Reuters has published an extremely interesting article on Shinzo Abe, the father of so-called 'Abenomics'. His economic policy is in essence little more than a warmed-up hoary inflationism, the quack cure that governments have employed throughout history in attempts to 'fix' their economies. It always 'feels good' in the beginning, as asset prices rise and numerous economic activities are set into motion that would never be considered absent the inflationary policy. What happens in the end is best summarized in the conclusion to a speech Fritz Machlup once delivered on the consumption of capital in Austria during the interwar period:
“Austria was successful in pushing through policies which are popular all over the world. Austria has most impressive records in five lines: she increased public expenditures, she increased wages, she increased social benefits, she increased bank credits, she increased consumption. After all these achievements, she was on the verge of ruin.”
The main difference is perhaps that Japan is on the verge of ruin already, at least its government is. On the other hand, Japan also still has a lot of wealth that can be consumed and destroyed by Abe's policies. The de facto insolvency of the government is not an obstacle to additional wealth destruction, quite the contrary in fact.
Japan's current economic policy also has strong mercantilist overtones, as the devaluation of the currency is held to help its export sector. That this is to the detriment of everyone else in Japanese society as a rule remains unmentioned in the press, as it remains unmentioned that the export sector can at best hope to increase its profits temporarily, namely until prices and wages in Japan have adjusted to the devaluation. On the whole, Japan will end up poorer than it was prior to devaluation – and that is without considering the growing potential for a crisis that utterly destroys its currency and makes its outstanding stock of debt worthless.
Japan-Style National Socialism
However, as the Reuters article points out, 'Abenomics' is really not much more than an afterthought to Abe's true agenda, an add-on he thought of because a number of polls indicated that it would be politically more opportune to pursue the 'reflation' of the economy first.
His real goal however is to alter Japan's constitution in order to make it more similar to that of pre-war Japan. He and his clique of closest supporters call themselves 'true conservatives', but it would be more fitting to call them 'nationalists'. In fact, the overall political agenda is best described as national socialist.
