Japan's effort to rein in soaring health-care costs threatens to become a source of tension in economic relations with the U.S. after running into opposition from the American pharmaceutical industry. While the U.S. Commerce Department sees Japan's drug market, the world's third-largest, as the top ...

Japan needs to hold fast in limiting the rise of social welfare spending, said Minister of Health, Labor and Welfare Katsunobu Kato in a recent interview. To meet a spending limit set in fiscal 2015, Kato said he wants to adhere to a ¥500 billion ...

Millennials in Japan have little interest in the job-hopping ways of their overseas counterparts, seeking stability and security instead. That is thwarting the Bank of Japan's efforts to jolt the economy back to life. By some measures, young Japanese today face the best job market ...

Mandatory quotas for hiring and promoting women are options Japan could consider to take its "womenomics" push to the next level, according to the social policy chief at the OECD. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's government deserves credit for striving to improve the status of women ...

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is being trumped by Trump — in the sweets department. Sales of Lucky Trump cookies, maple-flavored and featuring a cartoon image of U.S. President Donald Trump, initially outpaced those of bean-paste filled buns bearing Abe's image, according to vendors who sell ...

Every spring people across Japan are enraptured as the cherry trees explode into bloom, clothing the country in pink. The blossoms last for only a few short weeks, but in that time the fleeting flowers make for good business. The blossoms are a gift to ...

The Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement, which U.S. President Donald Trump backed his country out of on Monday, is actually the best way to achieve the fair trade in Asia that he promised American voters, former Japanese economy minister Akira Amari has said. A ratified TPP ...

Nagisa Hirai was an active child who loved playing soccer with the boys. But that early happiness dissipated on her first day at elementary school when she became frightened after being unable to find her classroom. Over time, she became a hikikomori, a Japanese term ...

Japan's population is declining, deflation has returned, and the nation's economy is still stuck in cycle of weak, stop-start growth. And yet, there are a number of hidden and underutilized resources that Japan could tap to try to escape this economic malaise. The Organization for ...

Japan remains eager to host Chinese Premier Li Keqiang before the year is out, even as territorial tensions flare in the East China Sea with a pick up in military ships and planes traversing the area. Top government spokesman Yoshihide Suga said Japan is working ...