Word: demande
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...global recession has again exposed the structural weaknesses that plague Japan: overdependence on exports to drive economic growth, anemic domestic demand, inefficient enterprises and barriers to competition. It's no secret that the root of all of these problems is demographics. An aging population is shrinking Japan's labor force and consumer market. The country's working-age population (aged 15 and over) has declined 2% since 1999. Over the same period, the number of workers aged 65 and up expanded 19%, while the labor force of workers aged 25 to 34 shrank 9%. (Read "Japan: Stimulating the World Markets...
...costs and become more competitive by hiring temporary, part-time and irregular workers. This change has been, if anything, too successful. Part-timers and temps today make up a third of the labor force, and most of them are young. This group should be a wellspring of domestic demand. Young people starting out in life are usually prodigious consumers as they purchase cars, buy homes and raise children. But part-timers and temps are not eligible for company benefits and certainly not lifetime employment - and because they frequently earn too little to contribute to public welfare funds, they are also...
...Japan's public debt is approaching 200% of GDP - the highest among developed countries - which limits the government's options. Still, the state must deepen the social safety net to better cover the underserved: young workers and families. This will help reverse the population decline, rebalance growth toward domestic demand and remove the need to mitigate unemployment by propping up inefficient companies and farms. Japanese citizens will have to make sacrifices - they may have to pay more taxes, for example. But neglecting the demographic problem will only prolong stagnation and risks relegating Japan to has-been status among economic powers...
...biggest media coup so far came in April when Save the Rich, which denounces a system it says is rigged to keep the wealthy and powerful in their privileged positions, publicized its facetious demand for a minimum wage for rich people by barging in on a swanky Rotary Club lunch honoring Jean Sarkozy - son of French President Nicolas Sarkozy and a rising political star in his own right. With a boom-box blaring the theme music from the series Dallas, Save the Rich members handed Sarkozy fils an award for "Best Daddy's Boy" and congratulated him on his work...
...goes on sale in California in 2010. Coda expects to sell about 2,700 cars in the first year, with an annual sales target of around 20,000. For Coda's Czinger, the China connection allows him to keep his costs low and, more importantly, to manufacture on demand, which cuts his risk considerably. There's no other way a startup could compete - even one that just pulled in $24 million in venture capital funding and gave former U.S. Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson an advisory seat on its board. "It allows us to manufacture flexibly without putting huge amounts...