The author, Hashimoto, has been a solitary voice in the social stratification analysis of Japanese society for the last two decades presenting its class structure in Marxian terms. His models and findings have recently attracted much attention with an increasing number of sociologists demonstrating increased inequality and robust class reproduction in Japan.

This study is based on the Social Stratification and Mobility (SSM) survey conducted in 1995 and the previous SSM surveys dating back to 1955, massive data sets collected by teams of class and social stratification experts in Japan.

The book investigates four major classes - capitalist, working, new and old middle - and their characteristics and mobility patterns in terms of income, work, social network, leisure activity, gender relations and voting behaviour.