Japan’s found decade

Eamonn Fingleton, an ex-pat Irish financial journalist who lives in Tokyo, takes a decidedly contrarian view of the Japanese economy. Far from stagnating for 20 years, as received media wisdom would have it, Japan's economy has been ticking along just fine, he contends. Guest-blogging for James Fallows at TheAtlantic.com website (where Contrarian will take a guest-blogging turn the week of March 14), Fingleton cites a couple of inconvenient facts in support of his analysis: Japan's current account surplus in 1990, regarded as the onset of its 20-year economic malaise, stood at $36 billion. By last year, it had risen to $194 billion. Over the...