Japan's Financial Crisis and Its Parallels to U.S. Experience

Japan's Financial Crisis and Its Parallels to U.S. Experience PDF Author: Ryōichi Mikitani
Publisher: Peterson Institute
ISBN: 9780881322897
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description
Japan is only one of many industrialized economies to suffer a financial crisis in the past 15 years, but it has suffered the most from its crisis--as measured in lost output and investment opportunities, and in the direct costs of clean-up. Comparing the response of Japanese policy in the 1990s to that of US monetary and financial policy to the American Savings and Loan Crisis of the late 1980s sheds light on the reasons for this outcome. This volume was created by bringing together several leading academics from the United States and Japan--plus former senior policymakers from both countries--to discuss the challenges to Japanese financial and monetary policy in the 1990s. The papers address in turn both the monetary and financial aspects of the crisis, and the discussants bring together broad themes across the two countries' experiences. As the papers in this Special Report demonstrate, while the Japanese government's policy response to its banking crisis in the 1990s was slow in comparison to that of the US government a decade earlier, the underlying dynamics were similar. A combination of mismanaged partial deregulation and regulatory forebearance gave rise to the crisis and allowed it to deepen, and only the closure of some banks and injection of new capital into others began the resolution. The Bank of Japan's monetary policy from the late 1980s onward, however, was increasingly out of step with US or other developed country norms. In particular, the Bank of Japan's limited response to deflation after being granted independence in 1998 stands out as a dangerous and unusual stance.

Japan's Financial Crisis and Its Parallels to U.S. Experience

Japan's Financial Crisis and Its Parallels to U.S. Experience PDF Author: Ryōichi Mikitani
Publisher: Peterson Institute
ISBN: 9780881322897
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 256

Get Book

Book Description
Japan is only one of many industrialized economies to suffer a financial crisis in the past 15 years, but it has suffered the most from its crisis--as measured in lost output and investment opportunities, and in the direct costs of clean-up. Comparing the response of Japanese policy in the 1990s to that of US monetary and financial policy to the American Savings and Loan Crisis of the late 1980s sheds light on the reasons for this outcome. This volume was created by bringing together several leading academics from the United States and Japan--plus former senior policymakers from both countries--to discuss the challenges to Japanese financial and monetary policy in the 1990s. The papers address in turn both the monetary and financial aspects of the crisis, and the discussants bring together broad themes across the two countries' experiences. As the papers in this Special Report demonstrate, while the Japanese government's policy response to its banking crisis in the 1990s was slow in comparison to that of the US government a decade earlier, the underlying dynamics were similar. A combination of mismanaged partial deregulation and regulatory forebearance gave rise to the crisis and allowed it to deepen, and only the closure of some banks and injection of new capital into others began the resolution. The Bank of Japan's monetary policy from the late 1980s onward, however, was increasingly out of step with US or other developed country norms. In particular, the Bank of Japan's limited response to deflation after being granted independence in 1998 stands out as a dangerous and unusual stance.

Japan's Great Stagnation

Japan's Great Stagnation PDF Author: W. R. Garside
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
ISBN: 0857938223
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 229

