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The Tuesday Podcast: Why Japan Will Bounce Back

A worker assembles a Lexus car at the Toyota's plant in Miyata City, Fukuoka Prefecture on October 2, 2006.
Ken Shimzu
/
AFP/Getty Images
A worker assembles a Lexus car at the Toyota's plant in Miyata City, Fukuoka Prefecture on October 2, 2006.

The crisis in Japan is a horrible human tragedy. Is it also an economic disaster?

There are big, short-term economic problems. On today's show, a man who works at a major Japanese truck and bus manufacturer describes widespread factory closures and disruptions in the supply of parts.

But in the long-term, for all of the suffering, Japan's economy is likely to bounce back from the disaster.

In a developed economy, it turns out, you can have an earthquake that shifts a country by eight feet, and the economy will barely register it.

Planet Money in person: This Thursday in Brooklyn, Planet Money's Adam Davidson talks with Haitian photographer Sebastien Narcisse. Admission is free. Details here

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