This is kinda kewl, on several levels, for us progressives. Laura D’Andrea Tyson, in the NYTImes:
Among economists (most of whom are male), there is a tendency to treat diversity and gender equality as “soft” issues – worthy social goals perhaps, but secondary to the real business of economic growth, job creation and productivity.
But these soft issues have jumped to the top of the long-term growth agenda in Japan, the world’s third-largest economy, where Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is working to shake the nation out of its 20-year deflationary slump.
So far the world’s attention has focused on Mr. Abe’s bold macroeconomic policies to lift demand and growth in the short run. These policies have been strikingly successful, confirming the validity of Keynesian remedies for an economy suffering from insufficient demand when interest rates are stuck at their zero lower bound. As a result of higher deficit spending and a vast quantitative easing program by the Bank of Japan, the Japanese economy is growing at 4 percent, the highest rate among advanced economies, and the stock market has soared by 80 percent over the last six months.
Now, after his recent impressive electoral victory, Prime Minister Abe has signaled his intention to move forward with the “third arrow” of his policy quiver — significant structural reforms to increase Japan’s long-term growth potential. His list reads like a neoclassical economist’s list of “usual suspects,” including deregulation, industrial restructuring, corporate tax reform and trade liberalization — all worthy objectives. But in a departure from tradition, he is also championing reforms to expand economic opportunities for women.
Mr. Abe believes in numerical targets, and he has established several of them to increase the participation and advancement of women in the workplace. He wants to eliminate day-care waiting lists by creating 200,000 new day-care openings in authorized public facilities by 2015, with another 200,000 by 2017. He wants businesses to double their child-care leave to three years. He wants 30 percent of leadership positions in government and business to be held by women by 2020. He is calling on Japanese corporations to appoint at least one woman to their boards. And he is considering both changes in tax laws that discourage mothers from working and new training subsidies to help them return to the workplace following child-care leave.
These initiatives are not motivated by softhearted political correctness but by hard-headed economic logic…
kansi
But are his binders full of women?
Comrade Jake
Meanwhile the US is preoccupied with Hannah Montana twerking.
SatanicPanic
Fuck that guy, but you know what they say about broken clocks.
Baud
@SatanicPanic:
What’s your beef with the Japanese PM?
Yatsuno
This is also a subtle nudge to increase the birthrate, since Japan has been stuck in negative population growth for years. Women do work in Japan, but they are usually expected to be teachers or nurses and not rise too far above that. Mostly they are expected to be child rearers and not much else, and that is a deeply ingrained cultural trait. Japan does have feminists, but the society is still very much owned by men.
p.a.
So, in 14 years the Village Establishment will have had enough of our zombie recovery and emulate Japan’s 15-year-to-late economic moves? And Cryogenic Newt Gingrich will decry the move as ransoming our future, and Amazonline chief editorialist Harold Ford will claim the only hope for progress is to meet the Zombie Husk Republican Party (12 Senators- Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, South Carolina) half way.
JPL
@Comrade Jake: Since I don’t want to google the term, can you tell me what twerking is?
SatanicPanic
@Baud: His being a right wing fascist. Denying the existence of comfort women and playing down WWII war crimes. His “beautiful Japan” policy which sounds a little too much like a prelude to ethnic cleansing.
Baud
@SatanicPanic:
Thanks. I vaguely remember hearing about the WWII atrocities, but it seems like that sort of thing always is going on over there. Don’t know much about the rest.
Baud
@JPL:
It’s not that bad (in print anyway):
Twerking is a dance move that involves a person shaking the hips in an up-and-down bouncing motion, causing the dancer to shake, “wobble” and “jiggle.”[1] To “twerk” means to “dance in a sexually suggestive fashion by twisting the hips.
SiubhanDuinne
@JPL: Until this morning, I, too, was blissfully unaware of the term. It seems to be “booty-shaking” on steroids, or cranked up to eleven.
BruceFromOhio
Mr. Abe believes in numerical targets, and he has established several of them to increase the participation and advancement of women in the workplace.
Ummmm, okay. So, show me, don’t tell me?
@SatanicPanic: Ouch.
Shakezula
Cue the GOP trashing of Japan’s family wrecking policies in 3 … 2 … 1
BruceFromOhio
@Baud: … not so new, just different.
SatanicPanic
@Baud: @Baud: Japan is the middle of a very far right resurgence. Abe is Koizumi’s protege, but he’s not even that bad. The real guys to watch out for are the mayors of Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya. I forget all their names, but the mayor of Tokyo, Shintaro Ishihara, is at least old. The other two are young, popular, and have national profiles and are bad news. I love Japan and may even move back there someday, but the trend there is scary. If I do move back there I figure my American Privilege will protect me. Or I’ll have to run for my life. We’ll see.
Narcissus
Most people don’t have enough junk in the trunk to twerk successfully, but it hasn’t stopped everybody and their brother from trying.
JPL
@Baud: So to twerk with a foam hand is probably worse, huh… thanks..
Baud
@SatanicPanic:
I have never been to Japan, but hope to go one day. Can’t think of another situation where right-wing nationalism was combined with (potentially) greater opportunities for women (as the posted article suggests). I suppose with their economic woes and China at their back door, a rise in nationalism isn’t too surprising.
Baud
Apparently, everyone’s gone off twerking.
See you tomorrow.
eemom
Can “twerk” be adapted for blog use? What would the FP/comment equivalent of twerking be?
Just seems a shame to waste a cute little world like that on something that is not, er, not feasible for most of us.
Yatsuno
@JPL: I have a general idea, but I’ve remained blissfully ignorant of the messy details of the phnomenon so far.
@SatanicPanic: All Japanese PMs do this. Japan refuses to have an honest acknowledgement of their history because to do so would expose the Japanese to just how horribly their ancestors acted during the wars. Yes it is something they do need to come to terms with, and many Japanese who come to study in the US are horrified by what they learn about the rape of Nanjing (which is not discussed in Japanese history at all) and the sexual exploitatons on the Korean peninsula. It can be easier to just deny it.
Villago Delenda Est
“Hard headed economic logic” has a remarkable variety of meanings, many of which are anathema to corporatists, particularly those who see the growth of their personal short term fortunes far more important than any long term societal gains.
For these types, tumbrels are most definitely in order.
JPL
@Yatsuno: If we all googled the term then the ads on this site might be more interesting. We could google Miley and that term and see what happens..
BillinGlendaleCA
The Japanese colonial period in Korea was much more than that. The Japanese tried to eliminate Korean culture, including the language. One of the palaces in Seoul was converted into a zoo.
catclub
@Yatsuno: Interesting. In Yesterday’s sermon, the minister said that the Christian virtue opposite ot government secrecy was openness, which is balderdash. The virtue in opposition to government secrecy is confession. And the Japanese government shows the point.
They also say it is good for the soul.
SatanicPanic
@Baud: yeah, promoting women seems like it would be out of character, but IIRC he made a strong appeal to women to get elected. I could totally not be remembering correctly though.
@Yatsuno: I realize he’s in a tough position there, but he knows what he’s doing visiting Yasukuni Shrine. That’s been a deliberate provocation by the right.