Japan a country enriched with it's time-honored culture, has rapidly immersed western technology during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Japan recovered after its defeat in World War II to become an economic power and a ally of the US. While the emperor retains his throne as a symbol of national unity, actual power rests in networks of powerful politicians, bureaucrats, and business executives, capitalist. Japan's economy experienced a major slowdown starting in the 1990s followed by three decades of unprecedented growth.
Today, there is no need to try and convince the American people of how important Japan is to the United States. This was not the case many years ago, so why is Japan important, and how have they come so far economically and politically? Not only is Japan important to the United States as a trading partner but for many other economic reasons. Japan and the United States have not always been so friendly towards one another, so why now. With economic and political changes in both countries, they are able to reach agreements to make better both the United States and Japan. Much effort has been put forth by Americans to evaluate the American economic policies against those used and adopted by the Japanese. Japan as a nation continues to increase in productivity, minimizing their unemployment, and trying to avoid high inflation, and achieve steady economic growth. Japan seems to know what they are doing because they have been more successful than any other economy. Japan consists of 4 major and over 4,000 smaller islands, and is a mostly mountainous country with only 15% of its land that can be cultivated. Population is approximately 127,708,000 with the land area of 145,374 sq miles, which calls for tight living areas, not like that great wide open of America. You could compare it to the size of California, but a little smaller in size, but much larger in population.
