History
Japan’s economy in the post-war era: A Historical perspective

Leading status could be challenged by other places : the four small dragons and China

Conditions leading to Japan’s success

The US’s contributions

The Korean War (demands for materials and services. Example: coal production returned to pre-war levesl)

The Allied Occupation polices:

The Occupation’s position on Japan’s economy

The Occupation’s policy on the Zaibatsu combines

Seizure of the Zaibatsu families’ assets

The first TV set marketed by Mitsubishi in 1953. The corporation (with more than 100 of its former firms) was regrouped in 1954.

https://www.mitsubishi.com/e/history/

The Japanese: ambitions and technology

ambitions: the case of one company (Tokyo Communications Manufacturing, T?t?sk?), founded in the 1946

Founders: Morita Akio (24 from a well-off family specializing in sake, soy sauce, and miso) and Ibuka Masaru (38; experienced businessman)

Those who joined them? They were well-connected. Ibuka’s father- in-law (who was a former Minister of Education), Morita’s father (who was wealthy), former head of Mitsui bank taking care of finances

Converting military radio equipment for civilian use

Producing tape recorders and competing with the US (discovered that a key technology had been patented in Japan; bought the patent; right to royalites to US tape recorders; suing a US importer for patent infringement

Heading to success

The two key founders of Sony (left: Morita; right: Ibuka

http://allday.com/post/4587-how-the-sony-walkman-changed-the-way-we-listen-to-music-forever/pages/2/

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The Japanese: ambitions and technology

(continued)

pre-war technology laid the foundation for post-war success

Foreign countries’ tendency to underestimate Japan’s technological accomplishments

example: a samurai inventor (Sakuma Sh?zan) and his working telegraph in the 1850s

Telephone arrived in Japan early not too long after its invention (1877)

The Meiji state’s cultivation of experts in science and technology (College of engineering and Tokyo Imperial University)

Why was it that Japan could catch up with the world so easily from the Meiji period through the early 1920s? Patent protection was not effective; Western researchers’ projects were small; Japan was blessed by a well-organized research establishment

Sakuma Shozan

http://www.jpreki.com/sakuma/

The Japanese: management style 1960s-1980s

The principle of seniority: Comparatively low wages for newcomers (wages for old employees without college degrees were not a lot lower than wages for new employees with college degrees; members of the same cohort were promoted along the same route about the same time; elite employees were selected later on )

how did it benefit Japanese economy?

Life-long employment (recruiting from schools; life-time security; cautious in hiring)—attracted and kept people by offering long-term security

The concept of flexible leadership? The local offices were responsible for strategies. The famous example of KFC—different tastes from store to store

How did it benefit Japanese economy?

KFC in Japan

http://www.kfc.co.jp/top.html

The Japanese: education

The Meiji period; “knowledge should be sought throughout the world”

Familiar story: Western knowledge and Eastern morals

The Allied Occupation: from developing students’ spontaneous spirit to support for ideological control (Left-wing teachers were fired; traditional values reappeared in textbooks)

In the 1960s—reviving Meiji Japan’s use of education for economy, and adopting the concept of human resource management

Five subject areas in basic education (English, Japanese, mathematics, science, and social studies)

The image of the Ideal Japanese—the Ministry of Education emphasized: “to be free is to accept responsibility”

National exam system

Regular schooling and private education (cram schools and drill books)

Vigorous pre-college education; lack of academic intensity in higher education

Pre-college education was vigorous enough to produce an effective workforce

A cram school (juku)

http://kaigyou.cc/feature/juku/

Salarymen in contemporary Japan

the “salarymen” (corporate warriors) and Japanese men’s masculine identity

What define a salaryman? The corporate warrior identity, maintaining a family, and a comfortable middle-class lifestyle

Contemporary challenges

Bubble economy (based on strong growth and speculation) and its collapse

Example of how the Japanese were impacted: drop in real estate prices (the Imperial palace and its surrounding areas; had once been as valuable as Canada or California; dropped to about a quarter of its highest value)

a economy which still has not fully recovered since the bursting of the bubble

Hit again in the final years of the last decade

Life-time employment—decline of the tradition; in the late 1990sl employ law began to be de-regulated

Challenge for the younger generation (a considerable number of young workers were non-regular employees)

Challenge for middle-aged salarymen

A still from Shall We Dance, a movie depicting salarymen

https://www.us.emb-japan.go.jp/jicc/events/shall-we-dance.html