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Japan's industrialized, social market economy is the world's third-largest, adjusted to purchasing power parity (PPP), after the United States and People's Republic of China. Also, Japan is the world's second-largest economy by real GDP, nominal GDP and by market exchange rates. Its economy is highly efficient and competitive in areas linked to international trade although productivity is lower in areas such as agriculture, distribution, and services. Government-industry cooperation, a strong work ethic, mastery of high technology, and a comparatively small defense allocation have helped Japan advance with extraordinary speed to become one of the largest economies in the world. Its reservoir of industrial leadership, well-educated and industrious work force, high savings and investment rates, and intensive promotion of industrial development and foreign trade have produced a mature industrial economy.
Distinguishing characteristics of the Japanese economy include the cooperation of manufacturers, suppliers, distributors, and banks in closely-knit groups called keiretsu; the powerful enterprise unions and shuntō; cozy relations with government bureaucrats, and the guarantee of lifetime employment (shushin koyo) in big corporations and highly unionized blue-collar factories. Recently, Japanese companies have begun to gradually move away from some of these norms in an attempt to increase their global competitiveness and profitability (the latter due mostly to their increased reliance on equity rather than debt financing).
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