The Comparative Study Of Government Debts Between Japan And America

The alert of European sovereign debt crisis has not been lifted yet. In the background of the downturn of global economy, Japan and the United States of America, as two giant economies, cannot be immune. Japan has experienced two consecutive "lost decade", while the implementation of expansionary fiscal policy expanded its government debt. Though Japanese government debt has several characteristics which is different from certain European countries deeply stuck in sovereign debt crisis. However, without fiscal reconstruction, Japan there may face the serious outbreak of the government debt crisis in the future.As the world’s largest debtor nation, the United States can also not make both ends meet in recent years. Standard&Poor’s downgrade of U.S. government debt rating in2011and the "fiscal cliff" crisis at the end of2012reflected the deterioration of its financial situation, thus exerted a dramatic influence on the global capital markets.Though the problems of Japanese and U.S. government debt are troublesome, not the same as some European countries, they have not been evolved into a government debt crisis, which is determined by the characteristics of the two respective traits of government debt. It is also focused on by scholars. The problems of government debt between Japan and the U.S. have something in common, such as the characteristics of causes. While factors which trigger problems of government differ, the manifestations differ, thus the impacts and measures of solving it differ.This paper contain six parts, beginning with the introduction, which clarifies the background and meanings of this selected topic. In the literature review, relevant literatures about Japanese and U.S. government debt were separately introduced and analyzed. Finally in this part, the main innovation and deficiencies of this paper are described. The second part narrates the history of the evolution for Japan and the U.S., government debt respectively, describes the origin of the problems of two country. The third part summarizes the common points of Japanese and U.S. government debt problems by analyzing the external environment, the root causes and constraints aspects. The fourth part tells different points on problems between Japanese and U.S. government debt from four angles, including induced factors, manifestations, effects of and solutions.The fifth part discusses the revelation, which the government debt problems to China and makes recommendations for improvement of China’s fiscal policy, which is practically significant.