| TL/DR: Worker productivity in Japan is high and has risen like all other western countries. Other factors, like lacklustre respons to zombie banks, must explain "lost decade". I look at the Penn World Table. In:
* Real Income per Population,
* Real Income per Employed Population, and
* Real Income per Employed Work Hour Japan has lagged the USA pretty consistently. That is consistent with all other major economic countries. In the '90s Japan actually outperformed on the Income per Worked Hour. That means there are still 99 problems left for the Japanse economy, but worker productivity ain't one. Still zombie banks and government reponse to zombie banks might have created a consumption crisis (just as, for example in the Netherlands at this moment, consumers must pay for increasing bank buffers), but I would venture that corporations have retained profitability through the crisis. Japan didn't grow compared to it's neighbours. But that's catch-up growth for Korea and China. You can't blame Japan for already being first-world in 1990. Stock market isn't a good indicator for welfare of general population. Japan just might have been overvalued, or other countries overvalued. Property markets have gone beserk pretty much first worldwide, only in Japan first. Another pointer that we are just mimicing their banking crisis. |