Japanese Society
Once or before the economic bubble around 1990, it was often said that Japanese households who thought they belonged to the middle class accounted for 90% of all.
At the time the middle class in Japan meant having graduated from high school, college or university, having a regular job or being employed by a reasonable business, that is a big company or their subsidiary or their business contract, living in a standalone house or a modern apartment, owning a car, a color TV and other home electronics, having overseas traveling experiences, etc.
(In 1970, Japan's GDP exceeded that of Germany. Excluding the USSR, Japan was already the second largest economy in the world at the time.)
Anyway Japan has not been class society since the fall of the last samurai regime in the late 19th century and ultimately since the fall of the Empire of Japan at the end of WWII in 1945.
In the samurai dominant Japan farmers accounted for 85% of all the residents though the samurai class accounted for only 7%. And there were only about 130 noble-class houses, including the imperial house, who all lived in Kyoto. Most importantly not only samurais and noblemen but also many farmers could read and write. In the early 19th century the literacy rates of the samurai class and the noble class were both 100%, while even farmers, tradesmen and artisans who could read and write accounted for 50% of all of those non-elite classes.
Between the fall of the samurai regime in 1868 and the fall of the Empire of Japan in 1945, there was the aristocracy in Japan, consisting of traditional noblemen directly subject to the emperor and the new nobility who had been elite samurais before. But now there is no noble class in Japan except the imperial family, since the constitution adopted after WWII denies such a class system in the Japanese society.
So, the all-out democratic social system which has prevailed so thoroughly in the Japanese society after WWII is a key to the Japanese success, though the Empire of Japan had been the leading nation in Asia and one of five militarily strong nations in the world before WWII or even samurai-era Japan had been one of most advanced nations in terms of a literacy rate.
Japan's success in modern academy, science, technology, economy and business has given a great stimulus to Taiwan, South Korea and China. Those countries are also featured by social structure where most of the people belong to the same and the only one class, in addition to tradition of Confucianism and Buddhism.
In this context, East Asia is more democratic than Europe or the EU. Japan has been an equitable society to the similar extent of the US. That is why Japanese businesses can design and manufacture modern and cutting-edge products which can be highly welcomed by US consumers. They share the same view on goods and systems for promotion of a convenient and effective democratic life.
Nonetheless, it is so deeply interesting that once or during WWII Japanese soldiers in the Imperial Army and Navy dared to die fighting bravely without surrender or commit a suicide to avoid dishonor of becoming a prisoner of war. The Empire of Japan and the US were so different before 1945 beyond imagination of people living today, which might be another underlying condition for the Japanese success.
Finally Japan is the first nation in the world that could achieve the industrial revolution among non-Christian and non-European race-based nations without being colonized by any Christian or European race-based nations. Inevitably it is a very unique country in the human history.
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Mar 7:25 For a certain woman, whose young daughter had an unclean spirit, heard of him, and came and fell at his feet:
Mar 7:26 The woman was a Greek, a Syrophenician by nation; and she besought him that he would cast forth the devil out of her daughter.
Mar 7:27 But Jesus said unto her, Let the children first be filled: for it is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it unto the dogs.
Mar 7:28 And she answered and said unto him, Yes, Lord: yet the dogs under the table eat of the children's crumbs.
Mar 7:29 And he said unto her, For this saying go thy way; the devil is gone out of thy daughter.