Use this chapter and your own research to answer the following questions. Why might the factors listed below have compounded Japan's macroeconomic problems in its so-called lost decades'? Do Japan's lost decades provides strong evidence for the impotence of conventional and unconventional monetary policy at the zero lower bound?

(a) The refusal to adopt an explicit inflation target.

(b) Tightening monetary policy too soon in the 1990 s.

(c) Banks continuing to lend to firms in severe financial distress in order to avoid recognizing bad loans on their own books (see Chapter 7, Section 7.5.4).