Category: Econ & Business

The meaning of Ic(h)or

During a dinner conversation with friends on Thursday night, the subject of ichor came up. (Don’t ask – the gentlemen who mentioned it writes crossword puzzles for a living.) Not surprisingly, none of us had the slightest idea what he was talking about. It turns out that ichor is essentially the blood of the Gods.

From Wikipedia:

In Greek mythology, ichor (Greek ἰχώρ) was a mineral present in the blood of the gods that kept them immortal. It was sometimes said to have been present in ambrosia or nectar. When a god was injured and bled, the ichor made their blood poisonous to mortals.

But the word did ring vaguely familiar. After a few seconds, I remembered having heard it mentioned once in an international trade theory class. Of course, the professor wasn’t talking about Greek Mythology. Not being able to recall what the acronym stood for, I sought to commit it to memory. Here’s what I found.

According to Deardorff’s Glossary of International Economics

The amount of additional capital that a developing country requires to increase its output by one unit; thus the reciprocal of the marginal product of capital. Used as an (inverse) indicator of how efficiently a country is using the scarce capital it acquires.

Sound complicated? Actually, it’s really not all that difficult. It’s basically a measure of investment efficiency. Chi Hung Kwan explains in an essay written for the Japanese Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (REITI):

When considering investment efficiency in macroeconomic terms, the “incremental capital – output ratio (ICOR)” serves as a guide. ICOR is obtained by dividing the ratio of investment to GDP with real economic growth, and the smaller it is, the more efficient the investment.

Here are some comparative figures from Mr. Kwan’s essay:

Icor

So, there you have it. The hematological and economic significance of ic(h)or. Two of the most useful words in the English (and Greek) language(s).

Beneath Japan’s Cuteness

Yesterday Roy posted on Census-kun, the Giant Baby whose cuteness will compel all ethnic Japanese (and from the look of things, quite possibly Daniel Carl) to participate in counting Japan’s declining population, which is expected to peak at 127.74 million in 2006.

Not to be outdone, today I’d like to introduce readers to a valuable online resource that is not without its own brand of cuteness…The Ministry of Finance!

That’s right, The Ministry of Finance.

Seeing Census-kun reminded me of a user-friendly tax brochure the Ministry of Finance put out several years ago. The brochure, called “Let’s Talk About Taxes,” featured a cute claymation-like family of six who explores the wonderful world of government income and expenditure.

Who us? Cute?

Who, us? Cute?

Don’t let the cuteness fool you however. The contents of the brochure are excellent and provide a great introduction and overview to Japan’s current fiscal situation that most people might otherwise shy away from if it weren’t for the cartoon characters. Think of them as sugar coating on a bitter pill, or the lime wedge following a tequila shot.

But worry not dear reader, for the cuteness doesn’t end there. In visiting the MOF site I noticed a curiously cute button just above the one that takes you to the aforementioned tax guide. I clicked on it and the next thing I know I’m in Finance Town!

Go! Go! Finance Town!

In Finance town, visitors join the Finance kids, Noboru, Wataru, and Hikaru along with their two mouse-buddies and a lazy-ass cat called Doranyago, who wears a cape and superhero get up and apparently never pays his taxes. You can go fishing, perform high-flying acrobatics on the trapeze, or play dodge ball. Play the games, learn about the importance of paying taxes, and then go take the Finance Quiz. Perform well and make Doranyago pay his taxes!

Here again, don’t let the cuteness fool you. I actually learned a few things from the quiz. I don’t want to reveal too much for those of you who haven’t taken it yet, but I had no idea that there was 入湯税 in Japan, or that the symbol for a tax office on a map is patterned after the bead on an abacus!

Before the Zaibatsu

Time Asia has a great article on Osaka’s Kongo Gumi (金剛組) construction firm, which they describe as the world’s oldest family firm, but I suspect may actually be the world’s oldest continuously operated business of any kind. Sure, if you go back that far it’s probably the case that all businesses are family firms, but since today one term is a subset of the other, the latter is a bit more impressive to the ear.

Built to last

Of the 202 Buddhist sanctuaries in Osaka’s Tennoji neighborhood, there is one that stands out: Shitennoji, the first Japanese temple commissioned by a royal and one of the oldest Buddhist complexes in Japan. Construction began in A.D. 593, just decades after the religion reached the country’s shores. One of the carpenters for Shitennoji, Shigemitsu Kongo, traveled to Japan from the Korean kingdom of Paekche for the project. Over a millennium-and-a-half, Shitennoji has been toppled by typhoons and burned to the ground by lightning and civil war—and Shigemitsu’s descendants have supervised its seven reconstructions. Today, working out of offices that overlook the temple, Kongo Gumi Co. is run by 54-year-old president Masakazu Kongo, the 40th Kongo to lead the company in Japan. His business, started more than 1,410 years ago, is believed to be the oldest family-run enterprise in the world.

