via NYT
>
Source:
When Consumers Cut Back: A Lesson From Japan
HIROKO TABUCHI
NYT, February 21, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/22/business/worldbusiness/22japan.html
Category: Consumer Spending, Digital Media, Economy
Please use the comments to demonstrate your own ignorance, unfamiliarity with empirical data and lack of respect for scientific knowledge. Be sure to create straw men and argue against things I have neither said nor implied. If you could repeat previously discredited memes or steer the conversation into irrelevant, off topic discussions, it would be appreciated. Lastly, kindly forgo all civility in your discourse . . . you are, after all, anonymous.
Average vs median. Income inequality in Japan among the middle class is skyrocketing but you wouldn’t know it from that chart. Guess the NYT didn’t want to scare folks.
looks just like the US doesn’t it?
The scales on these graphs are different. The percentage drop in spending is less than the percentage drop in income, although you wouldn’t know if based on the first glance at the graph. The drop in the savings rate is very dramatic.
If the NYT is going to show Average Household Spending it needs to show Average Household Income. Otherwise it looks like Average Income in 1985 was $35,000 and Average Spending was $36,000 ( = $3000 x 12 months). But somehow the savings rate was 15%.