foreign investment in order to ensure local control of industry and to achieve economic autonomy. Between 1950 and 1966, for example, France was able to invest only $1 million in Japan, West Germany $4 million, England $22 million, Switzerland $34 million, and the United States $207 million. In contrast, during 1961-66 alone, the American investment in France totalled $735 million, in West Germany $1.4 billion, and in England $1.8 billion, resulting in a veritable financial invasion of Europe. Though the Japanese economy was helped by about $2.1 billion worth of aid, chiefly American, during the Occupation years of 1945-51, the Japanese economic growth has been financed largely by the Japanese themselves. From 1954 to 1963, the average yearly investment in capital by the Japanese was a phenomenal 34 percent of the Gross National Product. For the decade of the 60’s the share of private consumption in Gross National Expenditures fell from 59 to 49 percent. Such a fantastic belt-tightening investment subsequently led to a burgeoning productive plant and a rapid rise in personal incomes. During that time the per capita GNP figure rose from $460 to $1,900. In recent years, Japanese investment in plant and machinery has remained substantial. In 1967 it totalled $21 billion, in 1968 $26.9 billion, in 1969 $33.6 billion, and in 1970 $40.7 billion. But due to the recession of the past few years, industrial investment fell to $38 billion in 1971, and to approximately $35 billion in 1972. In comparison, the United States, which has twice the size of the Japanese population and over four times the GNP, invested $82 billion in 1971 and about $90 billion in 1972.
Not all of Japanese industrialization has been due to state capitalism or large funds of private venture capital, however. Sony Corporation, Japan’s well-known and world-wide electronics manufacturer was started by two penniless engineers in a Tokyo shed in the early 1950’s. Morita Akio, now the company president, and Ibuka Masaru, who manages the technical end of the business, begged and borrowed $500 to start the business. By creatively using foreign technology, the two men managed to produce good products which sold well. They financed their expansion through the public sale of stock and now are among the richest men in Japan. Morita is the largest shareholder in the company and is worth over $130 million. Another self-made capitalist is sixty-five year old Honda Soichiro. He started his business career as a garage mechanic, got into the manufacture of bicycle engines after the Pacific War, and now commands the motor company which produces one-third of the world’s motorcycles. Seventy-seven year old Matsushita Konosuke is another man who started with little capital and is now among the top wealth holders in Japan. Fifty years ago he started manufacturing a small light switch. Over the years he has built his company into the second largest Japanese electrical manufacturer, the fourth largest Japanese manufacturer of any kind, and the most profitable of all Japanese companies.
Another man, Tanaka Kauei, now fifty-four years old, left Niigata and his farming background during his teens and went to Tokyo to seek his fortune. He entered the construction business, later went into politics, and eventually became a millionaire contractor. After serving as Minister of International Trade and Industry, Tanaka was voted the Liberal-Democratic Party president, and became Premier of Japan.
Because most Japanese industries are now economically strong enough to survive international competition, capital “liberalization” — the entry of foreign capital into Japan — has been allowed on increasingly freer terms by the Japanese government. Large American and European corporations have made and are making many financial connections with Japanese companies. A subsidiary of the First National City Bank, the second largest monetary institution in the world. now supplies funds to about ninety Japanese corporations. Chrysler Corporation has made an $80 million investment in a 35 percent interest in Mitsubishi Motors Corporation which has about 10 percent of the Japanese automobile market. General Motors has a 34 percent investment in Isuzu Motors Ltd. which has 5 percent of the market. Ford Motors had sought to buy into the Toyo Kogyo Company Ltd. which has patent rights on the new Wankel rotary engine and produces the “Mazda” automobile. Many other sales, services, and manufacturing companies, large and small, have entered the Japanese economy, generally in joint ventures. Procter & Gamble, Sears, Roebuck, Safeway, Singer, and even Oscar Mayer, the world’s largest ham and sausage maker, are now in Japan. More than a dozen large companies were able to enter the Japanese market during the American Occupation and have been operating profitably ever since. In fiscal 1970, IBM had earnings of $112 million in Japan, Coca-Cola had $54 million, and NCR had $23 million.
Capital liberalization has also allowed foreigners freer access to purchase Japanese securities, and the value of government and private bonds held by foreigners is about $500 million. Foreigners also own close to $1.5 billion of Japanese corporate stocks, and ratios of foreign owned stocks in Japanese companies are increasing. Foreigners now own about 10 percent of Fuji Film, Maruzen Oil, and Nippon Electric; 15 percent of Canon Camera, Shiseido Cosmetics, Takeda Chemical, and Toshiba Electric; 34 percent of Sony; and 50 percent of Nippon Light Metal.
This picture of Eitai-Dori Avenue in Tokyo contains all the elements of modern Japan: the dense traffic in the streets, the thick smog which obscures the background, the smartly dressed “salary men” on their way to work in air-conditioned offices, and the anachronistic delivery-man on the bicycle wearing geta instead of shoes.
The new affluence of modern Japan can be seen in these commuter cars parked along the tracks of the Yamoto Station in Kanagawa. From here commuters take the Sagami Line into Yokohama and points beyond.
WORK FORCE
According to the “Labor Force Survey” for 1971 from the Bureau of Statistics in the Prime Minister’s Office, 52.8 million persons — 32.2 million men and 20.6 million women — were employed in Japan, totalling almost half the population. Only about one percent of the work force, fewer than 600,000 people, were unemployed, giving Japan one of the lowest unemployment rates in the world. In comparison, America has about 80 million working out of a population of about 209 million. The unemployed number between five and six million, about 6 percent of the labor force.
The primary sector of the Japanese economy consisting of agriculture, forestry, and fishing employs 19 percent of the work force, some 9 million people. The secondary sector of mining, manufacturing, and construction employs 34 percent, about 18 million people. The tertiary sector of sales, services, and transportation employs 47 percent of the work force, about 25 million workers. A little over 6 million people are self-employed, and 3.5 million are unpaid family workers.
The Japanese people, especially farmers and workers in small companies and businesses, work long hours. Many Japanese work as many as 70 hours per week. It is only in the unionized, industrial sector and in large companies that fewer hours are worked. According to a survey of 5,000 private companies conducted by the Ministry of Labor, only 10 percent of them are on a five-day week, while 59 percent of them are on a six-day week. Employees of big business fare better. About one-fourth of companies having more than 1,000 employees are on a five-day week, and in 35 percent of these companies, employees had annual vacations of from fifteen to nineteen days. About one-fifth of these employees received more than twenty days vacation.
The pioneer labor organization in Japanese history was the Doshikwai, the Community of Sentiment Society, established by printers in 1890. A similar organization was established by railway employees in 1898, and the Yuaikwai, the Laborers’ Friendly Society, in 1912. The latter group had 50,000 members.
The first serious labor unrest in Japan occurred during the First World War when the cost of living, especially the cost of rice, rose higher than wages. Just before the Armistice, riots occurred in Tokyo, Osaka, and Kobe in which rice warehouses and other property of supposed rice hoarders were burned. After the war trade unionism grew, but never flourished. The moderate, middle-of-the-road Yuaikwai continued to attract the largest membership among Japanese labor groups, and changed its name to the Japan Federation of Labor, Nihon Rodo Sodomei. However,
