Word: hatoyamas
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...voters handed power to the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) in the Aug. 30 parliamentary election, many had hopes that the country's new leaders would begin to solve some of the country's intractable economic problems. Among other popular proposals, the new government, led by Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, vowed to provide more government assistance for families to promote consumer spending while simultaneously taming the country's ballooning debt, which at nearly 200% of GDP is the highest among rich nations...
...finding it easier to make campaign promises than to keep them. Less than two months after taking over, Hatoyama's administration is being forced into a difficult balancing act between the need to prevent a double-dip recession and the desire to keep Japan's budget deficit from spinning out of control. The recession is knocking tax revenues so far below expectations that the deficit will rise to $548 billion this year, an enormous 10% of GDP. Yet, despite Hatoyama's instructions to keep next year's spending no higher than this year's initial budget of $970 billion...
...Thankfully, in the face of mounting bad news on the budget front, Hatoyama is not stubbornly clinging to pledges of fiscal austerity. Major spending cuts have been rendered unrealistic by the current economic climate. Falling real wages and low business investment mean Japan's recovery is fragile. A recent Nikkei newspaper survey showed that 38% of top Japanese executives rated the likelihood of another downturn next year as high or somewhat high. The biggest risk, cited by 69% of respondents, was "the effect of fiscal stimulus measures wearing off." Hatoyama appears to be willing to continue stimulus spending under...
...which was owned by the government until it was privatized in 1987, to fail. The airline has already been bailed out three times since 2001, and was guaranteed 80% of a 100 billion yen emergency loan by the previous administration. On Thursday, Japan's new Prime Minister, Yukio Hatoyama, said "public support may become necessary" for JAL and that he wants to finalize restructuring plans for the company "as soon as possible," on the sidelines of the G-20 meeting in Pittsburgh. Government officials "definitely don't want Japan's flagship carrier to file for Japan's equivalent of Chapter...
...There's no word yet on whether the government will provide the airline with additional funding in exchange for an ownership stake. Hatoyama's handling of the situation is being watched closely because it could signal whether Japan's new ruling party, the Democratic Party of Japan, will take a harder line on Japan Inc. than the Liberal Democratic Party, which recently lost power in parliamentary elections after nearly 54 years of unbroken rule. (See pictures of the global financial crisis...