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Research Paper - Ali Kilinc – 900235909

Mrs. Mandi Sena
ENG 191 – 3:30PM – 20424

12/1/2008

Japan
The Most Powerful Nation on the Planet

The world has changed more so in the past century than it ever has in

the past millennium. Many countries rose to power, and many countries fell

from power. Japan has taken great leaps in all forms of math, science, sports,

health and many more. The list of breakthroughs is unheard of and the

amount of information generated is unprecedented. Many people around the

world see the United States of America as the most powerful country in the

world. Just a century ago, the same image was seen of the United Kingdom.

When a country receives the perception, or “title” of the most powerful

country in the world, the country does not keep that title for long. The United

States of America has been dethroned in many areas of technology,

medicine, government infrastructure, currency value, quality of life, and

many others. The list goes on and on. Japan has proven itself to be the most

powerful country in the world, after the United States of America, by

demonstrating its excelling efforts in national health, technology, media,

education, and the overall quality of life.()

Japan has proven itself to be a powerful nation through its healthcare

system. The country of Japan has a national healthcare system available for

all of nation’s citizens. The country offers health insurance to hundreds of

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millions people, and is in fact compulsory if one is a citizen of their nation. A

multitude of healthcare services are offered free of charge which include

screenings for many different types of illnesses. Aside from that, there are

many other different types of government subsidized insurances for people

of types of income, especially for the elderly. This allows for the citizens of

Japan to live in peace and prosperity knowing that if something unfortunate

were to happen to them, their country would be there to take care of them. ()

This would give Japan’s citizens peace of mind in many ways.

The low obesity rate in Japan allows it to be a very powerful country.

The obesity rate around the world is rising every year with the U.S on top.

Oddly, while the U.S is the most powerful country in the world, they have the

highest obesity rate at about 31%. The second most powerful country in the

world, on the other hand, has the lowest obesity rate, at 3%. That’s about

one tenth of America’s rate. The obesity rate is an important factor for any

country because obesity leads to asthma, sleep apnea, heart disease,

diabetes, and many other horrible illnesses. If a person is plagued with many

illnesses, they would not live very long, and if a county is filled with people

who are constantly getting sick, or have many illnesses the peoples’

maximum lifespan and quality of life would decline. Furthermore, when the

people of a nation is not healthy, their health cost to the nation increases;

since the people of Japan are healthier than those of the U.S., the citizens

have a lower health cost. Also, the people of Japan have a healthier diet,

mainly consisting of rice and fish, compared to the junk food diet of
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Americans, which generally consists of meat and bread. Also coupled with

this diet is their lifestyle which requires more exercise. Even though the

people of America exercise more than people living in Japan, they are more

obese. The lifestyle and environment in Japan is healthier because it requires

more walking. These points on general health prove Japan to be a very

powerful country.()

The technology sector has proved to be very important in today’s

world, and as such Japan has proven itself in this field. Almost everything

that happens in the twenty-first century is connected in some way to

technology. Realizing this, the country of Japan has allocated fewer tax funds

to defense and the military, less than 1%, in lieu of other departments of

advancement.() The country uses a cabinet-level system for Science and

Technology to allocate and spend funds on technological development, which

leads to rapid advancement in many fields, a system that the U.S could, and

should adopt, but has not as of 2008.() Many of the world’s technological

headquarters are moving out of the U.S and moving into Japan because they

believe that Japan will be the technological capital of the world.() Japan is

leading in many areas of robotics; for example, most of the robots sold for

personal use are sold out of Japan. The Japanese have acclaimed such a

reputation with creating robots that their influence is even apparent in

American popular media. In 2007, the big-budget, American-made movie

Transformers, there is a scene where the main character’s vehicle transforms

into a robot; after this happens, the main character says, “It's a robot. You
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know, like a super advanced robot. It's probably Japanese. Yeah, it's definitely

Japanese.”() The country is also leading in the field of semiconductors, as in

parts for computers and cell phones, as well as sales of other types of

machine tools. The leading destination for Japanese machine tool exports is

the U.S. while Japan is the lowest buyer of the U.S.’s machine tools when

compared to countries like China, Germany, Canada, and the U.K.() This

means that Japan is selling tons of its machines to the U.S. and Japan is not

buying anything from the U.S. Considering all this, one would to think that

Japan is a better place to have the headquarters of a technological company

instead of the U.S., because Japan is one of the strongest countries in the

world, especially in the fields of machine and technology.

The world of video games is a media sector of the technology industry

that makes billions and billions of dollars each year, and Japan has proven

strong in this sector as well. The video game industry is a fairly new industry

as the first games started showing up in the early nineteen seventies, but

nevertheless it proves very important for influencing people around the

world. The first video games were coin-operated arcade machines, but that

market quickly rose and was also quickly losing interest. In a desperate

attempt to generate revenue, the video game industry entered the home

market in the late seventies. After only their second iteration of the home

console system, the U.S. based video game industry crashed in 1983

because too many unoriginal games had flooded into the market. The
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Japanese company Nintendo revived the defunct industry with the N.E.S1,

also known as the FamiCom2. () The N.E.S. sold over forty million units, and

the bundled game Super Mario Brothers, in many ways defined how games

were made from then on. () The Japanese continue to dominate the video

game industry in the twenty-first century. As of 2008, the video game

industry is in its seventh generation. The U.S.’s iteration in this generation is

the Xbox 360, made by Microsoft, launched on November 22, 2005. The

Japanese iteration into the seventh generation of video games is the Wii,

made by Nintendo, launched on November 19, 2006. Despite being launched

one year after its completion, the Wii has sold close to thirty-five million

units, compared to the Xbox 360’s twenty-two million units.() () Video games

can help in rehabilitating the elderly, and it can help in schools’ fitness

programs. Video games are very important and highly influential in the

twenty-first century, and the country of Japan has proven time and time

again that they can lead this industry.