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Book Description
'Recent events have rendered Japan's lost decades all the more relevant to the rest of us. Rick Garside, in this wide-ranging and accessible account, explores the political economy of Japan's great stagnation with an eye toward describing how other advanced economies can avoid going down the same path.' – Barry Eichengreen, University of California, Berkeley, US 'Professor Garside's timely book transcends the national preoccupation suggested by its title. From one viewpoint this is a case study (admittedly on a grand scale) of the experience of one country in one historical period. But in analyzing the dynamic relationship between Japan's post-war economic miracle and its chronic stagnation from the 1990's he offers a penetrating insight into the links between profound and embedded institutional and ideological influences, global upheaval, and almost disastrous national economic performance. Hence, Japan's Great Stagnation – the unfolding story of that country's declining experience from masterful economic power to seeming economic paralysis – provides us with an all-too familiar scenario with which to approach the contemporaneous ills of the world's developed economies. The interaction between banking crises, unwieldy institutions (especially, but not only, financial institutions), policy frailties, and stagnating demand – all conspired to create crisis and then handicap or prevent recovery. And the familiarity of the story is aggravated by the global financial crisis which now threatens to engulf us. History never fully repeats itself, but Professor Garside's illuminating examination of Japan's recent experiences must surely provide important points of relevance for the world's current malaise. He is to be congratulated on the depth and scope of what he has achieved – and for its relevance to what we are experiencing.' – Barry Supple, University of Cambridge, UK This timely book presents a critical examination of the developmental premises of Japan's high-growth success and its subsequent drift into recession, stagnation and piecemeal reform. The country, which within a few decades of wartime defeat mounted a serious challenge to American hegemony, appeared incapable of fully adjusting to shifting economic circumstance once the impulses of catch-up growth and the good fortune of an accommodating international environment faded. The banking crises, spiralling government debt, and stagnant growth experienced by major industrialized nations in recent years have evoked renewed interest in Japan's economic denouement since the 1990s. To many, Japan's drift into recession and financial crisis during the early 1990s, and later into stagnation and prolonged deflation, demonstrated precisely what not to do when fashioning remedial policy. This book details the legacies of Japan's high-growth success and how they affected Japan's capacity to cope with shifting national and international circumstance from the 1980s. It reviews the contentious debates over the causes and consequences of the 'bubble economy' and the 'lost decade', and assesses the extent to which reforms since 1997 have been compromised by lingering attachments to Japan's distinctive post-war political economy. Providing an analytical overview of both the high growth and recessionary periods and of subsequent reform agendas, this timely book will appeal to students, academics and researchers of economic history, development and politics, particularly those with an interest in Japan and Asian studies more generally.

Restoring Japan's Economic Growth

Restoring Japan's Economic Growth PDF Author: Adam Simon Posen
Publisher: Peterson Institute
ISBN: 9780881322620
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 216

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Book Description
Criticism of current Japanese macroeconomic and financial policies is so wide spread that the reasons for it are assumed to be self-evident. In this volume, Adam Posen explains in depth why a shift in Japanese fiscal and monetary policies, as well as financial reform, would be in Japan's self-interest. He demonstrates that Japanese economic stagnation in the 1990s is the result of mistaken fiscal austerity and financial laissez-faire rather than a structural decline of the "Japan Model." The author outlines a program for putting the country back on the path to solid economic growth - primarily through permanent tax cuts and monetary stabilization - and draws broader lessons from the recent Japanese policy actions that led to the country's continuing stagnation.

Japan's Financial Crisis

Japan's Financial Crisis PDF Author: Jennifer Amyx
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400849632
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 392

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Book Description
At the beginning of the 1990s, a massive speculative asset bubble burst in Japan, leaving the nation's banks with an enormous burden of nonperforming loans. Banking crises have become increasingly common across the globe, but what was distinctive about the Japanese case was the unusually long delay before the government intervened to aggressively address the bad debt problem. The postponed response by Japanese authorities to the nation's banking crisis has had enormous political and economic consequences for Japan as well as for the rest of the world. This book helps us understand the nature of the Japanese government's response while also providing important insights into why Japan seems unable to get its financial system back on track 13 years later. The book focuses on the role of policy networks in Japanese finance, showing with nuance and detail how Japan's Finance Ministry was embedded within the political and financial worlds, how that structure was similar to and different from that of its counterparts in other countries, and how the distinctive nature of Japan's institutional arrangements affected the capacity of the government to manage change. The book focuses in particular on two intervening variables that bring about a functional shift in the Finance Ministry's policy networks: domestic political change under coalition government and a dramatic rise in information requirements for effective regulation. As a result of change in these variables, networks that once enhanced policymaking capacity in Japanese finance became "paralyzing networks"--with disastrous results.

The current financial crisis in the United States

The current financial crisis in the United States PDF Author: Katrin Meier
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3640514009
Category : Political Science
Languages : de
Pages : 123

