Government-Business Relations and Benefits for Citizen

The success of any national economy in the world is the sum of the successes of the different sectors that make up that economy.

This is because every nation has more than one economic sector which is used for the purposes of enhancing the performance of the national economy. It has been paramount for every government to ensure that there are appropriate measures being put in place ensure that these various sectors of the national economy are performing well to be able to deliver the value needed for developing the nation and ensuring that there is rapid development (AMBA, 2009).

Therefore, in view of this – and given that the manner in which the business environment is able to operate is a key factor in the determination of the performance of economies of nations – it is critical that governments are able to devise models that will ensure that their relationship with businesses is such that benefits are able to be realized for the enjoyment of their citizens.

This paper compares the government-business relations employed in the United States of America and Japan, with a view to establishing the inherent benefits of each of them and so establishing which model is more appropriate owing to its ability to bring more in returns in the form of varied benefits to the country and to its citizens. The main focus will be on the manufacturing sector.

The Role of Government in Business and in Society

There is always an intrinsic relationship between government and business because the two are the main institutions in the society. The actions of one are affective of the other and the actions of the two affect the way the society is viewed.

As such, government – being the main player and coordinator of all affairs in a country – ought to ensure that it is in a position to work well enough to ensure businesses operate in the right way and that whatever is done is for the enhancement of the mutual good of the organization (AMBA, 2009). Governments play a very important role determining the direction of the economy and in influencing the outcomes of the economy.

Among other approaches, the nature of measures like protectionism, currency rate determination and control, free market policies, and the handling of globalization determines how businesses in the country operate and so their eventual outcome. The manufacturing sectors of the United States and Japan – the world’s largest and second largest economies – are very different. The main difference is in the relationship between the government and business.

The government-business approaches in the manufacturing industry come in different ways and vary in each of these countries.

Common policies in the sector have largely covered the areas of grants and subsidies, regulation with the aim of shielding the sector from stiff competition from the external environment especially in the face of widespread globalization of trade as well as other forms of regulation aimed at protecting the public from environmental pollution and other wasteful manufacturing practices; and ensuring that labor issues like employee rights, minimum wage, union autonomy, and work-place safety.

The manufacturing sector is usually a very important sector and is in most cases the main source of the country’s much–needed foreign through its exports (Toshiyuki, Mika & Yusuke, 2010).

Japan and the United States both have booming manufacturing sectors and although the United States has a relatively greater number of industries, Japan has tended to benefit a lot from the industry owing to its approaches to handling business matters (Toshiyuki, Mika & Yusuke, 2010).

The American government has emphasized the need to subsidize its products from the manufacturing sector so as to shield the sector from stiff competition brought about by the influx of other goods from other countries in the age of globalization; as well as to ensure that the consumers benefits from reduced prices.

Subsidies have made the cost of locally produced goods to be lower such that it makes it hard for products from other sectors to be able to compete on a level playing field with the American commodities (Toshiyuki, Mika & Yusuke, 2010). Therefore, although the country might not have a totally regulatory mechanism to check an influx of imports, it uses subsidies to give its products an unfair advantage over other products.