place where service industries are more agglomerated are likely to purchase more land than those resided in less service-intensive areas. By using a firm- level micro dataset, KIS-DATA, to estimate the elasticity of land as a firm's production input, we also show that the contribution of land to production has increased significantly after the 2000s.

Unlike capital goods such as equipment and buildings, the land does not suffer from depreciation and its supply is inelastic, so the land is an investment good that can benefit from rising prices as the economy develops. Companies, thus, could have speculative incentives to invest part of their operating profits on land. We use the Economic Census by Statistics Korea (2010, 2015) to show that some firms experiencing positive operating profits and decreased production facilities are likely to purchase land. This suggests that the net purchases of land by corporations could occur in part due to their speculative motive.

Preface
Executive Summary

Chapter 1 Introduction

Chapter 2 Statistical Analysis of Corporate Land Purchases
　Section 1 Corporate Land Purchase Trends in National Accounts
　Section 2 Corporate Land Purchases in Major Countries
　Section 3 Corporate Land Purchases in Financial Data
　Section 4 Land Assets in Corporate Taxation Data
　Section 5 Summary

Chapter 3 Analysis of Factors Influencing Corporate Land Purchases
　Section 1 Economic Structural Changes and Agglomeration Phenomena
　Section 2 Examination of Factors Driving Corporate Land Purchases
　Section 3 Examination of Factors Driving Household Land Sales
　Section 4 Summary

Chapter 4 Conclusion

References
Appendix
ABSTRACT