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Bank of Japan, in a Surprise, Adopts Negative Interest Rate

nytimes.com

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Re: Bank of Japan, in a Surprise, Adopts Negative Interest Rate

#111

Post by phkahler »

HSO wrote: post #86

Those who think Japan is unique in its condition and/or that the answer to its problems is more of the same old "advice" as proffered by standard issue economists and business types might profit from Robert Gordon's recently published "American Growth". (paper version: http://www.nber.org/papers/w18315.pdf ) At least, it can offer a different, longer-term perspective on the issues. It's not impossible that we will lo…

>> It's not impossible that we will look back in 20 years and see Japan not as some sort of failure but simply as the first society that had to learn to live without growth.

They still haven't learned, they're trying really really hard to force growth. Negative interest rates can be seen as a tax on inactivity, and while it's been talked about in the US, I think it comes too close to taxing assets for the rich to embrace it.

Re: Bank of Japan, in a Surprise, Adopts Negative Interest Rate

#112

Post by xyzzy4 »

hackerboos wrote: post #63
Cthulhu_ wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't it be acceptable to just accept a shrinking economy and change policies in such a way to deal with it? i.e. shrink the police and armed forces, public services, cut needless spending, etc. Become more frugal as economy allows.

The key phrase here was 'aging population'. If the majority of Japan's population are retired then there will still be a huge deficit. Japan needs to bite the bullet and accept immigration as part of its economic strategy.

Or ban birth control, abortion, porn, and have more arranged marriages.

Re: Bank of Japan, in a Surprise, Adopts Negative Interest Rate

#113

Post by VLM »

hackerboos wrote: post #63
Cthulhu_ wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't it be acceptable to just accept a shrinking economy and change policies in such a way to deal with it? i.e. shrink the police and armed forces, public services, cut needless spending, etc. Become more frugal as economy allows.

The key phrase here was 'aging population'. If the majority of Japan's population are retired then there will still be a huge deficit. Japan needs to bite the bullet and accept immigration as part of its economic strategy.

Is a Japan without any Japanese people still Japan? Culturally would modern Japanese tolerate a cultural mass suicide or did that go out of style at the end of WW2? USA has been talked into it, but would that work on modern Japanese?

Meanwhile there's a weird undercurrent of racism, if we just take Japan 2016 and person for person swap out for obviously superior foreigners (imperialism?) then magically everything is supposed to be better. However, in reality, that would obviously not be the case. If an Asian guy is sitting in a broken car, and the driver is removed and replaced with a foreigner, the car is still going to be just as broken. Likewise if the Japanese abandon their land and culture, that doesn't mean anyone else will necessarily do a better job of running the place. Or if there is a better way to run the place, they could save everyone a lot of bother, and implement it themselves.

Re: Bank of Japan, in a Surprise, Adopts Negative Interest Rate

#114

Post by Larrikin »

aikah wrote: post #72
hackerboos wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The key phrase here was 'aging population'. If the majority of Japan's population are retired then there will still be a huge deficit. Japan needs to bite the bullet and accept immigration as part of its economic strategy.

> Japan needs to bite the bullet and accept immigration. Immigration isn't going to solve anything, immigration from where ? Japan isn't the US, they aren't talking English nor their society is build in a way it can accept huge immigration waves. Japan needs to work on techs that will solve its problems, not resort to a massive immigration wave that will only kick the can down the road.

In my experience, the immigrants and foreign workers in Japan in the highly skilled jobs often don't need much Japanese to do their jobs, but the ones that learn the language have a much easier time and obviously advance quicker. All the people I came in to contact with low skill jobs that had spent any time in Japan, had amazing Japanese because they absolutely needed it because the vast majority of people do not speak any meaningful amount of English.

Japanese is not an easy language to learn, but its not impossible to learn. If people are allowed in then they will learn Japanese

Re: Bank of Japan, in a Surprise, Adopts Negative Interest Rate

#115

Post by danharaj »

dazc wrote: post #6
adrianN wrote: post #2

Can someone explain to me why both cheap oil and expensive oil seem to be bad for the economy? Back when oil was >$100 per barrel everybody seemed to blame the weak economy on expensive oil. Now somehow very cheap oil is also a bad thing.

