scfranklin94

The Growth of Japan's Working Poor

One thing you didn't mention is while wages have been declining, Japan has been experiencing deflation; so you make less, but things cost less also. The ones that deflation hurts the most are the those that didn't have any savings back in 1990 - basically the younger generation. The older generation makes virtually nothing on their savings, but then the yen keeps appreciating, so they are effectively 'more wealthy'.

As for the decision for Japanese companies to move the bulk of their electronics manufacturing to China, either they did that or watch Korean and Taiwanese companies come to dominate China based industries. So either way, the Japanese manufacturing jobs were going to be lost.

As to free market policies increasing wealth disparity in Japan, it's impossible for an export-dependent economy to maintain labor wage rates via protectionist policies, so the only answer is constant labor productivity gains. Productivity gains in a rapidly aging workforce is difficult at best, that is why you see Japan spending so much money on robotics research - whether it will work or not remains to be seen.

The gist of your post is that this is the future for the US; perhaps, but the US population is still increasing via immigration. In 2040 the US is projected to have a population of 400 million, while Japan will be 65% of todays population. 80 million more people in the US will mean more demand for everything (whether that's necessarily a good thing is a matter of opinion).

Lastly you point out all the problems in Japan, with the implied premise that capitalism has 'failed' the Japanese people. What other system would allow them to have the highest standard of living in Asia? If you have to be poor, would you rather be poor in Japan or China?