Kongo Gumi’s official corporate website is located here (in Japanese of course)

If you look at their ‘corporate summary’ page, you’ll see that their date of founding is listed as Asuka period, 6th year of the reign of the Bidatsu emperor, 30th emperor of Japan. To put that in perspective a little, this would be about the time that the Arthurian legends are generally believed to have been set, so for a more familiar equivalent, think about what it would be like if the construction company that had built Camelot were still in business-AND they’d kept up the maintenance on Camelot the whole time, so you could pay your five bucks admission to walk past the velvet rope in front of the Round Table, and get your photo taken in front of The Stone.

And yes, although now officially organized as a modern corporation, the CEO is still a Mr. Masakazu Kongo.

創業 飛鳥時代第30代敏達天皇6年(西暦578年)
社名 株式会社　金 剛 組
代表取締役 金 剛 正 和

Did you know that North Korea has an animation industry?

Uniting the Two Koreas, in Animated Films at Least (NYT)

“North Korean animators are excellent,” he added. “They learn quickly and work very hard.” The SEK animation studio in Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, which did the animation, has been involved in an array of international productions since the late 1990’s.

[…]

Mr. Shin has not finished working with North Korea, though. He said that both North and South Korea have agreed to produce his next project: a six-part animated series on Goguryeo, an ancient state that once occupied the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and much of Manchuria about 2,000 years ago. China recently created a furor in Korea when it claimed historical ownership of Goguryeo.

While South Korea is well known as a source of low-end cell drawing and inbetweening contractors for Japanese and American animation studios, the number of creative productions coming from that country has been dismally low. Despite being a fairly big animation fan, I have only seen a single long piece, a beautifully drawn film called Oseam, and a few shorts. Why after all these years is Korean animation so undeveloped? Why haven’t they benefited from this so-called ‘Korean wave’?

Media Executives Court China, but Still Run Into Obstacles

August 29, 2005
Media Executives Court China, but Still Run Into Obstacles
By GERALDINE FABRIKANT

In June, Yu Youjun, the executive deputy governor of Hunan Province, came to lunch accompanied by 16 dignitaries at the home in Beverly Hills of Sumner M. Redstone, the Viacom chairman.

Viacom, like many other American media companies, is already active in China. Its MTV network is carried in 10 million homes in Guangdong Province. Two-hour blocks of Nickelodeon programming like “CatDog” and “Wild Thornberries” are beamed on the government-run CCTV to more than 120 million homes.
Continue reading Media Executives Court China, but Still Run Into Obstacles

Walmart to Open in Japan

All these history posts are making my head hurt! Now let me depress you big time:

Seiyu To Open ‘Wal-Mart’ Supercenters Next Year

TOKYO (Nikkei)–Seiyu Ltd. (8268) will in 2006 start opening stores developed with Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and named after the U.S. retail giant, The Nihon Keizai Shimbun learned Tuesday.

Seiyu plans to open large outlets that combine supermarkets and discount stores. All of these so-called supercenters — Wal-Mart’s mainstay — will be developed jointly by the two companies, with some of them bearing the name “Wal-Mart Seiyu.” Candidate areas to host new supercenters include Hamamatsu, Shizuoka Prefecture.

These supercenters will offer discount prices on a regular basis under Wal-Mart’s everyday-low-prices concept. Although this marketing method is not widely popular among Japanese consumers, Seiyu will emphasize that the stores are operated under the Wal-Mart philosophy.

Personally, I am not the type to beatify Japan’s traditional culture or superior egalitarian values, but Walmart, I hope you agree, just sucks the big one. I went in there late at night the other weekend just to get soda and I was almost run over by some shitty teenager messing around on the fat-people-scooter they keep around. I mean, I go there to buy razors, but every time I’m there I silently pray that the big ugly Walmart will one day cease to exist, much as the Iraqis are friendly to American troops to their faces but secretly pray for their country to go back to normal as soon as possible.

Tabloid Journalism Trumps Politics in Taiwan

After reading the summary of Taiwan’s 2004 media space, make absolutely sure to read this translated article (plus comments) at the blog ESWN.

The most important thing to remember when reading this article, which is not made clear until the very end, is that the Libery Times (as well as its English languge subsidiary the Taipei Times) are ideologically in the pan-green, or pro independence, camp.

A detailed analysis of the Apple Daily-versus-Liberty Times consumer markets showed that the differences occurred in certain age groups and between urban-rural areas. Within the 30 to 34 age group, Apple Daily has 21.8% versus Liberty Times at 18%; within the 40 to 60 age group, Liberty Times is ahead. In the metropolitan areas, Apple Daily leads at 21.2% and Liberty Times only leads in the smaller towns and villages. Overall, the readership of Apple Daily is concentrated in the 12 to 39 age group, and that was the first time that Liberty Times got defeated in this group.

According to industry analysts, the traditional ecology of Taiwan newspapers has been thoroughly disrupted after Apple Daily entered the market two years ago. The two traditional large newspapers — United Daily News and China Times — were completely beaten by Apple Daily and Liberty Times in this survey. The “excellent tradition” of those two newspapers are slowly fading. The measures taken by the two newspapers in terms of editorial improvements have proven to be totally effective, so that the youth advantage of Apple Daily will continue to hold in the future.

