Page 217 - The Drucker Lectures

198 [ The Drucker Lectures

ence is they’ve moved into the computer age. But basically, these
are nineteenth-century banks the way they are run and staffed,
with five times as many people per transaction as is needed—or
maybe seven times as many as well-managed American banks
need. But where would these people go? That is a far more im-
portant question to the Ministry of Finance than the question,
“Is it an efficient bank?”
And so, let me conclude by saying that perhaps the assumptions
we in this country make about Japan are not the right ones. We
assume that the bureaucracy and leadership group is the exception.
No. It is the rule in all developed countries. And don’t accept that
deregulation is good for Japan. Financially: Yes. Economically:
Yes. Socially: Fast deregulation would be very traumatic.

From a speech given to the Pacific Basin Institute at Pomona College.