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Election result bad news for Japan's economy
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djuice
Use the trade surplus to pay down the deficit. No problem.
some14some
...then no more elections from now on :) Atleast they can not blame the foreigners for decades of bad economy.
alladin
This article should be called, "Election Results finally shows the truth about Japans economy". Japan really needs to fix what is going on when it comes to their economy. How can one country change Prime Minister so quickly and so many times in a very short period. It shows you that Japans law makers and government officials are not thinking about anything bit only themselves. Japan needs to create a fresh start and let new and young people start to run the government for a change.
But maybe that might not even work either because there are to many Japanese youth in Japan that has lost their pride for their own country. Heck, theyre not even proud of being Japanese at all. If you ask anyone in Japan today, "Are you proud to be Japanese" they will tell you that it is a difficult question to answer. People in Japan today has lost their true identity and no longer know who they really are as a person. They are always trying to copy another countrys style and are more proud of other countries than their own country.
Soon Japan will fall into the ocean to sink forever. If Japan does not make a change now, it will soon dwindle into a country of foolish individuals walking around not knowing what to do with themselves while living off of their families fortunes.
What a sad case of lost identity....
NationalistRE
It may have something to do with how the Americans, and the Allied collaborators wrote the constitution and in such a way that caused this recent political gridlock to occur.
nath
There is a now a stopgap in place. Nothing will be "pushed through" without a debate and compromise reached between opposing factions. Things are slowed down. This is the people's votes in action.
wawawasuremono
An fully elected upper house is un-necessary for a unitary state like Japan. But it to be in Japan's nature to fill in the gap that was left by the abolished Lords chamber.
I'd hate to see Britain adopt anything similar to the HoC when they eventually abolish their House of Lords.
kyoken
Good point!
The "truth" is already out since a while and frankly anyone who worked for a Japanese company knows about it: Japan's productivity is already the lowest among developed nations. At 70 percent of US productivity, Japan was the bottom of the list for the 15th straight year in 2008, figures from the Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development show.
(source: http://www.moneycontrol.com/news/world-news/japan-growth-plan-may-hurt-not-boost-economy_469478.html)
paulinusa
Only three ways out of this: cut spending, raise taxes, economy expands(or some combination of all three).
ronaldk
Or inflation! Yen drops in value, problem solved. Also, gridlock may be good because although they can't solve anything they also can't phuck anything up as well.
paulinusa
ronaldk: Yes,if the yen falls, then exports rise, but there is still a stagnant domestic economy, and no way that Japan's growth can cut it's huge debt substantially. You still have to cut the budget or raise revenues some other way.
Klein2
The debt is not even in the top 10 of Japan's problems. Doing nothing about it is much better than doing something.
Please don't believe me. Just look at bond rates and the yen over the last week. What do you see? I think the smart money looked at the election and Japan's "crisis" and said... MEH! in a really loud voice. I think I will do the same. You all have fun now.
nisegaijin
The first politician that would say that he would cut down the size of government would get my attention. Anybody who would say that they would legalize certain herbal substances for taxation and cut down on police force will get my recommendation.
Raising taxes, borrowing, inflating as all been done and it never worked! When are people going to learn?!
Piglet
Japanese bonds are mainly owned by retired Japanese people, but the savings rate is decreasing very fast. What will happen when not enough people buy bonds? Rate will increase and it will be painful for Japan.
kyoken
Good point, but the new buyer is already in the market and it is a problematic one for Japan: China bought a net 735.2 billion yen ($8.3 billion) of Japanese bonds in May, doubling purchases for this year as it heads for the biggest annual increase since at least 2005.
(Source: http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-07-08/china-buys-japanese-bonds-at-record-pace-data-shows.html)
Piglet
Interesting! However, this might give some short-term relief to Japan, whose debt is not even near stabilizing.
It will be interesting to watch wether Japan credit rating will be downgraded or not in the near future. A lower credit rating would definitely increase the cost of credit, which would be an additional burden.
yokomoc
As opposed to last year when the DPJ-controlled upper and lower house got so much done, right?
ronaldk
Piglet said "Japanese bonds are mainly owned by retired Japanese people..." I don't think this is true. The bonds are bought by banks that hold the savings of retired Japanese (think Japan Post). When the retired people start withdrawing at an accelerating rate in the coming years these banks or other financial institutions will then have to sell the bonds to get the cash to the account holder. If this happens at too fast a pace could be a big problem. Keep your passport handy.
kyoken
Both is correct.
The bonds are mainly held by the post bank and pension funds . Later is the biggest holder of government bonds and will become by (estimated) 2015 the biggest seller of bonds to pay out the premiums for the retired Japanese.
Now, in principle, the Japanese who pay their money to the post bank and their pension funds own the bonds. So either way one can say the Japanese people own the bonds or the Japanese institutions.
nigelboy
To go further, bonds are bought by banks because of the surplus deposits that the banks retain (net deposits less loans disbursed).
Which means that the retired people are "spending".
sf2k
I don't know. Given that Japanese politicians can't make decisions at the best of times, (Ozawa scandal decision in my lifetime hellooo???) actually this type of Parliament is ideal. Thus no one is to blame and no one has to know anything about anything or even be lucid.
I was into hope and change but really it would seem Parliament remains nothing more than shiny keys jangling as distraction while the bureaucracy runs the country.
How many lost decades can Japan endure? It's been asleep so long people don't even know what being awake even means anymore. Thus anything requiring a "decision" is not only undesirable, but feared!
crazygaijin
doesn't matter what the election results were. plain and simple the Japanese gov't, in whatever form it takes, is what's really bad for the Japanese economy.
sf2k
maybe it's all really a plot from newspapers, white glove manufacturers, and bus tour companies. Maybe they are really in charge
Sarge
"Japan's economy"
It can't be that bad; every time I go out to the store to buy something there's always a horde of people in my way spending their money.