Re: Japanese development
[was: Re: [PEN-L:9327] Re: Re: Re: Japan] Michael Perelman asked: Another question. Haven't all of the economic "miracles" fizzled. I, too, was under the impression that the Japanese bureaucrats were clever, thinking that there was an exception to the miracle rule. Brad writes: Oh, the bureaucrat of MITI were quite clever--and very interested in promoting economic development. But even during the heyday of the Japanese miracle there were a lot of other bureaucrats regulating agriculture, retail trade, finance, and so on who were clever too but not that interested in promoting economic development... The vagueness of this formulation is amazing! (What happened to the alleged rigor of orthodox economic thinking?) Specifically, what is "economic development"? does that refer to increasing "real" GDP per capita? or do we measure "development" by looking at measures such as the Genuine Progress Indicator, which includes a lot of benefits (and subtracts a lot of costs) missed by GDP? or do we think of "development" in some broader sense that can't be quantified? I was actually thinking of the McKinsey Global Institute's comparative study of manufacturing productivity in Japan, German, and the U.S., and the *extraordinary* dual economy it showed. The contrast between those sectors regulated by MITI and those regulated by other ministries is amazing... But in the future all my formulations will be rigorous. Brad DeLong
Re: Re: Japanese development
Brad wrote: Oh, the bureaucrat of MITI were quite clever--and very interested in promoting economic development. But even during the heyday of the Japanese miracle there were a lot of other bureaucrats regulating agriculture, retail trade, finance, and so on who were clever too but not that interested in promoting economic development... I wrote: The vagueness of this formulation is amazing! (What happened to the alleged rigor of orthodox economic thinking?) Specifically, what is "economic development"? does that refer to increasing "real" GDP per capita? or do we measure "development" by looking at measures such as the Genuine Progress Indicator, which includes a lot of benefits (and subtracts a lot of costs) missed by GDP? or do we think of "development" in some broader sense that can't be quantified? Brad ripostes: I was actually thinking of the McKinsey Global Institute's comparative study of manufacturing productivity in Japan, German, and the U.S., and the *extraordinary* dual economy it showed. The contrast between those sectors regulated by MITI and those regulated by other ministries is amazing... Being no fan of MITI, I won't defend it (though I should mention that last time I checked, Japan was doing much better than the US in terms of productivity growth). But I do want to defend rigor of thought once more. Too often these days, people use words like "development," "reform," and "progress" to mean the successful imposition of neoliberal free-market policies. This kind of fuzzy thinking is central to the agit-prop of the neoliberal revolution from above... Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Japanese development
[was: Re: [PEN-L:9327] Re: Re: Re: Japan] Michael Perelman asked: Another question. Haven't all of the economic "miracles" fizzled. I, too, was under the impression that the Japanese bureaucrats were clever, thinking that there was an exception to the miracle rule. Brad writes: Oh, the bureaucrat of MITI were quite clever--and very interested in promoting economic development. But even during the heyday of the Japanese miracle there were a lot of other bureaucrats regulating agriculture, retail trade, finance, and so on who were clever too but not that interested in promoting economic development... The vagueness of this formulation is amazing! (What happened to the alleged rigor of orthodox economic thinking?) Specifically, what is "economic development"? does that refer to increasing "real" GDP per capita? or do we measure "development" by looking at measures such as the Genuine Progress Indicator, which includes a lot of benefits (and subtracts a lot of costs) missed by GDP? or do we think of "development" in some broader sense that can't be quantified? The word "development," unless explained clearly, is just another buzz-word, like the neoliberal word "reform" (which sounds good but refers to forcing society into a free-market strait-jacket and in the case of "welfare reform" is simply punitive). Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Re: Japanese development
BTW, for all the negativism of Burkett and Hart-Landsberg about the nature of Japanese capitalism, not to mention all the moaning and groaning of various outside critics, especially the would be neoliberalizers, Japan does not look too bad on a lot of those human development index performance indicators. In particular, they are number one in life expectancy. Where they look especially bad is in terms of the relative performance of women. Part of the B and H-L argument is that women and other displaced groups (Korean immigrants, etc.) bore the major burden of the repeated sectoral restructurings of the Japanese economy, in contrast with the privileged elite of the lifetime employed of males in the core keiretsu firms. Barkley Rosser - Original Message - From: "Jim Devine" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, March 22, 2001 11:38 AM Subject: [PEN-L:9343] Japanese "development" [was: Re: [PEN-L:9327] Re: Re: Re: Japan] Michael Perelman asked: Another question. Haven't all of the economic "miracles" fizzled. I, too, was under the impression that the Japanese bureaucrats were clever, thinking that there was an exception to the miracle rule. Brad writes: Oh, the bureaucrat of MITI were quite clever--and very interested in promoting economic development. But even during the heyday of the Japanese miracle there were a lot of other bureaucrats regulating agriculture, retail trade, finance, and so on who were clever too but not that interested in promoting economic development... The vagueness of this formulation is amazing! (What happened to the alleged rigor of orthodox economic thinking?) Specifically, what is "economic development"? does that refer to increasing "real" GDP per capita? or do we measure "development" by looking at measures such as the Genuine Progress Indicator, which includes a lot of benefits (and subtracts a lot of costs) missed by GDP? or do we think of "development" in some broader sense that can't be quantified? The word "development," unless explained clearly, is just another buzz-word, like the neoliberal word "reform" (which sounds good but refers to forcing society into a free-market strait-jacket and in the case of "welfare reform" is simply punitive). Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
