Osamu Nakamura

The book describes the structure of Keynes-Leontief Model (KLM) of Japan and discuss how the Japanese economy could overcome the long-term economic deflation since the mid-1990s. The large scale econometric model and its analysis have been important for planning several policy measures and examining the economic structure of a country. However, it seems that development and maintenance of the KLM would be very costly. The book discusses how the KLM is developed and employed for the policy analyses.

The Japanese economy has experienced a structural deflationary gap since the mid-1970s. Although the gap was decreasing in the bubble period, the deflationary economy has become more serious since the bursting of the bubble. Accordingly, this book attempts to examine the causes of the Japanese deflationary economy, characterized as a structural deflation and discusses how to alleviate the prolonged slowdown in order to restore Japan to a trajectory of high economic growth, with a special focus on the function of income distribution. In addition, not only income distribution flows but also accumulation of assets and debts in the household sector are taken into account for improving the prolonged economic stagnation of Japan by employing an econometric analysis with modeling and forecasting techniques. Furthermore, this book makes a long-term forecast of the Japanese economy, up to the fiscal year 2030, with policy scenario simulations in order to capture the long-term growth path of the Japanese economy and to analyze the effects of alternative policies on the economy.