Americans are more concerned by the economic...

Americans are more concerned by the economic threat from Japan than by the military threat from the Soviet Union by a 3-to-1 margin, a new poll indicates.

In the poll for Business Week magazine, 68% of respondents named Japan as the bigger threat to the future of the United States; 22% named the Soviet Union and 10% rated them equal or were not sure.

Sixty-eight percent felt that American companies’ troubles exporting to Japan were partly the result of unfair Japanese barriers, while 57% said American products were too expensive and 38% said they were not as good as Japanese products.

Seventy-nine percent favored requiring that a certain amount of U.S. products be allowed into Japan; 61% favored higher tariffs on imports from Japan; 69% favored a limit on imports from Japan, and 59% favored restricting the flow of technology to Japan.