<story><title>Japan Falls into Recession</title><url>http://online.wsj.com/articles/japan-falls-into-recession-1416182404</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>akg_67</author><text>We have been traveling in Japan for past 4 weeks (another 2 weeks to go). Talking to regular folks, there seems to be divergence between what regular folks thinks need to be done compared to government.&lt;p&gt;The regular folks want to see Dollar-Yen parity. As Yen drops, things become more expensive and regular folks cut back more on spending. I am not sure why increasing cost of imports doesn&amp;#x27;t show up as inflation. Things would have been worse if not for drop in oil prices (major import for Japan). These folks don&amp;#x27;t believe dropping Yen is the solution as majority of investment by Japanese companies is outside Japan and weaker Yen just reduces that investment, in turn less profit flow back in the country.&lt;p&gt;The expectation of deflation is deeply rooted in regular folks. Everyone is waiting to spend on large items, just not right now. Land prices are falling so no one wants to buy a house now. We were interested in buying a place in Sapporo but everyone told us to wait until we really need to buy. An apartment costing $200-300K rents for $500-700&amp;#x2F;mo in Sapporo compared to similar place in Seattle renting for $1,000+&amp;#x2F;mo. One of our friend mentioned that they just sold their house in Sapporo and had to offer healthy discount to the buyer.&lt;p&gt;I don&amp;#x27;t have a solution to Japan&amp;#x27;s problems. But QE, weaker Yen, and raising taxes doesn&amp;#x27;t appear to be the solution. Rolling back tax increases may be a start in the right direction.&lt;p&gt;Regular folks seems to have better pulse on the problem than establishments.</text></comment>
<story><title>Japan Falls into Recession</title><url>http://online.wsj.com/articles/japan-falls-into-recession-1416182404</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>skwirl</author><text>Here&amp;#x27;s an article that&amp;#x27;s not behind a paywall: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.bbc.com/news/business-30077122&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.bbc.com&amp;#x2F;news&amp;#x2F;business-30077122&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>