> The debt time bomb that could explode in Japan's face
> TOKYO, Jan 28 (AFP) -
>
> Two life insurers collapsed last October to become the biggest corporate
> failures in Japan since World War II, victims of the economic slump that
> has been Japan's bane since the "bubble economy" burst in the early 1990s.
Ho ho ho. You can just tell this article was written by rentiers! The insurers were pretty small, not among the heavy hitters or anything. Gems like this, though are priceless:
> "It's theft, pure and simple," the banker said.
A banker condemning theft is like Hitler denouncing human rights violations.
> "The tollgates don't even earn enough to pay for painting the bridges every
> two years," says Kenneth Courtis, vice president of Goldman Sachs Asia.
As opposed to the US investing in billion-dollar weapons systems, which sit around and expensively rust at Air Force bases.
> Goldman Sachs predicts the government's "on-balance sheet" gross debt will
> surpass 151 percent next year, compared to 91 percent 10 years ago, the
> result of the more than 850 billion dollars that the government has spent
> during the "lost decade."
What a crock. This is the same crap that the Social Security privatization crowd peddles in the US, you know, if you throw in Sallie Mae, Freddie Mac, Medicare and Social Security, US public debt levels would increase by a similar proportion. Japan has spent around $600 billion in bailouts and pump-priming, or $60 billion a year, well within the means of a $4.5 trillion economy.
> Taking its own valuation of unfunded pension liabilities rather than the
> government's, Goldman Sacks reckons that Japan's total public debt is more
> than four times GDP. And the true extent of Japan's financial crisis is
> even more scary once the vast bad debts of the banks are included.
They just want to get their slimy tentacles on those pension funds, of course; create a crisis, then call in self-appointed experts to "solve" the crisis for outrageous fees, the same way Rohatyn & Co. gang-raped New York. Too bad for them the East Asian bourgeoisie have different priorities, like piling into the chip and software biz.
-- Dennis