The Weight of the Yen

In the mid 1980s, the land in Tokyo and its surrounding area was thought to be worth more than the combined value of all real estate in the United States. Ten years later, with a banking system $400 billion in debt, the picture is entirely different. R. Taggart Murphy, an investment banker who lives in Japan, delves into the reasons for this backward fall in The Weight of the Yen. He details the Japanese political and economic systems and then nudges the finger of blame toward the country's civil service system--especially the Ministry of Finance--and to the mishandling of the U.S.-Japanese alliance.