Cheap oil is bad for net exporters of oil and good for net importers. And visa versa. I get the impression the media are always talking about an imminent financial catastrophe because eventually they'll be right and we'll forget how many times they have been wrong.

on the other hand, we know they'll be right eventually.

Re: Bank of Japan, in a Surprise, Adopts Negative Interest Rate

#116

Post by oblio »

VLM wrote: post #113
hackerboos wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The key phrase here was 'aging population'. If the majority of Japan's population are retired then there will still be a huge deficit. Japan needs to bite the bullet and accept immigration as part of its economic strategy.

Is a Japan without any Japanese people still Japan? Culturally would modern Japanese tolerate a cultural mass suicide or did that go out of style at the end of WW2? USA has been talked into it, but would that work on modern Japanese? Meanwhile there's a weird undercurrent of racism, if we just take Japan 2016 and person for person swap out for obviously superior foreigners (imperialism?) then magically everything is…

Mmmm... the Japanese have problems even reintegrating Japanese Brazilians, i.e. Japanese who have moved to Brazil.

That reeks more of Japanese xenophobia than of some "Western imperialist racist conspiracy" to destabilize Japan.

Re: Bank of Japan, in a Surprise, Adopts Negative Interest Rate

#117

Post by guard-of-terra »

xyzzy4 wrote: post #112
hackerboos wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The key phrase here was 'aging population'. If the majority of Japan's population are retired then there will still be a huge deficit. Japan needs to bite the bullet and accept immigration as part of its economic strategy.

Or ban birth control, abortion, porn, and have more arranged marriages.

Do you have even one case where this has worked? You can outright drown your horse but even that won't necessarily make it drink.

Making people miserable is rarely a good strategy unless you're building ISIS.

Re: Bank of Japan, in a Surprise, Adopts Negative Interest Rate

#118

Post by jessriedel »

jernfrost wrote: post #109
HSO wrote: post #86

Those who think Japan is unique in its condition and/or that the answer to its problems is more of the same old "advice" as proffered by standard issue economists and business types might profit from Robert Gordon's recently published "American Growth". (paper version: http://www.nber.org/papers/w18315.pdf ) At least, it can offer a different, longer-term perspective on the issues. It's not impossible that we will lo…

But the growth problems of Japan is largely an illusion and myth caused by population decline. Growth per capita in Japan has been completely normal in the supposed terrible years. It is the population decline which causes the overall GDP growth to look anemic. Naturally it is growth per capita which matters as this is what improves the living conditions of people. There are many countries with high GDP growth but wh…

What time period are you talking about? In 1991, per capita GDP in US and Japan were both ~$32k in 2005 USD. But now it's ~$38k for Japan and $47k for US.

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united-states/gdp-per-capita

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/japan/gdp-per-capita

Re: Bank of Japan, in a Surprise, Adopts Negative Interest Rate

#119

Post by oblio »

akerro wrote: post #89
green7ea wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honest question: why Norway? I thought it was more about Russia, Iran, Venezuela, ISIS and that Norway was simply collateral.

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-norway-economy-insight-idU...

That article's lead picture is silly. I'm willing to bet that the woman in the picture is from my country instead of being an actual Norwegian. Shameful journalism, portraying Norway's economic problems like some sort of meltdown.

Re: Bank of Japan, in a Surprise, Adopts Negative Interest Rate

#120

Post by yuiyui »

hackerboos wrote: post #63
Cthulhu_ wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't it be acceptable to just accept a shrinking economy and change policies in such a way to deal with it? i.e. shrink the police and armed forces, public services, cut needless spending, etc. Become more frugal as economy allows.

The key phrase here was 'aging population'. If the majority of Japan's population are retired then there will still be a huge deficit. Japan needs to bite the bullet and accept immigration as part of its economic strategy.

> Japan needs to bite the bullet and accept immigration as part of its economic strategy.

What strategy?

Getting replaced?

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