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Rich Miller
For Rich Miller's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:
Gross domestic product data released on Thursday showed the U.S. economy ended the year with a bang, while China is struggling under the weight of a yearslong real estate bust and its worst streak of deflation in some 25 years.
BUSINESS / Economy
Jan 26, 2024
U.S. extends lead over China in race for world’s biggest economy
China was expected to experience a fast recovery as it reopened its economy fully after strict COVID-19 lockdowns, but that hasn't happened.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
May 1, 2023
Jerome Powell could face more opposition as Fed choices get tougher
Federal Open Market Committee voters have to decide whether to continue the inflation fight or try to cushion a slowing economy.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Jan 13, 2023
World economy walks tightrope between recession and soft landing
A variety of factors are combining to dissipate some of the gloom that engulfed financial markets at the end of 2022.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Jan 9, 2023
Economists fret over perils ahead for global growth
The world economy may be shifting to a more difficult era where interest rates will be higher, geopolitical tensions greater and uncertainties more pronounced.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Nov 28, 2022
There’s a job-market riddle at the heart of the coming recession
Almost three years after COVID-19 hit, companies around the world still complain that they can't get the talent they need.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Aug 29, 2022
‘Inflation fever’ is finally breaking, but central banks won’t stop hiking rates
The major global central banks, which failed to see the pandemic price shock coming, are set to press ahead with interest-rate increases even as headline inflation tops out.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Feb 14, 2022
$100 oil threatens to compound world economy’s inflation shock
The U.S. Federal Reserve and fellow central banks are worried as they seek to contain the strongest price pressures in decades without derailing recoveries from the pandemic.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Dec 16, 2021
Jerome Powell declares inflation big threat as Fed signals rate hikes
In an abrupt shift, the Fed sped up the drawdown of its asset-purchase program and laid out a plan for a series of interest-rate increases over the coming years.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Dec 1, 2021
U.S. Fed chair ditches ‘transitory’ tag and paves way for a rate hike
Many in the market took the buzzword to mean the Fed expected price pressures to be short-lived. Powell said policy makers intended it to mean something different.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy / ANALYSIS
Apr 4, 2021
World economy risks ‘dangerously diverging’ even as growth booms
It could take years for swaths of the world to join the U.S. and China in fully recovering from the pandemic.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / FOCUS
Aug 24, 2020
Jackson Hole conference goes virtual as monetary experts discuss life after ‘peak central banking’
After convening every August since 1982 at the edge of Wyoming’s magnificent Teton mountain range, monetary policymakers will hold a virtual Jackson Hole conference this week that will look pale by comparison. The same could probably be said of the central banks themselves.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Apr 6, 2020
Reeling world economy slammed by dangerous disinflationary shock
The sinking global economy is suffering through a colossal disinflationary shock that could briefly push it into dangerous deflation territory for the first time in decades.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy / FOCUS
Mar 23, 2020
Top economists see echoes of depression in U.S. economy's sudden halt
The U.S. is entering a recession. The ultimate fear is that could turn into a protracted malaise that has some flavor of a depression.
BUSINESS / Markets
Dec 18, 2017
Central banks quietly trim stimulus while hoping to maintain global growth
Central bankers are gingerly trying to take away the punch bowl without interrupting the party.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Markets / FOCUS
Oct 3, 2016
BOJ seen adopting American WWII rate-pegging ploy to spark inflation
In deciding to target bond yields, Japan is deploying a monetary strategy to combat deflation used by its former enemy in World War II. The trouble is that America's experience back then suggests the tactics probably will not work on their own.
BUSINESS / ANALYSIS
Sep 20, 2016
With no growth locomotive, world economy struggles to gain speed
Here's what's wrong with the world economy: No nation has the will or the way to be the locomotive for global growth.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Aug 16, 2016
IMF's radical wage plan for Japan turns Nixon policy on its head
In a sign of how worried it is about Japan's economy, the International Monetary Fund is urging the country to resurrect a radical strategy once employed by former U.S. presidents Nixon, Ford and Carter — only in reverse.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Jul 19, 2016
Helicopter cash presents hopes for Japan, but history shows it can trigger hyperinflation
As Bank of Japan Gov. Haruhiko Kuroda confronts pressures to launch helicopter money, he could do a lot worse than remember the life — and death — of Viscount Korekiyo Takahashi.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Markets
Jun 17, 2016
The only certainty for world's central bankers is uncertainty
From the immediate possibility of Britain leaving the European Union to the longer-term consequences of aging populations, the world's major central banks this week just are not sure what to do next.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Nov 11, 2015
Japan's lost decade has lesson for those dreading China slowdown
When Japan's economy downshifted dramatically in the 1990s, the rest of the world managed to do just fine. Now, as China suffers a sustained slowdown, there's a group of economists who say the same may well happen again.

Longform

Later this month, author Shogo Imamura will open Honmaru, a bookstore that allows other businesses to rent its shelves. It's part of a wave of ideas Japanese booksellers are trying to compete with online spaces.
The story isn't over for Japan's bookstores