Post-Defeated Phoenixes

Noah Smith blogs about Japan. 

Despite its lost decade Japan kept unemployment low with worksharing.

Germany’s Jobless Numbers Buck Euro Zone Trend by Floyd Norris

IN unemployment, as in many other areas, Germany stands alone at the top of the euro zone.

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Off the Charts: In Jobs for Young, Germany Stands Alone

The European Union’s statistical agency, Eurostat, reported this week that the unemployment rate among German adults fell to 5.1 percent in June, the lowest figure since the country was unified in 1991.

Japan and Germany have done well despite having been destroyed at the end of World War II.

In the 1990s, Professor Bernanke and others criticized Japan's economic mismanangement. Today the U.S. has 8.3 unemployment and  we will have to wait 10 years or so until full employment. In the 1990s, American economists mocked European welfare states with their sky-high unemployment. Today the U.S. economy suffers from a large output gap and slow growth for the foreseeable future. The periphery of Europe like Spain is suffering Great Depression like conditions but the German welfare state is doing well with 5.1 percent unemployment. Although a Euro-wide recession is starting to weigh on Germany also.