I want the Japanese future back!
Deep Dives
Explore related topics with these Wikipedia articles, rewritten for enjoyable reading:
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Lost Decades
15 min read
The article directly discusses Japan's economic stagnation periods and argues 2008, not 1990, was the true turning point - understanding the full economic history of the Lost Decades provides essential context
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Junichiro Koizumi
15 min read
The article references the Koizumi era as a time when Japan had recovered from its 'lost decade' - his structural reforms and economic policies are directly relevant to understanding Japan's 2000s economy
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2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami
16 min read
Listed as a potential culprit for Japan's post-2008 stagnation, including the subsequent nuclear shutdown - readers would benefit from understanding the scale and economic impact of this disaster
My first book, Weeb Economy, came out in March of this year, but only in Japanese. Since then, a bunch of people have been asking me for an English translation.
Half of the book was a series of translated posts from my blog, so those are already in English. The other half was a new part that I wrote in English and had translated into Japanese by my excellent translator, Kataoka Hirohito. So while I’ll eventually republish the whole book in English, what I can do right now is to publish my English-language first draft as a series of posts on this blog.
In this first installment, I discuss:
Why 2008 was a pivotal turning point for the Japanese economy (and not in a good way)
Why economic stagnation actually presents Japan with a golden opportunity
Why Japanese policymakers should stop focusing so much on macroeconomics, and focus more on development economics
Why a multi-strategy approach to development is better than a single strategy
How Japan has already been attacking its productivity stagnation by improving the performance of its big corporations and by encouraging more startups
Japan lost the future in 2008, not in 1990
When I lived in Japan in the mid-2000s, it still felt very much like “the future”. 3g flip-phones with grainy cameras were far more advanced than anything I had encountered in the U.S. Japanese people had LCD or plasma TVs, while most Americans were still using old cathode-ray machines. Their kitchens had automatic rice-cookers and other appliances I had never seen, and their laptops were higher-performance and far more durable than the ones I had used in the U.S. Their toilets were like something from a spaceship, and their showers could dry clothing. Some people even had digital SLR cameras that could shoot movie-quality video — a miraculous technology I had never even dreamed was possible.
And the cities! Giant screens adorned the sides of buildings, like something out of science fiction. There was always a train station within walking distance that would take me anywhere I wanted to go. The trains were clean and fast and they ran on time, and they even had electronic screens that told you when the train would arrive at the next station. Japanese cars and even motorcycles glided along quietly, where in America they roared and grumbled. Even in the U.S., of course, the most revolutionary, futuristic
...This excerpt is provided for preview purposes. Full article content is available on the original publication.