I know you’re already on my side on this one, but you can wave this article wildly in front of friends who still need persuading. The New York Times just ran quite an important piece about the ominous example of Japan, which is about as close as you can get to a knock-down argument against performing any more Keynesian experiments on our economy:
Few nations in recent history have seen such a striking reversal of economic fortune as Japan. The original Asian success story, Japan rode one of the great speculative stock and property bubbles of all time in the 1980s to become the first Asian country to challenge the long dominance of the West.
But the bubbles popped in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and Japan fell into a slow but relentless decline that neither enormous budget deficits nor a flood of easy money has reversed. For nearly a generation now, the nation has been trapped in low growth and a corrosive downward spiral of prices, known as deflation, in the process shriveling from an economic Godzilla to little more than an afterthought in the global economy.
Now, as the United States and other Western nations struggle to recover from a debt and property bubble of their own, a growing number of economists are pointing to Japan as a dark vision of the future. Even as the Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, prepares a fresh round of unconventional measures to stimulate the economy, there are growing fears that the United States and many European economies could face a prolonged period of slow growth or even, in the worst case, deflation, something not seen on a sustained basis outside Japan since the Great Depression.
The Times has of course been pretty cheerful about the application of precisely these policies to our own economy, but this was definitely written by an internal dissenter:
The decline has been painful for the Japanese, with companies and individuals like Masato having lost the equivalent of trillions of dollars in the stock market, which is now just a quarter of its value in 1989, and in real estate, where the average price of a home is the same as it was in 1983. And the future looks even bleaker, as Japan faces the world’s largest government debt — around 200 percent of gross domestic product — a shrinking population and rising rates of poverty and suicide.
But perhaps the most noticeable impact here has been Japan’s crisis of confidence. Just two decades ago, this was a vibrant nation filled with energy and ambition, proud to the point of arrogance and eager to create a new economic order in Asia based on the yen. Today, those high-flying ambitions have been shelved, replaced by weariness and fear of the future, and an almost stifling air of resignation. Japan seems to have pulled into a shell, content to accept its slow fade from the global stage.
Indeed, notes the author, these policies have literally left Japan impotent:
Japan’s loss of gumption is most visible among its young men, who are widely derided as “herbivores” for lacking their elders’ willingness to toil for endless hours at the office, or even to succeed in romance, which many here blame, only half jokingly, for their country’s shrinking birthrate.
Contest now open: Condense that last part of the lesson to a memorable soundbite without violating Ricochet’s Code of Conduct. I’ve submitted my entry already, obviously.
That headline alone deserves its own illustration.
Everything Paul Krugman writes is wrong.
Keynsian policies have, in fact, deflated more than just Japanese prices…
Wonderful! But is there a reason you have dinosaur toys and Viagra just lying around?
Ironically, Japan’s screwed. (I’m sure that’s toeing the line.)
I would be much more optimistic about Japan were it not for the government’s ossified politics and its rugged determination to make the same mistakes over and over again. I had some hope during the Koizumi years but to put the issue in Claire’s terms, he may have been a mini-Thatcher: briefly arresting the decline but not turning things around. The Japan I know is a very inventive society but capital is locked up in an oligarchical structure. Suffice to say, there are very few George Savages in Japan.
Young Japanase males should revive their fathers’ diet of raw oysters and whale testicles.
We’ll keep the contest open for a few more hours before declaring you the winner, but that’s pretty much a formality after this.
The wife will tell you there’s no need for either. But some days when all four of the kids have exhibited “special” moments, I don’t particularly care for the way she looks at the paring knife and then glances at me and then back to the knife….
I need to put up a graphic request form and start charging. Things like this need to be taken care of…
No longer the Land of Rising Sons, Japan’s flaccid economy stalls, stock prices soft.
I can’t improve on Claire’s headline, but I can make it rhyme a little:
From T-rex to “can’t do sex”: Keynesian Japan
We need a production of this. Where’s Jonathan Gilbert?
Japanese T-Rex Fossils are Flaccid?
That dinosaur looks like Barney Frank.
Japanese over-stimulation causes shrinkage – the cold shower of Keynesianism
The theatrical union laws will require me to pay for two viola players and a child-wrangler, so we might as well see if we can add them to the script…Ironically, I spent time this weekend with a young man directly descended from both Keynes and Charles Darwin. We went to IKEA, which I kept thinking was sort of like watching evolution and the effects of Keynesian economics on a culture happen right in front of you, but I was the only person who was amused by this. Sadly, he’s a bit pink. On many levels.
For the contest, I’ve got nothing that beats that image. Reading this, though, it makes sense to me now how Japan’s suicide rate is surpassing Sweden’s…
Japan: the land in which you can no longer sit and watch the bamboo grow.
Recalling ancient tradition, Japanese commit ritual herbicide.
Somewhat OT, I’ve heard that the turtle called Gamera is friend to children.
Makes you want to commit Harry Carey – Holy Cow!
The wonderful comments in this thread alone make my year’s subscription a bargain.
As a long-time resident of Japan, I am qualified to speak on all things Japanese, without exception.
1. The Viagra box in the picture is Chinese.
2. Any country that is erecting the tallest freestanding tower in the world is obviously not impotent.
http://www.tokyo-skytree.jp/english/design/maxheight.html
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3. Tokyo had two express trains to Narita Airport, but not being satisfied, they just opened another that cuts commuting time in half. How’s your city doing?
4. Haneda Airport in Tokyo has just opened a new runway and all new terminal building. How’s your city doing?
5. Japan has a national earthquake warning system that sends a message to your cell phone. How’s your country doing?
6. The crime rate in Japan is essentially zero. How’s your country doing?
7. Tokyo has 197 Michelin-starred restaurants. How many does your city have?