Among other countries, Japan was one of the countries that participated in the G8 summit in Canada :

In the video, it looked as if Prime Minister Naoto Kan (菅直人) was excluded from the group. He was physically outside the circle of the leaders of major countries. Obama, stop hogging all the attention!

Now in all seriousness, the major agenda in the summit was over the economy. In this regard, Japan and the other nations face a common source of problems. In particular, Japan has the second largest debt of any nation. To remedy this problem, Japanese tax payers may be forced to shoulder the burden of relieving the national debt. However, as of now, Japanese tax payers pay comparably lower taxes, especially in regards to other industrialized nations.

As of April 2010, Japan’s unemployment rate was around 5%, which is reasonably decent, especially when you compare this with the other G8 countries. This percentage, however, has been disputed by some economists. Part time workers who work less than part time were counted as “employed”, which actually placed the employment rate lower than what it really was.

People are worried about how Japan can continue to sustain its economy. For example, although Japan Airlines is considered one of the largest companies in the world, the company is grappling with a large debt crisis.

Hopefully Japan’s new Prime Minister can figure out what to do!