The graph bellow shows the difference between the unemployment rates in the US and Japan between March 1993 and March 1999.
As we can see, Japan started nearly 2.5 percent at the beginning of the graph. Meanwhile Americans percentage of the work force started at 7.0 percent. Then, the US unemployment had a slight leap, but after that rates fell dramatically and reached less than 5.5 percent in March 1995. After minor increasing, it continued to decrease with fluctuations. We can see a clear downward trend. Unemployment rate in US reached nearly 4.0 percent in March 1999.
However, Japan that started below 2.5 percent had an upward trend also having fluctuations. It was increasing till March 1996, but then with a slight drop from 3.5 percent to almost 3.0. After that, unemployment rates were sharply increasing, and stabilized reached 3.5 percent in March 1998. Since that time, it rose dramatically, peaked at more than 4.5 percent in March 1999.
