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Gearoid Reidy
Japan Times
CULTURE / TV & Streaming
Feb 9, 2023
‘The Last of Us’ shows it pays to take gaming seriously
The TV series' critical and commercial success signals the potential rise of video game adaptations.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Feb 2, 2023
Superheroes need not apply for the BOJ’s top job
The challenges facing Kuroda’s BOJ successor look almost conventional. There’s no sense of national peril this time.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 27, 2023
Begging Japanese companies to hike wages is not the answer
Japan’s prime minister is asking employers to pay workers more. He should make the market do that instead.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 27, 2023
Kuroda’s head-fakes make the unthinkable plausible
Skepticism about the Bank of Japan’s intentions is clouding Gov. Haruhiko Kuroda's last months on the job.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 25, 2023
The growing comprehension gap that isolates Japan
Japan's central bank governor and the market are talking at cross-purposes. It shows a country that’s both badly understood and a poor communicator.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 13, 2023
Japan’s standing is rising, but not so for its leader
Japan's significance as a geopolitical power has rarely been higher, but that's little solace for its unloved prime minister, Fumio Kishida.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 9, 2023
Don’t pay people to leave Tokyo. Make more Tokyos.
Trying to arrest rural depopulation, Japan wants people to quit Tokyo, its greatest metropolis. How about creating new ones instead?
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Dec 30, 2022
‘Avatar’ performance shows how Japan is ditching Hollywood
The world's third-largest box office, Japan, is dumping Western movies for local animated hits. Hollywood needs to pay attention.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Dec 28, 2022
Haruhiko Kuroda spent 2022 showing the courage to be disliked
Bank of Japan Gov. Haruhiko Kuroda ticked nearly everyone off in a chaotic year. He won't care.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Dec 21, 2022
Master of surprise Kuroda does it one more time
An unexpected BOJ policy tweak stunned markets. Expect central banking's biggest outlier to keep confounding investors.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Dec 15, 2022
The fight to build up Japan’s military is just beginning
The famously pacifist nation's plans to double defense spending are both welcome and overdue. Now Japan needs to find a way to pay for them.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 14, 2022
A SoftBank buyout would look more like Musk than Dell
Rumors persist that SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son wants his company to go private. It's a good idea, if he can afford it.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Dec 8, 2022
These are not the most expensive cities — unless you are an expat
Lists of the world's priciest urban centers assume you're a tennis-playing, vermouth-drinking expat paid in dollars with a maid and a car.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Dec 7, 2022
Japan needs billionaires like Jack Ma, not just more tourists
Japan has much to offer the ultrarich — it now needs to figure how to attract more of them given how much more money they spend than the average tourist.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Nov 30, 2022
China’s video game ambitions threaten to one-up Japan
Along with the EU, the world's second-largest economy, China, wants to use gaming to promote soft power. Japan should take that as a warning.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 24, 2022
Musk must preserve Twitter’s most vital function
The platform's experience in Japan shows how it can play a crucial role in providing a public service during times of disaster — if Elon Musk doesn't break it.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Nov 17, 2022
Property markets work better when the line doesn’t always go up
Japan's housing sector has been flat for years. But if dwellings are plentiful and attainable, why should that be a bad thing?
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Nov 16, 2022
Markets’ magical thinking on China has extended to the BOJ
After tying themselves in knots over Xi Jinping's 'COVID zero' policy, it looks like investors are doing the same with Japan's central bank.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Nov 9, 2022
Breaking Japan’s cash habit by nudging wage earners
The Japanese government plans to pay workers directly into digital wallets to move them off cash and into virtual payments.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Nov 4, 2022
North Korea missile salvo hits the law of diminishing returns
These days, markets are more concerned with U.S. Fed Chief Jerome Powell than North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his missiles. So what's Pyongyang's game plan?

Longform

Professional cleaner Hirofumi Sakurai takes a moment to appreciate some photographs in a Gotanda apartment whose occupant died alone. 
The last cleanup: Life and death in a lonely Japan