Japan is rich because of 'higher levels of religious belief'

[Taro Toporific]

Thou Shalt Not Increase G.D.P.
NYTimes.com by DANIEL GROSS October 3, 2004
CAN belief in heaven or hell be a competitive advantage for nations?....
...This "quantitative approach to the study of religion," as Professor McCleary calls it, rests on the assumption that religion can affect economics by fostering beliefs that influence productivity-enhancing traits...
In other words, countries' economies may perform best when people have relatively higher levels of religious belief than religious participation. Among the nations falling into this category are Japan, South Korea, Singapore and some Scandinavian countries - all of which performed well economically in the period studied. Countries in which belief was low compared with religious participation included India and many in Latin America.

[Samurai_Jerk]

I saw an article about that study a couple of weeks ago. When I first saw it I said the same thing .... JAPAN!?!?! But when you look at how loosely they define relgious belief it might make more sense:

This "quantitative approach to the study of religion," as Professor McCleary calls it, rests on the assumption that religion can affect economics by fostering beliefs that influence productivity-enhancing traits like thrift, hard work and honesty. A widespread feeling that such behavior may ultimately be rewarded (a belief in heaven), or that a lack of such behavior may be punished (a belief in hell) may therefore spur economic growth.

I would say that a lot of people in Japan do believe that.

[djgizmoe]

I don't know, I quess you can interpret relationships between any two groups of characteristics - GDP & religious belief, shoe size and air pollution output - but to imply causation? Lame.

Maybe Starbucks consumption and economic growth would be a more accurate correlation...but so freaking what?

And how do you really measure religious belief seperate from religious participation anyhoo?

[Samurai_Jerk]

That's why I think their definition of religious belief is so important. I also thinks it's a pretty poor one. Or at least the way it's presented in that very short hardly informative article. We'd probably have to actually read the study to form a valid opinion on it.

It would seem to me that they are basically just saying that a society's belief system (whether you want to call it religious or not) can have an effect on how successful they are economically. Well no shit.

Maybe it has something to do with the fatalism of Hinduism and Catholicism.

[Lifer]

you can interpret relationships between any two groups of characteristics - Lame.

I gotta agree there - and I have to question whether most Japanese are motivated by a belief in heaven or hell rather than just the feeling of generally not wanting to make waves in society (read "the neighborhood") or cause embarassement to the family. Though they have very strong religious beliefs regarding family and duty after death - I haven't really seen any evidence pointing to trying to get into any kind of heaven or avoid hell. Of course neither I nor my J wife are the least bit religious so I may have just missed out.

[Samurai_Jerk]

Right now I'm working on a theory that there is some sort of relation between Saudi Arabia's wealth and it's oil deposits.

[Taro Toporific]

[Taro Toporific]

[Samurai_Jerk]

I have to go with you Taro T. I don't know much about Singapore but Japan and Scandanavia are probably some of the worlds most agnostic societies.

But if Heaven = hard work leads to reward and Hell = laziness leads to failure then, yeah, they might have something. I'm glad you did the reading for me. Sounds like they are full of crap.

[Cubed]

This is yet another example of US writers reaching the wrong conclusions for the right reasons.

A classic used to be saying that Japan is an expensive country because the price of apples and muesli compared to the US was ridiculously high. Of course, such a sentiment was never widely reported by Japanese journalists going to New York and comparing prices of sea urchin sushi and shiso leaves.

The NY Times are a bunch of dolts - the frightening thing is that they're taken seriously in the US.

[Buraku]

JAPAN IS RICH !!!???? :P

thanks for the laugh, those NYtimes folk have really lost it this time


http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040924/ap_on_bi_ge/japan_debt_2

new record of 729.228 trillion

it will break the Ga-Zillion record soon, :P debt is getting so bad in Nippon that Japan looks to those backward South American banks with envy

http://www.businessweek.com/1998/20/b3578003.htm

http://www.garynorth.com/y2k/detail_.cfm/5971

http://forum.japantoday.com/m_112243/mpage_2/tm.htm

http://www.nbr.org/publications/executive_insight/no14/

[devicenull]

[Buraku]

nice pic