Another very important point is the quality of life in Japan, which

proves it to be a powerful country. There are many factors which determine

quality of life and Japan has made great strides to improve the quality of life

in many parts of the country. For example, technology plays a huge role in

the quality of one’s life. Millions of Japanese citizens no longer carry any sort

of physical money, any ID, any credit cards or any other form of

1
N.E.S.: Nintendo Entertainment System
2
FamiCom: Family Computer. The N.E.S. was known as the FamiCom in Japan.
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identification. Millions of citizens no longer have to worry about their

security, or their cash being stolen. This is due to the use of eWallet. This

system of information and security is accessed through the cell phone. It

stores credit card information, identification as well as many and all forms of

security required; when the user wants to purchase something or when the

user is required to provide ID, the only thing the user has to do to is to wave

their phone, and the RFID3 chip built inside the phone sends the information

to the receiver. The phones also have build in GPS4 chips if stolen. This

technology has been implemented, and has been in use for many, many

years; thousands of retail locations all over the country have implemented

systems to accommodate such devices and accept eWallet payments.()

Another example of the technologies that improves the quality of life in Japan

is the paperless toilet. In the early nineteen-eighties, an invention

revolutionized using the restroom. In Japan, there are toilet systems that do

not require toilet paper for proper hygiene. The paperless toilet utilizes an

automatic water-jet that cleanses the front and rear part of the body with the

push of a button. After the water-jet, an air blower, the same kind used for

drying hands, is used to dry the areas. This system does away with

traditional toilet paper, improves hygiene because the areas are actually

cleansed with water, and adds convenience because everything is

automated, so the user’s hands do not touch those areas. Furthermore, trees

3
RFID: Radio Frequency Identification
4
GPS: Global Positioning System
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are not wasted and turned into toilet paper, just to be flushed down the

drain. These types of technologies that every-day, ordinary people of Japan

use greatly improve their quality of life and put the people at ease, once

again proving Japan to be a very powerful country. There are many other

sectors which prove Japan’s superiority as a nation though, besides its

technology sector.

Finally, with its fantastic education program, Japan is obviously one of

the most powerful countries in the world. Having an educated population is

essential to having a powerful country. The people of Japan, more

importantly the younger population, view primary as well as higher

education, an essential part of life and pursue it passionately. The education

system of Japan is fantastic. With the post-war education reform, the country

of Japan has proven itself in many areas of math and science time and time

again as the top country in education. The students of Japan are not as

exhausted by attending school as much as the student in the U.S., and as

such, they are more enthusiastic to attend, and they are more motivated to

graduate. The students are not exhausted because they spend less time

being lectured in schools and spend more time studying at their own pace.

“Studies have repeatedly found no correlation between time spent at school

and levels of achievement.” (Baines, 2008) The students in Japan are also

assigned less homework when compared to the U.S; yet the students still

score higher in Japan on test scores. On the other hand, although the
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students spend fewer hours in school5, but they attend more days of school,

as opposed to the U.S. average6. Quite different from the U.S education

system, attendance to high school in Japan is not mandatory; despite this,

the attendance rate is extraordinarily high. This system of fewer hours, more

days, has proven to be highly effective in Japan because the graduation rate

for high school students is also fantastically high (89%) when compared to

the U.S (75%).() In addition, in some parts of the Japan the attendance rate

for college out of high school is very amazing, 99% in those areas. () The

education system in Japan is set up in a way that encourages students to

pursue higher education. () This is done through a process where in some

areas of the country, if a student graduates from high school, the student

automatically enrolls into a university, such as The University of Tokyo. This

type of education system makes Japan a very powerful country.

The world has changed. The wars never end, and on the one hand, the

United States of America has decided to give a lot of its attention to fighting

wars. Japan, on the other hand, has decided to stay out of wars, and in the

meantime, has been playing the catching up game to be the most powerful

country in the world. So far they’ve been succeeding, and they’ve triumphed

over the U.S. in education and technology. The country has even found ways

to inspire its young generation to high school, graduate, and then pursue

5
The students of Japan spend a total of about 650 hours in school per year. 3 (hours) X 220
(days) = 660
6
The students of the U.S.A. spend a total of about 1100 hours in a school per year. 6 (hours)
X 180 (days) = 1080
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college; more students graduate from high school in Japan then they do in

the U.S. They proved that their machines and robots are better than the

U.S.’s. The country has even excelling in sports for further consolation; they

won the World Baseball Classic in 2006.() The highest import for machines in

the U.S is from Japan. Japan is second in number of millionaires in the whole

world, second only to the U.S. with a higher percentage than the U.S. as

well.()Taking all of this into consideration, one can easily come to a

conclusion; Japan is the close second most powerful country in the world.

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