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Comment by iopq | Hacker News Reader

> If, as your post seems to be recommending, such regulations were abolished, Japanese farmers would pretty much cease to exist because of their inability to compete with cheaper imports.

Good, they can do something more useful with their time because Japan does not have a comparative advantage in farming. Having farms in Japan is very inefficient, since there are better regions to grow these crops.

Sure, you can't displace these farmers tomorrow, but slowly increasing the imports is a good idea. For one thing, it would decrease the cost of living for the average Japanese person, even if farmers are negatively affected.

Why is a farmer more important than a city dweller?

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I would assume because maintaining some level of domestic food production would be important for national security.

I would assume maintaining healthy trade relationships is important for food shortages like these, as well.

Is the claim here that Japan is not able to trade as often as it would like? That seems to be obviously wrong.

Of course it's not. When you erect trade barriers with other countries, they don't want to trade with you that much either. So exports to other countries are probably limited by the import policy of Japan, since they never made trade deals that lower tariffs on both ends.

But that is what is, in my opinion, obviously wrong. Go on a drive in any town in America and tell me there aren't a lot of Japanese products being sold here.

Which are much more expensive than American goods, which is what I'm saying is bad. If there isn't an extremely good trade deal between the two countries, then the tariffs will be high. Japan doesn't WANT a lot of American stuff, so they have no incentive to give a really good deal to American manufacturers.

http://www.cnbc.com/2017/02/10/trump-and-abe-us-may-struggle...

indeed, it seems it's hard to get a good trade deal with Japan (asking for low tariffs on American imports)

A Mazda is much more expensive than a comparable Ford?

You have to pay more for a Mazda than you otherwise would. It doesn't matter if Ford makes worse or more expensive cars.

And yet Japanese cars consistently are among the top sellers in the United States (and are hardly uncommon on most of the globe's continents). It seems to me that there is nothing "unhealthy" about Japanese trade relationships.

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