Managing Director Shima Kōsaku - Vol. 4 Ch. 52 - Let Me Go Lover

[MangaDex]

 

[Draugadrottinn]

Thank you for another volume, halfway through the managing director arc. The mangaka was pretty clear about what the rise of China would mean for much of the industrial production in the rest of the world, both in this volume and the former, so 20+ years ago. I guess he kept contact with his old friends in Matsushita.

 

[HCO]

Thanks a lot for the TL, high-effort shit. The mangaka really had his finger on the pulse of happenings, huh. China's GDP today is ~20T (can't really blame him for not being perfect on that one given how opaque the country is from the outside) and Japan's is 4T, a 5x difference.

 

[77BLc9JwJGpLVARkamJx]

Thanks again for the volume drop. Japan can still make it with their high end electronic stuff but they are under the great satan after all, not looking too good with the yen now too. Welp money printing time.

 

[Kewl0210]

Yeah when I was translating this volume and the last few I kept thinking about how they were making these various estimations about the future and how accurate they turned out to be, but also there's various problems like the aging societies and all that that both countries are dealing with. And inevitably you can't totally predict the future based purely on trends. Sometimes there's black swan-type events that through every prediction off.

But as we go forward with this series we see that type of thing again and again and you can always look back on the types of things they say here in retrospect. (Obviously he doesn't stay in China forever but the story does continue to be about economics as he's higher and higher up in th company)

 

[Suben]

Thank you for another volume, halfway through the managing director arc. The mangaka was pretty clear about what the rise of China would mean for much of the industrial production in the rest of the world, both in this volume and the former, so 20+ years ago. I guess he kept contact with his old friends in Matsushita.

Hirokane is very well connected simply because of the nature of the manga he makes. He definitely knows people or is able to talk to people not just at his old company but the wider business and economic world, he has buddies that work in the government bureaucracy (I believe the Foreign Ministry especially). His co-writer for Kaji Ryusuke was Naoki Inose who was the Governor of Tokyo back in 2013 and is currently a member of the House of Councillors. So a lot of what's presented in his works comes from stuff he hears from people who are very deep in the weeds of what's going on.