What Happened to Japan?
July 25, 2023
by Paul Krugman
I hope that at least some of my readers are too young to remember this, but in the early 1990s many Americans — especially pundits, but also business leaders and a fair share of the general public — were obsessed with the rise of Japan. Two of the best-selling books of 1992 were Michael Crichton’s novel “Rising Sun,” about what he imagined to be the growing, sinister influence of Japanese corporations, and Lester Thurow’s “Head to Head: The Coming Economic Battle Among Japan, Europe and America.” It’s easy to forget now, but I like to remind people how airport bookstores were full of paperbacks with samurai warriors on their covers, purporting to teach you the secrets of Japanese management.
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