Try reading this story in a Russian accent


Be fit with the help of video-player

18:32 2005-07-14
Lots of people dream of becoming fit and slim. Some of them keep to various diets, others prefer to exhaust themselves with endless physical exercises.

But in Japan people lose weight by playing video games. Dance Dance Revolution, a popular Japanese video game makes players leap around on a platform as instructed by arrows – up, down, right or left – to a throbbing techno beat. The moves get faster and harder as players get better, making the game arduous, addictive and inadvertently aerobic.

Matt Keane, now 21, became addicted by Dance Dance Revolution less than a year ago. At the start his weight was 209 kilograms. Dancing at the game platform he lost 68 kilograms.

A recent Pennsylvania study of 35 adolescents found that, on average, Dance Dance Revolution elevated players’ heart rates to double their resting level over a 45-minute period, according to one of the study’s coordinators, Stephen Yang.

“There is no doubt the games are great exercise,” Yang said, “but first and foremost, they’re fun.”

Usually a sedentary activity, video games might seem an unlikely weapon in the battle of the bulge. Earlier video games were blamed even for mass suicides. But over the past few years “exertainment” – a merging of exercise and electronic entertainment – has helped the industry’s image as well as its profit margins, says the AP.

With dance simulation video games making exercise fun and hip, parents, teachers and doctors are starting to pay attention. And manufactures are hoping to capitalize.

Obesity is quite a problem for many societies. Experts differ in ways to struggle obesity. Some of them advise to drink milk, others suggest not to watch TV, but now we know the correct answer – Dance Dance Revolution is the answer to all the health problems.

Give and take

The NYT reports on a little known industry that has been outsourced to China.

Own Original Chinese Copies of Real Western Art!

At 26, Mr. Zhang estimates that he has painted up to 20,000 copies of van Gogh’s works in a paint-spattered third-floor garret here where freshly washed socks and freshly painted canvases dry side-by-side on the balcony.

A block away, Ye Xiaodong, 25, is completing 200 paintings of a landscape of pink and white flowers in another third-floor garret. And down the street, Huang Yihong, also 25, stands in an art-packed store and paints a waterfall tumbling gracefully into a pool, mixing the paints on an oval palette.

China’s low wages and hunger for exports have already changed many industries, from furniture to underwear. The art world, at least art for the masses, seems to be next, and is emerging as a miniature case study of China’s successful expansion in a long list of small and obscure industries that when taken together represent a sizable chunk of economic activity.

I was a little but shocked and amused to get to the middle of the article and find out that the seat of production had formerly been near my hometown.

Northern New Jersey used to have a small but thriving cluster of businesses with artists churning out inexpensive paintings for restaurants, hotels and homes across the country. But these enterprises have been switching to imports, like the Dae Ryung Company, which had seven painters two decades ago at a studio attached to its offices in Hackensack, N.J., and let the last one leave four years ago without finding a replacement.

“In the beginning it was better here, because we were able to tell them exactly what we wanted,” said Helen Cho, the company’s purchasing and accounting manager. “But after a while, the Chinese caught on.”

Should New Jersey residents be upset that outsourcing has moved yet more crappy, pointless jobs out of our state to a faraway land where people will appreciate them more?

Two days later, the Times printed another article on another industry that is now just beginning to boom in New Jersey.

TEN years ago, New Jersey had 14 wineries. Today it has 27, and within the next year or so the number is expected to reach 40.

Ten years ago, New Jersey made 873,000 gallons of wine (about 360,000 cases). Now it makes almost twice that much, more than 1.5 million gallons. In 1995, it was eighth in the nation in wine production; now it is fifth, behind only California, New York, Washington and Oregon.

But one thing hasn’t changed in that decade of extraordinary growth for New Jersey wine: hardly anyone knows a thing about it. Less than 1 percent of the wine consumed in New Jersey was made in New Jersey – not surprising, considering that few restaurants serve it and few liquor stores carry it. Even experts like John Foy, a consultant who writes a wine column for The Star-Ledger of Newark and assembled the world-class wine list at Restaurant Latour in Hardyston, confess ignorance.

Amazing. Is there really still room for vineyards in the nations most populous state amidst the chemical factories and urban sprawl? Will The Garden State earn its name?

Addendum: A second newspaper reports on a long established Newark, New Jersey based manufacturer whose entire production has been outsourced.

Two busted with illicit beef

Today’s Taipei Times has this brief news item.

Two people were caught last Wednesday at the CKS International Airport trying to bring in beef from Japan, despite a ban on its import, the Taipei Customs Offices said yesterday. Japan is the only Asian victim of mad cow disease and has reported 20 cases since September 2001. The government has banned the import of Japanese beef since 2001. Inspectors seized nearly 20kg of frozen beef from the luggage of the two passengers, including a Taiwanese and a Japanese, when they arrived from Tokyo aboard a China Airlines flight. The smuggled beef was shipped to a quarantine center in Hsinchu where it will be destroyed.

It’s almost funny that Japan, which has had 20 confirmed cases of mad cow disease, has banned beef from the US, which has had no cases of human transmission in that same time period.