There can be no permanent substitute from the resources of another nation for the efforts required from the Japanese Government and the Japanese people to meet their own problems. To live as a self-supporting and not a dependent nation Japan must accumulate capital by savings and economy, it must supplement its limited internal resources with materials and products only available from other sources and it must be able to pay for them from expanding exports.
To put it briefly, the national deficit cannot be allowed to increase as production expands.
We have seen a rising production index, accompanied by a large and progressive increase in the amount of U.S. aid. The excess of imports has increased and the gap between imports and exports has substantially widened. The time must come when this national trend is completely reversed.
If individual enterprise continuously has to be subsidized to provide saleable exports, then increasing volume suggests only correspondingly increased deficits.
To meet this problem the way has to be found to convert the dollar of imported materials into more, and not less, than a dollar of exports.
It is the height of folly to point with pride at an increasing production index or increasing exports which may actually represent only increased U.S. aid, increased subsidies and increased deficits. Too much attention is being given merely to raising the totals of production and exports without regard to cast or net results. Too little attention is being given to the need for creating the greatest possible net production and using imported raw materials so as to create the greatest possible amount of net exports.