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Book Description
Diplomarbeit aus dem Jahr 2009 im Fachbereich BWL - Wirtschaftspolitik, Note: 1,0, Georg-Simon-Ohm-Hochschule Nürnberg, Sprache: Deutsch, Abstract: The current financial crisis, which started in the Unites States, has dominated the headlines all around the world since summer 2007 and especially after Lehman Brothers’ breakdown in September 2008. Wall Street legends like Bear Stearns, Merrill Lynch or Citigroup as well as insurance and mortgage giants like AIG, Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac had to either go out of business or were bailed out by the U.S. government. What started as a subprime crisis in the beginning soon turned to a global financial crisis and then changed to a worldwide recession. Governments around the world try to fix their financial system and to restore economic health. (...) The current crisis in the U.S. has parallels with a range of other crisis such as the Great Depression or the U.S. Savings and Loans crisis. Rogoff and Reinhart, for instance, compared the current crisis with a wide range of other crises (2008) However, The Economist (2009d), Posen (2009), Kobayashi (2008b), Koo (2008), Krugman (2009d) and Nakamae (2008) are just few of many well-known authors who state that Japan’s experience in the 1990s is the most suitable for serving as a reference to the United States. Despite many differences between both crises, I agree with Koo who points out that the U.S. is “extremely fortunate” to have the opportunity to learn from Japan’s experiences, a country which “went through something very similar just fifteen years ago” (2008, 69). (...) The objective of this paper is to explain what the U.S. can learn from Japan’s experience and to give a road map of how to respond to the unfolding events in financial markets. (...) The current head of the Federal Reserve Ben Bernanke studied Japan’s crisis in depth during the 1990s and 2000s and hopefully, U.S. policymakers will make good use of those lessons in order to minimize the pains of the U.S. economy. This paper is divided into four sections. The first section provides an overview of the events that led to what the International Monetary Fund (IMF) then called the “largest financial shock since the Great Depression“ (Stewart 2008). The second part explains how the crisis in Japan unfolded and why it took so long until policy measures had a significant positive impact. The third part shortly summarizes America’s response to the crisis so far. The final part tries to answer the question what America can learn from Japan when it comes to handling its crisis.

The current financial crisis in the United States

The current financial crisis in the United States PDF Author: Katrin Meier
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3640511557
Category :
Languages : de
Pages : 133

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Book Description
Diplomarbeit aus dem Jahr 2009 im Fachbereich BWL - Wirtschaftspolitik, Note: 1,0, Georg-Simon-Ohm-Hochschule Nürnberg, Sprache: Deutsch, Abstract: The current financial crisis, which started in the Unites States, has dominated the headlines all around the world since summer 2007 and especially after Lehman Brothers' breakdown in September 2008. Wall Street legends like Bear Stearns, Merrill Lynch or Citigroup as well as insurance and mortgage giants like AIG, Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac had to either go out of business or were bailed out by the U.S. government. What started as a subprime crisis in the beginning soon turned to a global financial crisis and then changed to a worldwide recession. Governments around the world try to fix their financial system and to restore economic health. (...) The current crisis in the U.S. has parallels with a range of other crisis such as the Great Depression or the U.S. Savings and Loans crisis. Rogoff and Reinhart, for instance, compared the current crisis with a wide range of other crises (2008) However, The Economist (2009d), Posen (2009), Kobayashi (2008b), Koo (2008), Krugman (2009d) and Nakamae (2008) are just few of many well-known authors who state that Japan's experience in the 1990s is the most suitable for serving as a reference to the United States. Despite many differences between both crises, I agree with Koo who points out that the U.S. is "extremely fortunate" to have the opportunity to learn from Japan's experiences, a country which "went through something very similar just fifteen years ago" (2008, 69). (...) The objective of this paper is to explain what the U.S. can learn from Japan's experience and to give a road map of how to respond to the unfolding events in financial markets. (...) The current head of the Federal Reserve Ben Bernanke studied Japan's crisis in depth during the 1990s and 2000s and hopefully, U.S. policymakers will make good use of those lessons in order to minimize the pains of the U.S. econo

“Lost Decade” in Translation - What Japan’s Crisis could Portend about Recovery from the Great Recession

“Lost Decade” in Translation - What Japan’s Crisis could Portend about Recovery from the Great Recession PDF Author: Mr.Murtaza H. Syed
Publisher: International Monetary Fund
ISBN: 1451874278
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 42

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Book Description
Is the recovery from the global financial crisis now secured? A strikingly similar crisis that stalled Japan's growth miracle two decades ago could provide some clues. This paper explores the parallels and draws potential implications for the current global outlook and policies. Japan's experiences suggest four broad lessons. First, green shoots do not guarantee a recovery, implying a need to be cautious about the outlook. Second, financial fragilities can leave an economy vulnerable to adverse shocks and should be resolved for a durable recovery. Third, well-calibrated macroeconomic stimulus can facilitate this adjustment, but carries increasing costs. And fourth, while judging the best time to exit from policy support is difficult, clear medium-term plans may help.

