Passage 37
Japanese firms have achieved the highest levels of
manufacturing efficiency in the world automobile
industry. Some observers of Japan have assumed that
Japanese firms use the same manufacturing equipment
(5) and techniques as United States firms but have bene-
fited from the unique characteristics of Japanese
employees and the Japanese culture. However, if this
were true, then one would expect Japanese auto plants
in the United States to perform no better than factories
(10) run by United States companies. This is not the case,
Japanese-run automobile plants located in the United
States and staffed by local workers have demonstrated
higher levels of productivity when compared with facto-
ries owned by United States companies.
(15)Other observers link high Japanese productivity to
higher levels of capital investment per worker. But a
historical perspective leads to a different conclusion.
When the two top Japanese automobile makers
matched and then doubled United States productivity
(20) levels in the mid-sixties, capital investment per
employee was comparable to that of United States
firms. Furthermore, by the late seventies, the amount of
fixed assets required to produce one vehicle was
roughly equivalent in Japan and in the United States.
(25) Since capital investment was not higher in Japan, it had
to be other factors that led to higher productivity.
A more fruitful explanation may lie with Japanese
production techniques. Japanese automobile producers
did not simply implement conventional processes more