The New World Economy, Japan as Number One
What will happen to the world’s economy, now that the American boat is sinking, who will lead the pack?
The present world economy trembles as the American economy stumbles to its knees. The armor of the economy has been breached and it starts to show the flesh of the meager man inside, who was once the leader of the world’s economy. By lending huge amounts of foreign cash, the American system has been able to establish an armor. By means of that magnificent armor, the American economy has been able to dominate the world’s economy. But for years the American politicians have neglected to feed the man inside. The real face of the American economy has diverted from its facade, so far, that it can barely be recognized anymore. Moreover, by underfeeding the economic man in the last eight years, he has become unable to support the armor that made it so fierce in the future. The American weakness has become visible by the whole world to behold.
This raises questions about the world’s financial system. The system was based on the United States. The dollar has been the most important coin in the world, but that age is in the past. People realize that the American system, when continued, will bring the same problem once again. The bubble has burst and people don’t feel like blowing a new one using the same soap anymore. The economy will turn its head towards another nation.
The problem is that there is no logical successor to the United States. The three power centers are now the European Union (Strength through diversity), The Russian Federation (Strength through resources) and The people’s Republic of China (Strength through growth and manpower). The outsiders are the Opec countries and Japan. The European Union is the most likely candidate when looking at the financial stability and status, but the problem is that there is no unity on political level. There is no visible hierarchy in the system and the borders of the Union are not well defined. The Euro is not used in all countries of the EU and that poses the biggest problem. Russia is willing and its resource magnates who turned billionaires in the last century feel like it is time to change the tide. The problem is that the successor must be accepted by the World and the status of Russia for that matter is doubtful. Russia’s currency has never grown to be one of the major players on the world market. Although China is the belly of today’s economy, the belly can never control. The currency is too low, the country is still developing and the political and especially the jurisdictional system is far from trustworthy.
The world will look at a successor for the US in the most likely place. It will search for a more reliable copy of the system. That more reliable copy is Japan. Being the second economy of the world it is also not a real surprise and it is also a stable country. With its current anti-war policy it can play the role as referee of the present world economy.
1 Comment
It will be interesting to see what happens in the next few years. I live in Canada, so we watch American TV and news – in fact, their political races receive more press here than our own.
We have watched as the American government has been running one deficit budget after another. The baby boomers who came of age in the 60’s developed a selfish, me first attitude; with no work ethic and poor parenting practices. Individuals and families have been living extravagent lifestyles that they feel entitled to, but they are living on credit with a ‘buy now, pay later” attitude.
I have been thinking that China will take over as a world power, mostly because of their strong work ethic. While the Americans have been clammoring for higher wages and more benefits, companies have sinking money into machinery to replace the human workers. From what I have seen, Chinese have less unemployment as the factories are able to pay lower wages and hire more humans in manufacturing.
But you could be right about Japan. China has a bad reputation for human rights violations. I don’t know what wages are like in Japan – I have heard that it is difficult to find workers for low level jobs in the service industries. The Japanese (I think) have more education and they are more competitve for the higher paying jobs.
Great topic – good research.