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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, APRIL 19, 1985
PAGE 9
buss in trade disputes with Japan•••• It makes much more sense
for America to concentrate instead on opening up those markets
where it can compete successfully•••• It also means more effort
from American firms and other foreign grumblers. They will have
to strive as hard as Coca-Cola has done in winning 60 per cent of
the Japanese soft-drinks market. How many foreigners bother to
learn Japanese? How many foreign companies have a Japanese on
their management team, or a Japanese non-executive director?
American Telephone and Telegraph, the deregulated telephone
giant, had only one salesman in Japan 18 months ago. Look no far
ther for an explanation of why it has failed to make much headway
into Nippon Telegraph and Telephone's domestic market.
This is mainly a Japanese and American row, but Western Europe
cannot afford to remain a spectator until the congress turns its
attention to agriculture, and the European common market's pro
tectionist agricultural policy, later this year. For if, despite
President Reagan's best efforts, an exasperated congress legis
lates an import surcharge, it may well be across-the-board, not
least because a measure against Japan alone would look racist.
The best way Europe can help the Reagan administration to avoid
this is to support efforts at the Bonn economic summit next month
to have a new round of Gatt trade negotiations in progress by
early next year.
The ECONOMIST alluded to the lack of sensitivity often displayed by Ameri
can exporters in adapting their products to the Japanese market. This was
evident the other evening in a televised report from Japan concerning Prime
Minister Nakasone's attempt to get his countrymen to buy more u.s.-made
products. From man-on-the-street interviews, two impressions were gained.
First, "made-in-America" products have a reputation for unreliable and
slipshod workmanship (a specific reference was made to appliances), much in
the same way Japanese products were considered thirty years ago in the U.S.
Secondly, several Japanese consumers complained about the lack of the use
of the Japanese language on many U.S. imports, especially food product
packages. The camera panned to some familiar American breakfast cereals,
the boxes of which contained information only in English.
Then too, it must be realized that although Japan is a modern, quite
materialistic society, it is not a consumer society along the American
model, as explained in this April 11, 1985 LOS ANGELES TIMES syndicated
column by Joseph Kraft:
Inscrutable Oriental mysteries like the Tea Ceremony•••come to
mind when people speak of "cultural obstacles" to economic coop
eration with Japan. But in fact such mundane things as patterns
of spending and savings are chiefly involved•••• Consider, first,
� avings. Japan is
E,2,!
a consumer society in the American fash
.!2!!• There� practically� credit cards. Nor are there con
sumer loans, with tax breaks, to ease the buying of homes or cars
or gadgets. On the contrary, the ordinary Japanese make pur
chases the old-fashioned way.
They � the money.
[ The
Japanese per capita savings rate is about 20 percent as compared
to the 5-6 percent range for Americans. ]
Major banks, with their huge deposits, are closely regulated by
government, as a means of guiding the development of industry.