Auge y estancamiento de Japón (1955-2008). Una explicación marxista [Rise and standstill of Japan (1955-2008). A Marxist explanation]

The present study analyzes the economic Japanese performance according to Marxist political economy. In that sense, an estimation of the valorization process categories is made: profit rate, surplus rate, value capital composition and turnover speed. The Japanese economy is passing through a long period of two decades with low growth related to the world and Japan´s own recent history. There is a deep and constant fall in the profit rate, and its low levels since the nineties keeps Japanese capitalism in the current standstill situation. This work also presents data that refute “profit squeeze” explanations of the profitability fall, reinforcing those related to capital over-accumulation, due to increasing fixed capital to labor force. “Profit squeeze” theories ignore both the basic foundations of the wage income participation and the fixed capital consumption tendency to growth, as a particular income expression of fixed capital relative increase.