WORSE IN JAPAN?
A worried discussion is going on.in the Japanese press over the correct name for the present economic situation. Is it a "recession," a "depression," the "eve of a panic," or a "panic'?
Even the Asahi Geino, a weekly noted for rather lurid material on the country's sex life, ran a heavy-weight article in its July 4 issue, "The Shadow of Economic Panic Hanging Over the Japan Islands,
The article maintains that Japan is on the verge of an economic panic. It draws parallels between the present situation and the economic panic in Japan around 1930.
Some interesting figures are presented on the present situation, Between last January and March, for instance, there were 2,520 cases in which 41,569 workers complained that they were not paid their wages,
The number of companies facing bankruptcy up to May was 2,464 which is 86% of the entire last year's figure.
Old-time cabaret managers who recall the 1930's think the situation is worse today than then. Many women, they report, are coming to Tokyo from the Tohoku area, "wishing to make money as ‘night butterflies.!"
In 1931 in the same area daughters of farmers were sold for prostitution or as geisha. This is now prohibited. Nevertheless an illegal trade in girls is going on, according to the report.
Other weeklies are taking a less gloomy attitude, many of them simply calling the present situation an "age of bankruptcy."
Reports about bankruptcies have, in fact, given rise to considerable nervousness. The July 4 Sunday Mainichi reported. that a baseless rumor caused a run on a cooperative that_could not be stop- ‘ped until it piled up 500,000,000 yen [$1,389,000] in banknotes in front of its depositors.
JAPANESE