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Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues
Aug 10, 2004

Your golden handshake

What is the Japanese pension system?
JAPAN
Aug 8, 2004

Government eyes more local control of schools

Local governments may be empowered to do away with the current uniform elementary and junior high school years and set these periods according to local needs, according to a draft plan for reforming the nation's compulsory education system.
JAPAN
Aug 8, 2004

Government eyes more local control of schools

Local governments may be empowered to do away with the current uniform elementary and junior high school years and set these periods according to local needs, according to a draft plan for reforming the nation's compulsory education system.
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Aug 8, 2004

Happy Democrats suffer some nostalgia

WASHINGTON -- A lot of Democrats arrived home from the 44th national convention of their party happy that the performance of their new nominee exceeded their expectations and that the entire presentation was positive and error-free.
BUSINESS
Aug 7, 2004

State to stop civil servants' pay cuts

The government will stop cutting the basic salaries of civil servants in fiscal 2004, for the first time in six years, now that the gap has lessened between salaries in the public and private sectors.
BUSINESS
Aug 7, 2004

Daiei creditors to seek IRCJ help; Hawks may go

Daiei Inc.'s three main creditor banks are in the final stages of hammering out a plan to seek the help of the state-backed Industrial Revitalization Corp. of Japan to rescue the embattled retailer, sources said Friday.
BUSINESS
Aug 5, 2004

Large companies to lift capital spending by 7%

Large Japanese companies plan to boost capital spending by 6.9 percent in fiscal 2004 from the previous year, the first investment expansion in four years, the Development Bank of Japan said in a report released Wednesday.
BUSINESS
Aug 4, 2004

Tepco posts 54.17 billion yen profit

Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Tuesday its group net balance swung back into the black in the first three months of fiscal 2004, mainly because the restart of some of its nuclear power enabled it to cut large expenses for fossil fuel to run its thermal power plants.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 4, 2004

Life after the bomb

The Face of Jizo Rating: * * * 1/2 (out of 5) Director: Kazuo Kuroki Running time: 99 minutes Language: Japanese Currently showing [See Japan Times movie listings] The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 were Japan's single greatest catastrophe of World War II. They...
JAPAN
Aug 3, 2004

350 attend Asia-Pacific conference

About 350 alumni of the East-West Center from 23 countries attended the opening Monday of a three-day international conference in Tokyo organized by the Hawaii-based research and education institution.
BUSINESS
Aug 3, 2004

Tax revenues see 10.9% rise

Tax revenues rose 10.9 percent in June from a year earlier to 2.047 trillion yen for the fifth straight monthly increase, due to the widening economic recovery, the Finance Ministry said Monday.
BUSINESS
Aug 3, 2004

Land prices down for 12th year

The average price of land along select major thoroughfares was down this year for the 12th straight year, the National Tax Agency said Monday.
JAPAN
Aug 2, 2004

Law to bolster banks with public funds takes effect

A new law intended to strengthen the nation's financial system by allowing the government to inject public funds into financial institutions in a preventive manner took effect Sunday.
JAPAN
Aug 2, 2004

Law to bolster banks with public funds takes effect

A new law intended to strengthen the nation's financial system by allowing the government to inject public funds into financial institutions in a preventive manner took effect Sunday.
COMMENTARY
Aug 1, 2004

Mideast role challenges EU

PARIS -- France and Germany no longer make the law in Brussels. In spite of a long fight, they failed to get their Belgian candidate elected to head the European Commission and could only accept the appointment of Jose Durao Barroso, who, as prime minister of Portugal, backed U.S. intervention in Iraq....
BUSINESS
Jul 31, 2004

JAL narrows loss; ANA logs profit

Japan Airlines Corp. said Friday it posted a group net loss of 40.7 billion yen in the April-June quarter, compared with a 77.2 billion yen loss in the same period a year earlier.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Jul 31, 2004

I. Marek Kaminski

Many of the sequences in the life of I. Marek Kaminski have been beset by complications. Some were political, and not of his own making. Some were personal, and equally not of his making. His was the task of dealing with them instead of being defeated by them. He takes a broad view. "As a refugee, I...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jul 31, 2004

Cabinet OKs 48.2 trillion yen outlay cap

The Cabinet on Friday approved a 48.2 trillion yen ceiling for core policy-related outlays in the fiscal 2005 budget, kicking off the annual scramble by government ministries and agencies for public funding.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jul 30, 2004

Teachers develop trilingual textbook

OSAKA -- English teachers from Japan and South Korea who are trying to deepen international exchanges in Asia through language education have together developed a unique textbook.
BUSINESS
Jul 30, 2004

Matsushita sees 12-fold rise in profit

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. said Thursday its net profit for the April-June quarter soared 12-fold to 32.82 billion yen on strong sales of plasma display-panel TVs and cost-cutting efforts.
JAPAN
Jul 29, 2004

Pension delinquency down -- nominally

The delinquency rate for national pension premium payments fell to 36.6 percent in fiscal 2003 from a record 37.2 percent the previous year, with the number of people required to pay having declined, the Social Insurance Agency said Wednesday.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jul 28, 2004

Something for your head

Animators have always had a thing for Surrealism, going back to Disney's "Silly Symphonies" in 1934 and beyond. (Disney, in fact, collaborated with the most notorious Surrealist of all, Salvador Dali, on 1946's fabled "Destino" project.) Japanese animators, however, are the arch Surrealists of the movie...
EDITORIALS
Jul 28, 2004

Making the farm sector competitive

The government's economic and fiscal report for 2004, which was released last week, has a subtitle that sounds only too familiar: "No growth without reform." Yet the report deserves attention for two reasons. First, it focuses on the regional economy, a subject that has been more or less overlooked in...
BUSINESS
Jul 28, 2004

Local government tax subsidies fall for fourth year

Ordinary tax subsidies allocated to local governments for fiscal 2004 dropped 6.5 percent from the previous year to 15.87 trillion yen, down for the fourth year in a row, according to a report submitted Tuesday to the Cabinet.
BUSINESS
Jul 28, 2004

2005 budget outline promises 'effectively' lower outlays

The government's key policy-setting panel released a general outline Tuesday for the nation's core fiscal 2005 budget that aims at keeping general outlays "effectively" below levels seen this year.
BUSINESS
Jul 27, 2004

Store sales fell in first half of year

Sales at supermarkets and department stores in the first six months of 2004 fell from the same period last year on a same-store basis, according to industry data released Monday.
EDITORIALS
Jul 27, 2004

Worrisome muscle flexing

Relations across the Taiwan Strait continue to deteriorate. The re-election of Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian has alarmed the mainland government, which is convinced Mr. Chen seeks Taiwan's independence. China has been sending signals that it is prepared to take military action if Taipei takes that...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Jul 26, 2004

Separate but equal acts of reconciliation

NEW YORK -- In "My Life" (Knopf, 2004), former U.S. President Bill Clinton writes: "Elizabeth Eckford, who at 15 was deeply seared emotionally by vicious harassment as she walked alone through an angry mob, was reconciled with Hazel Massery, one of the girls who had taunted her 40 years earlier."
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Jul 26, 2004

Despite its luck, Japan must not shirk reform

In the July 11 House of Councilors election, the main opposition force -- the Democratic Party of Japan -- made big gains while the leader of the ruling coalition -- the Liberal Democratic Party -- fell short of its modest target of a one-seat gain. Nevertheless, the LDP-led coalition government still...

Longform

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