https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?QueryId=107229
Human Capital (let's take Pisa scores as a proxy):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programme_for_International_St...
GDP growth, JPN vs US
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/national-gdp-constant-usd...
(Worth pointing out that the US population has grown by ~1/3 whilst Japan has remained about constant, so per capita the effect is not as pronounced)
Great example: https://youtu.be/Km6bFBSVty4?t=74
https://www.pastposters.com/details.php?prodId=4514 https://filmandfurniture.com/2014/09/blade-runner-design-whi...
Books: Necromancer etc.
Good compilation:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/JapanTakesOverTh...
Stepping back... having higher "productivity" or "GDP growth" does not make a cut-and-dry "winner". Everything is a trade-off.
OK, so what's the upside to working almost twice as long to achieve the same output as an American? Doesn't seem to be happiness, because Japan seems to score a good deal lower there as well, and that's after GDP adjustment:
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gdp-vs-happiness?country=...
As I said, I'm aware of plenty of metrics that Japan does significantly better than the US on, but I'd like to see one that's linked to low productivity and low growth.
Excluding totalitarian communist monarchies, the Japanese are, human-capital adjusted, about the least productive people on earth. So they are not actually "focusing on the problem".
> Has that prevented them from advancing as a society? No.
The US pumped out a number of popular and populist movies and books in the 80ies and 90ies that betray a real fear of being overtaken by Japan. The notion seems completely ridiculous nowadays, and a glance of the GDP development of both countries over the last four decades will immediately make clear why.
> Has that prevented new innovations? Certainly not.
So what important innovations have come out of Japan in the last 40 years?
Japan has a lot of admirable qualities, but a pragmatic focus on productivity and innovation is not one of them.