Rather than a list of essential books, I would suggest they should not hesitate to be very eclectic in their reading. In particular, I feel that many economists do not spend enough time reading books outside their field, although this remark would probably not apply to Japanese scholars. As for myself, I have always spent a large part of my working and leisure time reading books or articles, in economics, but also anthropology, history, political science, and even other fields in which I have very little expertise, such as genetics or agronomy. These studies were apparently unrelated to my research projects and I am aware that spending time with them certainly reduced my productivity to some extent. But quite often, I realize a few months later that a section of a book or an article apparently unrelated to the project I am conducting has been a source of inspiration, usually in a strange or unexpected way.

If I have to give pieces of advice, I restrict myself to two. The first and more important one is that researchers, junior or senior, should work on topics that they are interested in, rather than on what would be regarded as fashionable at a particular moment by non-academic decision makers pretending to determine the priority or is advisable in strategic terms to be recruited according to their peers (or supervisors). Encouraging researchers to focus on research questions they regard as particularly relevant is in my view the best way to ensure that, overall, their work will generate a return on investment, satisfying the social demand. It is also the surest manner to persuade them to maintain their productivity throughout their life cycle, as their intellectual curiosity would remain largely intact. My second advice is that, even if writing a monograph is not always highly regarded, particularly among economists (and perhaps also in other disciplines), it is worth considering such an option. It may be considered as an unwise publication strategy as the criteria for recruitment and promotion tend to be based exclusively on published articles. But with a risky strategy, the return could be high as well. It is a matter of risk aversion. I feel I have been too risk adverse, even if many of my colleagues have an opposite perception.