Wholesale distributors must consolidate or perish. Perhaps the Japanese are not ready for the end of their particular form of welfare state. The government's recent extension of unemployment insurance is a step in the right direction. Some people also argue that the Japanese will not tolerate the inequality that a more competitive society would bring. But that, says Heizo Takenaka of Keio University, is more a reflection of the past than the present.
Recent studies suggest that income inequality in Japan is nearing American levels.
The Japanese attachment to equality is sentimental and illusory. That leaves the question of speed. The Japanese have been conditioned to fear isolation from the group. People all over Japan dutifully observe rules that no longer have any purpose, and perhaps never did. Yet when change does come, it comes very quickly because everybody embraces it at the same time.