Japan's Policy Trap

Japan's Policy Trap PDF Author: Akio Mikuni
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 0815798768
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 314

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Book Description
Until quite recently, the Japanese inspired a kind of puzzled awe. They had pulled themselves together from the ruin of war, built at breakneck speed a formidable array of export champions, and emerged as the world's number-two economy and largest net creditor nation. And they did it by flouting every rule of economic orthodoxy. But today only the puzzlement remains—at Japan's inability to arrest its economic decline, at its festering banking crisis, and at the dithering of its policymakers. Why can't the Japanese government find the political will to fix the country's problems? Japan's Policy Trap offers a provocative new analysis of the country's protracted economic stagnation. Japanese insider Akio Mikuni and long-term Japan resident R. Taggart Murphy contend that the country has landed in a policy trap that defies easy solution. The authors, who have together spent decades at the heart of Japanese finance, expose the deep-rooted political arrangements that have distorted Japan's monetary policy in a deflationary direction. They link Japan's economic difficulties to the Achilles' heel of the U.S. economy: the U.S. trade and current accounts deficits. For the last twenty years, Japan's dollar-denominated trade surplus has outstripped official reserves and currency in circulation. These huge accumulated surpluses have long exercised a growing and perverse influence on monetary policy, forcing Japan's authorities to support a build-up of deflationary dollars. Mikuni and Murphy trace the origins of Japan's policy trap far back into history, in the measures taken by Japan's officials to preserve their economic independence in what they saw as a hostile world. Mobilizing every resource to accumulate precious dollars, the authorities eventually found themselves coping with a hoard they could neither use nor exchange. To counteract the deflationary impact, Japanese authorities resorted to the creation of yen liabilities unrelated to production via the largest financial bubble in history. The bursting of that bubble was followed by massive public works spending that has resulted in an explosion in public sector debt. Japan's Policy Trap points to the likelihood that Japan will run out of ways to support its vast pile of dollar claims. Should the day come when those claims can no longer be supported, the world could see a horrific deflationary spiral in Japan, a crash in the global value of the dollar, or both. The effects would reach far beyond Japan's borders. Mikuni and Murphy suggest that a reduction in Japan's surplus must be accompanied by a reduction in deficits somewhere else—most obviously through far-reaching shifts in the American economy.

Balance Sheet Recession

Balance Sheet Recession PDF Author: Richard Koo
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 308

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Book Description
In this groundbreaking book, leading international economist, Richard Koo argues that far from being the sick man of Asia, Japan is suffering from a temporary but highly unusual economic aberration. Economists and business commentators have always assumed that the majority of companies in any economy are forward looking and are trying to maximize profits. They never considered the possibility that a vast majority of companies may be placing their highest priorities on minimizing debt in order to repair their balance sheets. But that remote possibility has been the reality in Japan for the past decade, and more recently in many other countries including at least a part of the US. Balance Sheet Recession argues that contrary to popular belief, it is this massive shift in corporate behavior, instead of structural problems, that is the root cause of both the deflation and the non-performing loan problems that have troubled Japan for so long. It argues that when the causality runs from the corporate balance sheet problems to deflation and banking problems, a highly unconventional policy response is needed to stabilize the economy. After all, the last time anything similar has happened was the 1930s in the US. Richard Koo's experience in dealing with both the US banking crisis of the early 1980s and the Japanese balance sheet and banking problems of the last ten years makes him unique qualified to comment on this situation. He clearly explains how such a recession can happen in any economy following an asset price bubble, and how best to deal with it.

Japanese Monetary Policy

Japanese Monetary Policy PDF Author: Kenneth J. Singleton
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226760685
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 208

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Book Description
How has the Bank of Japan (BOJ) helped shape Japan's economic growth during the past two decades? This book comprehensively explores the relations between financial market liberalization and BOJ policies and examines the ways in which these policies promoted economic growth in the 1980s. The authors argue that the structure of Japan's financial markets, particularly restrictions on money-market transactions and the key role of commercial banks in financing corporate investments, allowed the BOJ to influence Japan's economic success. The first two chapters provide the most in-depth English-language discussion of the BOJ's operating procedures and policymaker's views about how BOJ actions affect the Japanese business cycle. Chapter three explores the impact of the BOJ's distinctive window guidance policy on corporate investment, while chapter four looks at how monetary policy affects the term structure of interest rates in Japan. The final two chapters examine the overall effect of monetary policy on real aggregate economic activity. This volume will prove invaluable not only to economists interested in the technical operating procedures of the BOJ, but also to those interested in the Japanese economy and in the operation and outcome of monetary reform in general.